Blogs from Spain, Europe - page 11

Today we finally get to go on our postponed tour to the Caminito del Rey, the Path of the King… well that’s assuming they’ve fixed the brakes on the bus. And if they haven’t, well our last post was probably just that. We get to the pickup point a few minutes early, but the bus is full, which probably means our pick up’s the last. We run the gauntlet of angry stares to the few spare seats up the back. Fortunately a couple of gents get in several minutes after us, so we’ve now been relegated to only third and fourth on the list of most despised passengers. First stop is the impossibly cute village of Ardales perched on a hillside some sixty kilometres or so north-west of Malaga. The absolute number one rule here would ... read more

Today we’ve decided to get adventurous and catch a bus five kilometres or so east along the coast to the beach at the seaside town (suburb?) of Palo. We’ve got no idea how the public transport system works here so we’re feeling a tad nervous. We join a group of fellow travellers lined up along the kerb next to the bus stop. The bus arrives and we surge towards the door behind other touristy looking types. I don’t know a lot of Spanish, but enough to pick up that the people behind us aren’t happy; it seems we’ve now been branded scum of the earth queue jumpers. Apparently the line along the kerb was locals queuing in an orderly fashion to get on, which it seems was a perfectly good system until the tourists got involved. ... read more

I think jetlag’s got me; I can’t sleep. I start browsing the news and the first article that comes up is about the sighting of an eight metre shark in the waters just off Malaga. The article claims it hasn’t got any teeth, so it’s harmless. … so I clearly am really asleep and this is just one of those nonsensical nightmares. But no, it seems the article is real. Now that that’s clarified at least we can reinstate earlier plans to go to the beach at some stage while we’re here. Toothless sharks … they’re not going to believe that one back in Oz. First stop this morning is the Picasso Museum. We read that the great man was born in Malaga only a couple of hundred metres from where the museum now stands, and ... read more

We’re met outside our central Malaga apartment block by the delightful Carmen. She speaks about as much English as I do Spanish and the conversation is in equal parts both …. so virtually unintelligible to everyone. If she needs us to know anything important …. such as how to get in the front door, or perhaps more importantly how to get out the front door when the building catches fire …. well let’s just hope the building doesn’t catch fire…. She takes us up to our floor in the lift … but what’s this … why doesn’t the key fit in the lock? We prod and poke for several minutes, but it’s not budging. Hmmm. “Maybe the cleaner’s got a better key”, says Carmen, “I’ll give her a call.” We prod and poke some more. Eventually ... read more

1. Picos de Europa When Spanish mariners returned from their early voyages to the Americas, the first sight of land they had from far out to sea was that of the giant mountain summits just behind the northern Spanish coastline of Asturias & Cantabria. They called them ‘Picos de Europa’, and in 1918 became Spain’s first National Park. We were naturally drawn to these mountains, although there was also some anxiety about driving ‘Django’, our new to us, but rather bigger than our previous camper, through the mountain passes. However, we had our trusty guidebooks, and even a ‘Back roads of Spain’ driving tour, what could possibly go wrong? The gateway to the mountains from the East is Potes our first stop, and a visit to a fantastic information centre. The pictures show some of the ... read more