Mijas

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Granada and Costa del Sol

This morning we woke up early, even earlier than the alarm. For some reason we were up at 6:15AM rested and ready to go. Another buffet breakfast greeted us. I had some trouble last night with the WiFi so I was not able to publish the blog. I continued to have issues this morning so I am afraid the blog was late today. To those of you who were waiting I am sorry for the delay!

We had a short bus ride to the Alhambra (red castle) built by the moors in the 1500’s and virtually destroyed by Napoleon in the 1800’s. This was a citadel or fortified city where the ruling Sultans ruled their Spanish domain. We toured the sultan’s palace, the Harem (which means forbidden) and the summer palace high up on the hill. This city supported a population of 2000 inside the walls and a population of 35,000 outside the fortifications. Most of the area was originally fruit and vegetable gardens designed to feed the Citadel, but today it was converted into a British Garden complete with flowers and walking paths surrounded by bushes in a maze like pattern. Unlike the last time Cathy and I were here 5 years ago, the weather was a very comfortable 75 and dry. The breeze was blowing making this a very pleasant 3 hour tour.

After this tour we were back on the bus for the 15 minute ride into downtown Granada. Here we were given FREE TIME to shop or dine, we chose dining. We walked a little ways and found a real nice quiet and secluded outside Café. We sat down and ordered drinks (beer for me water for all) and studied the menu.

It seemed they had a daily special for 11 euro. You could get a choice of pasta, salads, or soup followed by a choice of chicken, meat, pasta or pizza. We assumed smaller portions as this all for 11 euro seemed to be a great bargain.

Rick and I had pasta (bolognaise for me carbonera for him) while Cathy and Alla enjoyed a healthy salad. We all asked the size of the pizza and were assured by our waiter it was small, Well he was wrong. Rick and I had a very nice helping of pasta while Cathy and Alla had a huge mixed green salad. The waiter then brought our four 9 inch pizzas, one for each of us!

Needless to say we could not eat it all and when we were sated we still had enough left over to make two full pizzas! We did notice a homeless man outside near our bus pick up spot so we offered him our spoils which he graciously accepted.

Back to the now for the 1.5 hour ride to the Costa del Sol (coast of the sun) and our beach adventure.

The drive to Costa del Sol was another time to take a nap, so I did! We arrived at the hotel on time but not without hassles. It seems that this hotel was less than prepared for our arrival. Our tour director, Bozo, called in advance as always but when we arrived it was mass confusion. It seems that the hotel required each guest to surrender their passports! This was the first time we saw this in Spain. The hotel staff was insistent but not prepared to process all our passports so it took an inordinate amount of time to check in….about 45 minutes.

We got into the room and our A/C would not turn on. Rick had a problem with the A/C and also the toilet! Things did not start out well. Bozo and I then Bozo again all argued with the front desk who finally fixed our issues.

We did have some time to walk on the beach and swim in the pool. The beach sand was hot and the water was very cold, as Chris and I learned 5 years ago. I sat around the pool and had a few beers while the rest of the folks got rested then got ready for our trip tonight to the white city.

Mijas, aka the white city, was beautiful. This hill top town is truly painted white everywhere and has been for the last 1000 years! The town is now devoted to tourists with high quality restaurants, leather goods and of course jewelry.

We toured the town then had free time to shop and explore. I was able to buy a really nice Espana shirt for Chris and Rick bought several items for his friends. It was beautiful weather and the panorama was amazing. On the whole it was a fun excursion, but not a harbinger of what came next!

We then drove to a fish restaurant right on the beach. This was the same place we stopped 5 years ago when we were last in Spain. The food then, as now was fantastic. We started with grilled sardines, then small clams (Chris I am sure can remember these), then calamari and fried mullet, next came roaster peppers and salad all this BEFORE the main course of fresh salted sea bass! All the wine and Sangria you wanted and topped off with dessert. We were serenaded by guitar and laughed and joked the whole evening.

Since Cathy and I were familiar with the area and the nice shopping we asked Bozo how far was it if we walked back to the hotel. He said “two or three kilometers” a nice walk after a nice dinner. He was wrong!

We started out happily enough, strolling down the boardwalk and stopping for photos and buying from street vendors (I was able to buy 2 Mont Blanc pens for 30 euro!). We walked about 2 kilometers and did not seem to be any closer to the area of our hotel. It was now 10:30 and we continued to walk. And walk and walk and walk. Now it was 10:45 and the boardwalk ended and there was darkness all about. The Mediterranean was ahead of us and the road turned to the left. We had no choice but to follow.

We decided to hail a cab but by this time there were none, nor was there any sidewalk! We followed the road and continued to walk. Good thing we had Rick as he has a great sense of direction and through his guidance we finally arrived home at midnight! The entire 2 kilometer walk was actually 5.5 MILES.

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Photos

Mijas
Center of town

Costa del Sol
dining on the beach