Outlying districts of Fuente Álamo: La Pinilla

La Pinilla is in the south-west of the municipality of Fuente Álamo de Murcia

La Pinilla is a small rural district pedanía located in the south-west of the municipality of Fuente Álamo, and is one of the villages which grew up along the route of the old "Camino Real", route between Cartagena and Lorca.

The village was always a farming community and most of the local economy today is based on agriculture, pig and chicken rearing concerns replacing non-irrigated such as olive and almond  growing. Other members of the local community work outside the village, there being very few alternative career paths.

The tale of La Pinilla begins 12 million years ago - various fossils have been found in the area - and there is also some evidence to suggest that there were Roman and Moorish settlements nearby, such as the old Barrio del Fortín. The population suddenly grew in the middle of the twentieth century, when a new area of cooperative housing was built, but a later period of emigration and the re-invention of crop farming in the surrounding area have made La Pinilla the residential agricultural village it is today.

Location of La Pinilla, Fuente Álamo de Murcia

Click for map, La Pinilla, Fuente Álamo, Murcia.

A brief history of La Pinilla

Fossil remains

Many fossils have been found in parts of the area surrounding La Pinilla, such as the Finca de Los Montesinos, El Majar de Gracia and Las Cuestas.

12 million years ago, this area was underwater, and the various strata in which the fossils have been found correspond to coastal, shallow water. Most of the fossils discovered belong to creatures which lived in these waters, and the presence of various types of coral indicates that the water here was very warm at the time.

There is an area near the former railroad (see below) which is particularly rich in fossils, and in case there are any enthusiasts amongst readers, include the following: Ostrea crassissima, Cardium edulus, Strombus Almería and Comus mercatí.

The Romans in La Pinilla

The Romans invaded Cartagena (Carthago Nova) in 209 BC, and set about not only building infrastructure throughout the region, but also setting up trade routes to move the raw materials and natural resources of Spain throughout their vast empire.

Some of the existing trade routes used by the indigenous population and their trading partners were brought under the control of the Empire, and the road linking Carthago Nova, Eliocroca (Lorca) and Cástulo (Jaén) passed directly through La Pinilla. Next time you drive along this road, have a look, yes, it´s straight!

As the centuries passed, the road became the Camino Real between Cartagena and Lorca.

There are Roman remains from the 3^rd century BC scattered in various places along it; El Raal, Fuente Pinilla, Pantaleo, Casas de Egea, Cueva de Pagán and Cabezo del Sordo, and a Roman tombstone has been found near Pantaleo. It is now on display at the Archaeological Museum in Cartagena, and bears an inscription penned by the deceased's sister: "I believe that, his flame having been extinguished so soon, he has been deprived of moments of happiness, but has also been spared bitter memories".

The Moors in La Pinilla

After the 4th century and the departure of the Romans, Cartagena was subjected to a number of invasions, the most permanent being that of the Visigoths. But by the early 8th century Arab invaders from Africa were sweeping across southern Spain and in 713 the pact of Tudmir was signed, which allowed Moorish settlers to take up farming in peace, in co-operation with a negotiated Visigoth Governer for the area.

The Moors became the dominant population by the 9th century.

Some historians believe that the name of the La Pinilla comes from the Arabic "Ben-iella", meaning "daughter of the pact", from which the name of Fuente de la Peniella is  derived ("fuente" means water source or spring). There is no documentation related to the village from the period when it was under Moorish rule, and the evidence of human activity in this time is limited to a few remains in El Fortín, and Cueva Jara and some evidence of fish ponds.

This lack of documentation has led to lots of speculation about the nature and extent of Moorish settlements in the area, but most probably the Moors would have chosen to live close to sources of water and would have built wells, ponds and irrigation ditches. Caves like the Cueva Lara were dug out and turned into little oases in the enormous dry plains.

This area again changed hands in 1243 when it was the subject of another pact, which gave control to the Christian Castilian forces of Prince Alfonso, who later became Alfonso X "El Sabio" (The Wise). There is little information about the area at that time, although it did suffer depopulation following an uprising of the Moors in 1266, and many of them were expelled from the area.

It is known that in the 16^th century the village belonged to the township of Lorca, and was part of the area which began to be repopulated in the Campo de Cartagena. Encouragement was given to those repopulating and revitalizing the countryside in Lorca, Librilla and other neighbouring municipalities, and it is believed that the growth of the village began in the area of El Fortín, where the first church was built. The first documented reference to the church dates from 1748 in the will of one of the inhabitants of the village.

