Blogs from Ronda, Andalusia, Spain, Europe

April 12, 2012- Our hotel stay included breakfast and we were eager to check out the spread. Two items of note were the standard "Pan de tomato" and something we like to call "Pequena Debbie". The tomato bread is a tomato spread that you but onto toast. It tastes similar to brushcetta, and is delicious. We have been trying all different variations on this trip. The other item we discovered this morning was similar to a Little Debbie Swiss Cake Roll, but better. Amy and I split one. After breakfast, we headed out to visit Ronda during the day. Our first stop was the tourist information center. Just as we were walking up, I saw two buses chock full of tourists pull up in front...so I went from a normal pace to hyperspeed in order to ... read more

Rhonda Saturday today and Anna and Linda have very kindly offered to take me to a town called Rhonda which is one of the white villages. These are villages which are painted completely white high up in the mountains. Although we were supposed to leave early due to the amount of walking the previous day we actually left rather late. A fantastically winding road took us up to Rhonda, a drive which lasted about 1 hour and we luckily found a free parking place rather quickly. After a walk down the main shopping street we ended up at the plaza de Toros which is a large and very famous Bull ring where the two main stars are two brothers who have continued the family tradition of bull fighting which goes back centuries. A little past this ... read more

Visiting Ronda was one of the reasons for choosing Fuengirola as a base for these three days. Ronda is situated inland so this meant a drive up and through the range of mountains that act as a backdrop to this picture postcard coastline. The drive in itself was spectacular with views around every corner but unfortunately it was punctuated by groups of oncoming motor cyclists “practising” for the next Moto-GP. The tourists heading our way were more sedate in the way they tackled the task. Added to the mix a local cycle team chose this day and this route for a practice ride. The drive into the town is like any other town, quite unspectacular with the usual industrial and commercial centres. Once the car was parked up for the afternoon in an underground car park ... read more

Arcos is a pretty small place, not that it isn't worth a few days, but we get itchy feet. So yesterday, after breakfast we pointed the car east and did a loop through the beautiful country in Andalucia's interior. The landscape is covered in velvety green right now as the winter wheat comes up and cows and windmills dot the rolling hills. There are some beautiful mountains so we stopped in Bosque, a mountain town where the permits for hiking are distributed, and grabbed a map. We decided on a trail that goes straight up a mountain called Torreon, about 1700 meters high and it was awesome, a great little butt-kicker of a hill. We made it up the 5km in about an hour and a half, through a pygmy forest of some unknown tree that ... read more