James Foster, Curriculum Leader – Geography, reporting on a recent Xaverian College trip for Geography A Level students. 

Year 12 Geography students experience the many fascinating topics they learn about in the classroom in a number of trips as part of their Geography A Level course. The most recent visit was to the Tabernas Desert in southern Spain in October 2024, where the students worked on a ‘living case study’ on the issues created by the local climate of the region. 

Day One:  

Travel days used to be more interesting when our flights were early, and we would be in the Desert in the daylight and have time for an introductory lecture by a retired University professor about the issues with water in the area and the overuse of the aquifer that sits beneath our feet. However, now we arrive in the dark and we are greeted by the ladies of the Cortijos who serve up Paella with gusto and relish, and large portions of the welcoming chicken, vegetable and rice dish are gorged on by the students. This is followed by a meeting at the bar, some scorpion hunting and the customary sorting out of rooms and the beginnings of new friendships amongst the 40 students marshalled well by the likes of Cathrine and Ed, who is here in the capacity of possibly running his own biology trip here in the future, and with that in mind, he went and had a second portion of Paella. The only mishap of the day being Rory who sprayed aftershave in his eyes at the airport and was partially blind for the first part of the flight. 

Day Two: 

As we gathered for breakfast, the sun was breaking over the mountains to bathe the students in warmth. We ate well and made our sandwiches for the day, and soon we were on the coach which was somewhat delayed, firstly by a translation error, and secondly by a road accident, and we arrived at the ‘Plastic City’ somewhat behind schedule but ready to enter the greenhouses under which 33,000 hectares of fruit and vegetables grew including tomatoes, peppers and courgettes, as well as much of the citrus fruit we see on our supermarket shelves. Interestingly, in this greenhouse, some 23 varieties of tomatoes alone are grown in a ‘sustainable way’ and, as Lola discussed at great length her passion for farming, students took notes and posed the occasional question in the heat of greenhouse number 3, as we were introduced to the bees, and parasitic wasps that they buy in to keep the bugs at bay. This was of particular interest to our biology teacher. 

After the talk, the students had a chance to sample fresh produce from the farm including cucumbers, honey, tomatoes and bread. In previous years, the teachers have generally eaten more than the students, but the likes of Oliver Fogget and Frankie Connolly did an excellent job of hoovering up everybody else’s and preventing the teachers from indulging themselves. Oliver Gibson, Divisional Lead at Xaverian, would not have been happy! From there, the students reboarded the bus and we headed for the solar research platform for a guided talk on the research going into how solar energy can hopefully be used to solve our fossil fuel crisis. This was outside and the sun was beating down relentlessly on the students who had already applied copious amounts of SPF30. As they took notes, we were surprised to see Abbie and Oliver not standing next to each other for a change, Alfie shielding his head from the heat, and Eva’s cap getting blown off and landing in the only puddle for a 100 square miles. 

That evening, students were eating courgette soup followed by meatballs and, though tired from the day’s activities, still managed to stay up late enough to see the comet and go searching for scorpions with a blue light well into the late evening, before retiring and falling asleep quickly after the day’s exertions in the heat. 

Day Three:  

Today we visited the water distribution society in Almeria and met the team behind the reuse and re-distribution of the water in the eastern side of the area. They manage to recycle some 75% of the water used in farming, which is reused and redistributed to farms to be held in large reservoirs and used for irrigation. This is a very precise and very costly business which contributes to maintaining an industry that theoretically should not exist. Students took copious notes, however the heat and the talk appeared too much for Lily who slowly drifted into slumber before being nudged to wake up, obviously two nights in a room full of girls was taking its toll on her. 

This was followed by a visit to the University of Almeria to meet up with the lecturers in Anthropology Estafania and Ángeles Arjona Garrido, both of whom are interested in the problems of migrant workers within the area. She and her colleague have worked with me on the publishing of papers on this issue with their research bringing to light a major problem that not only blights this region but many others. Here it is Moroccan migrants, both men and women, who are subjected to inequality and inhumane treatment by employers in the region. Estafania always puts on an interesting lecture and the questions soon came thick and fast with Ed at the forefront as she discussed the segmentation and dualization of the workforce, the problems caused by not being registered and the exploitation of these workers by farmers to inflate their profits. 

The students then spent an hour visiting the University campus and eating lunch before we were told we had to abort our trip to a desalinisation plant. After thinking on our feet, we allowed the students an hour in a local shopping centre, where they could explore the shops before heading back to the centre for yet another nice meal and a night playing pool and darts in the bar. 

Day Four: 

This is genuinely my favourite day of the trip as we now push the students academically well beyond the A Level syllabus. As expected, the students were up to the challenge, and I was pleased to see so many engage with the subject in such an enthusiastic way. 

We started with a walk into the desert to a dormant volcano, where we followed a path to the centre. We stopped to talk about the biodiversity involved to try to understand the past through the discovery of volcanic tuffs and bombs that have sat here undisturbed for up to 11 million years and appreciate the point at which pyroclasts turn to rock (535oC). We then stopped at a ‘Cortijos’ which are old farmhouses, many of which have been abandoned due to rural-urban migration. Students studied the old terraces that were built by hand to grow crops in the arid environment. Finally, we reached the centre of the caldera where the students were left in the baking sun to try to interpret the volcanic behaviour of this long-since dormant volcano.  

After an interesting morning, we hiked back and headed for the small town of San Jose where students were given the chance to spend some time on the beach and enjoy the last daylight hours of their trip. A splash in the Mediterranean was enough for most to cool down, and they also took time out to walk around the stunningly beautiful village in the Cabo de Gata. 

The night rounded off with a fantastic BBQ put on by our hosts, followed by a quiz in the evening warmth on what they had learnt during the week, which became somewhat competitive before students trooped off to their rooms, tired and happy from their exertions of the day. 

This trip has become an unforgettable highlight of their time studying Geography and, for those going on to university, they see it as a window to their future lives. As a department, we enjoy showing them the scope of Geography and some of the fascinating ways people in different regions of the world interpret the some of the unique issues and challenges they face and implement innovative solutions.