The "villa", as it then was, probably passed into the hands of a rich landowner from Lorca at around this time, and after 1820, when the municipal boundaries of Fuente Álamo were defined, La Pinilla had to wait 26 years before being able to free itself from Lorca and form part of Fuente Álamo. This was a period of bitter arguments with the Town Hall in Mazarrón over the ownership of the Fuente de La Pinilla and the Cabezo de la Calera.

In the early part of the 20^th century, a time of hunger, pestilence and crop failure brought misery to the residents, but as the century progressed there was a period of relative prosperity.

In the 1920s, under the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, a new program to build more infrastructures was begun, and this plan included the construction of a railway line from Cartagena to Totana. The railway promised to end the isolation of La Pinilla and stimulate further growth, but these hopes were dashed when General Berenguer came to power in 1928 and work on the line was halted. Part of the proposed route of the line is still used as a rural track, but otherwise no vestige of the railway remains.  

Public schools were built in the village in 1935, one for girls and another for boys, funded by the Town Hall of Fuente Álamo, but the outbreak of the Civil War in 1936 brought to La Pinilla the same conflicts as in all other areas of Spain, pitting neighbours and even brothers against each other.

Cartagena is close by and it was not unknown for villages nowhere near the city to be hit by stray bombs during the fierce bombardments which took place during the war. Fearful that pilots on unsuccessful bombing raids might release their bombs over the area on their way back from missions, it became commonplace for locals to seek shelter in the caves each night until the raids were over.

After the war ended in 1939 there began a hard post-war period for the residents of La Pinilla, the economic hardships of the period being exacerbated by the residual bitterness felt by supporters of both sides in the struggle.

Some left the town to escape these residual quarrels, some to fight on elsewhere in different causes (such as Miguel Marín, who joined the French resistance) and others simply to start life anew in fresh fields. For those who remained in the village these were two decades of drought, disease, fear, misery and, above all, hunger, and they became a hardy population of farmers, agricultural workers and shopkeepers.

La Pinilla was hooked up to the national grid in 1942, when it became the first village in the area to receive electricity. The installation was carried out by a private company belonging to Joaquín Payá in Cartagena, and one of the streets is still named after him.

Despite this, though, the village remained a very traditional community, with religious affairs very much at the centre of everything that went on, and nothing really changed until the arrival in 1953 of a new priest, Antonio Gómez Ruiz. In the eight years he spent here he introduced a series of forward-thinking changes, including the construction of the church tower in 1957, making it the highest building in the area.

The cemetery was made presentable, trees were planted, a kindergarten was set up, a group of 32 new houses was built and running water was brought to the village (previously it had been necessary to bring drinking water from the other side of the cemetery, more than a kilometre away). Sr Gómez even oversaw the organization of communal trips to the seaside in Isla Plana, where the children escaped from the hardship of their daily existence for a few days every year.

In July 1960 the first telephone in the village was installed in the house of Antonio Madrid, although it was later moved to the bar belonging to Joaquín Barcelona, and in 1968 work was completed on the updating of the area's sewage system.

Today part of the land around the village is still used for dry crops, and some of the inhabitants are employed in local pig and chicken farms. The proximity of Mazarrón, with its growing services sector, and Fuente Álamo with industrial activity offer better work prospects for the younger population, and the village is now mostly residential.

The church of La Pinilla, La iglesia de Nuestra Señora de Montserrat

This little church has a single Latin-crossed nave, with four sections and an adjoining chapel on the side of the epistle. One of the sections is crowned by a hexagonal dome, which in turn is topped with an iron cross.

The main façade faces west, and the wooden door is decorated with geometric patterns. A tiled image of Nuestra Señora de la Luz can be seen in the upper right-hand part, as well as a plaque commemorating the origin of the clock housed in the tower.

The church was originally dedicated to the Virgen de Montserrat, but following the Spanish Civil War, devotion in the village was changed to the Virgen de la Luz, one of the few sculptures which escaped the ravages of the Civil war and which had been hidden throughout by villagers who concealed the image in their home for safety, carved by Sánchez Lozano.

There are also images in the church of San Antonio de Padua and san Ramón Nonatao.

This is the second church one to have been built in La Pinilla: it dates from the 19th century and replaced the first, which was in the El Fortín area.

