The Rambla de Nogalte in Puerto Lumbreras

The normally dry river bed is used as a car park but has caused several natural disasters in the south-west of Murcia

The geography of Puerto Lumbreras is unusual, and often surprises those visiting the town without any prior knowledge, as running through the centre and effectively cutting it in half is a wide “rambla”, or dry river-bed, known as the Rambla de Nogalte. At least, it’s dry for most of the time, and is actually used as a large free car park at almost all times of the year.

But a “rambla” is not just a river which has run dry: it is also a floodwater run-off channel which has been carved into the landscape over the millennia by rainfall cascading down from the higher ground which lies further inland, and when the clouds gather the locals wisely make sure that both they and their cars are out of the rambla.

On 19th October 1973 one of the autumn cloudbursts which are known in this part of Spain as the “gota fría” affected the mountains of which lie to the north and west of Puerto Lumbreras, and although the rainfall was comparatively light in the town itself within a couple of hours the Rambla was full to overflowing as a flash flood made its way towards the Mediterranean coast. The devastation to farmland and the town itself was horrific, the economic losses amounting to millions, but the figure that stands out in the memory is that no fewer than 85 people lost their lives.

A similar episode of torrential rain in late September 2012 was less dramatic in terms of the loss of human life, but nonetheless 13 people died in the incident which encompassed Almeria, Lorca and Puerto Lumbreras and around 150,000 head of livestock were lost (see videos).

For this reason, when parking in the Rambla prior to taking a stroll around the town, take a quick look to check that no storm clouds are gathering, and that the locals are not hastily removing their vehicles. The Rambla de Nogalte is a convenient spot to leave the car, but the walls which line it are not merely ornamental: they are containing structures, and although for most of the time it is hard to imagine, the height and volume of the rushing torrent during a gota fría episode can make them seem dangerously fragile structures.

The importance of the Rambla de Nogalte in Puerto Lumbreras

All of this begs the question of how and why the town of Puerto Lumbreras came to occupy such an obviously perilous location, but the answer, to a large extent, also lies in the Rambla de Nogalte.

At first the town came into existence when first Moorish and then Christian forces occupied the castle on top of the hill on the western bank of the  Rambla, and the few  intrepid farmers and other settlers clustered around the fortress for security. But the Moors also discovered that underneath the Rambla de Nogalte just to the north of the town centre was an underground water reserve, and found a way of tapping into it. This consisted of the construction of what are still known as the “Cano” and Contracaño”, which are essentially galleries along which the water from this aquifer is channeled. Access to the water is provided by vertical well-like structures which allowed maintenance work to be performed, and these “lamp-holes” are known as “lumbreras”: most accept that this is the origin of the name of the town, such is their importance in its development.

The Rambla de Nogalte: geographical data

The normally dry Rambla de Nogalte is a tributary of the River Guadalentín (also dry for large parts of the year), which itself flows into the River Segura. It runs through the municipalities of Vélez Rubio (in Almería), Puerto Lumbreras and Lorca, starting in the Sierra de las Estancias before crossing Puerto Lumbreras and the Campillo district of Lorca.

In modern times there is no longer a direct connection with the Guadalentín, as the proliferation of agricultural activity has effectively taken over the stretch of the Rambla which runs alongside the Sierra de Almenara to the main road between Lorca and Águilas. After this it reappears, joining the Guadalentín not far to the south-east of La Hoya. 

Click for more information about the Puerto Lumbreras municipality