Hazy distance

I've just crossed the low pass after Alcuescar. Upon reaching the summit another immense landscape opens up to the eye.

The road drops onto a vast plain, which stretches out to the south and on to the horizon, although with the heat and the distance there is no sharp line, instead the limit of sight is simply a blue haze.

There are dark rounded mountains rising up to the left and straight ahead, and the arrow straight road marches south between them.

Knowing this seemingly insurmountable landscape has to be crossed could be depressing, but having seen this time after time you know that by gently plodding on time coverts to distance, and slowly, imperceptibly, the mountains move closer, the plains fall away behind, and this landscape too will be crossed, and the next and the next, and one day, the new horizon that opens up in front will be not mountains and plains, but the blue ocean.