The tower was added in 1956, and took 5 months and 15 days to build. The local villagers paid for the construction themselves, by seeking donations, and holding small theatrical performances to raise funds. Those who had no money contributed by supplying man power and labour, using their donkeys to lug the building materials required and lift the building materials up to the workers as the tower grew in height.

The church is built on the site of one of the greatest treasures in the area, a freshwater spring. It was restored in January of 2010, the roof being an exact copy of the original. 

Mass is held at 12.30 on Sundays.

One of the newest additions to the village is a sculpture by Murcia artist Antonio Campillo, the figure of  " A Coscaletas" presented to the village by the family of Madrid Conesa (Los Penchos) in 2011. Campillo is one of Murcia's best-loved sculptors and another piece from this same model is in the Parque Escultórico Antonio Campillo in Central Murcia.

Fiestas in La Pinilla

The local fiestas are held at the start of September in honour of the Virgen de la Luz, the patron saint of the village since the middle of the 19^th century, when for reasons unknown she substituted the Virgen de Montserrat.

Social Centre

In the area of La Pinilla known as Las Casas Nuevas is the Plaza de las Eras, where most of the public buildings are grouped together. These include the social centre, and it is in this square that the locals celebrate the events of the village fiestas.

The centre includes a computer room with free internet access, where various courses and workshops are held throughout the year. All cultural events are based around the social centre, and the fiestas are coordinated and organized from here.

Sports facilities are located next to the local primary school, with courts and pitches for football, volleyball and handball. The health centre and a childrens play area are also close by.

Address: Centro Social Plaza La Era s/n

30410 La Pinilla (Fuente Álamo)

Tel: 968 159265

Buying property in La Pinilla

In the first years of the 21st century La Pinilla became extremely popular with British expats, partly due to the presence of the Old Farmhouses estate agency in the area. They were attracted by the many country properties which in the area, many of them reformed, and the area is just a few minutes from the coast and the beaches of Mazarrón. On the other hand, it is still quintessentially Spanish, despite the large expat population of nearby Mazarrón.

The area tends to attract those who like the security of being near an English-speaking area but do not want to be in it and are still seeking rural Spain.

Infrastructure connections are good: Corvera airport is around 30 minutes away by car and it is very close to the AP-7 motorway. 

Hypermarket shopping is available in Cartagena (30 minutes) and there are numerous supermarkets in Fuente Álamo and Mazarrón.

La Pinilla has a bar/restaurant and medical consultorio.

El Calvario and the Vía Crucis of La Pinilla

This is a charming Vía Crucis and walk which is little known outside the immediate village community.

Driving into the village from Las Palas, a hilltop to the south of the village sports a white dome which makes it look a little like a mosque, tucked amongst the trees on the hillside, but driving behind the hunters' bar in the main street then left, there is a track leading up the hillside. This lasts for around a kilometre from the bottom of the track: first the road is open, then as it starts to climb trees line it on the climb up the hill.

The Stations of the Cross

Set up alongside the road are the Stations of the Cross, some damaged by time, but each representing a stage in the Passion of Christ:

Jesus is condemned to death

Jesus accepts the burden of the cross

Jesus falls for the first time

Jesus meets his mother, Mary

Simon helps Jesus to shoulder his burden

The feet of Jesus are washed

Jesus falls for the second time

Jesus urges the daughters of Jerusalemnot to cry for him

Jesus falls for the third time

Jesus is stripped of his garments

Jesus is nailed to the cross

Jesus dies on the cross

Jesus in the arms of his mother

Jesus in the tomb

Jesus arisen

At the top, on the Cumbre del Monte de Los Cabecicos, is the Calvary and a small domed chapel with a figure of the Virgin inside, but what makes the walk so worthwhile are the stunning views out across the surrounding countryside, with the Sierras of Carrascoy and Algarrobo in the background.

During the winter the road can become rutted by rain but by spring it is levelled, ready for the annual Romería at the beginning of May in which the villagers carry the figure of la Virgen de Fátima from the church in the village to the top of the hill. The structure which is here at the moment dates from 1992 and was built to replace a simple wooden cross which had been destroyed during the Civil War.

This is a very calm location close to the developments or resorts of Camposol, Mazarrón Country Club and Condado de Alhama, reached by car in just a few minutes. And once your walk is over, the bar down in the village sells drinks and tapas!