As Marph already said, we spent 16 wonderful days exploring Andalusia, the most Southern province of Spain. We started in Malaga and made a round trip in our rented Ford Fiesta. This blog will focus on the route from Malaga to Seville and the next blog post will focus on the return route from Seville back to Malaga.
First things first, we had 16 days of constant sunshine! Too amazing. It is the most consecutive days of sun we have had since leaving SA a year ago! It was about 18-20ºC everyday except for Granada which had a max of about 11ºC due to snow on the Sierra Nevada mountains. We managed to catch a few rays and have had so many comments on our ‘tan’ since our return to the Netherlands. We were thinking you would probably lose your tan if it was only 20ºC for a few weeks in SA! Lol. It made a really nice change to the 6ºC, epically windy and very wet weather we have been (and still are!) having in the Netherlands. And we still keep being told that it this is unusually warm for this time of year… The other nice thing was the sun sets about an hour later in Southern Spain in the Netherlands which really makes a difference to the day. But it rises at about the same time or so.
Something else that deserves a mention before we get started is driving on the right hand side of the road! Justin did a really great job of getting us around in our little Ford Fiesta rental. Well done Boib! It took a while to adjust to getting in the other side of the car, doing gears with the right hand and remembering to drive on the right hand side of the road! You also need to remember that turning right is easier than turning left etc. Road rules in Spain also seem to be more guidelines, people seemed to do their own thing anyway and also park anywhere. One thing we certainly would not have survived without is our recently acquired GPS. Thanks Kate! Justin did really well to get us around but some narrow roads and too many one-way roads can be problematic! Kate was great except for the few times she mixed up her lefts and rights. But now that we have hired a car and driven around we will be more confident to do it again and maybe around here which will make day or weekend trips much easier =)
Malaga to Seville:
We landed in Malaga quite late on Sunday 19 December 2011 and so decided to spend our first night close by in Torremolinos. After picking up some car snacks the next day we were ready to start exploring! Our first stop was Ronda in the Publeos Blancos region. These are small towns with white-washed houses that were built in the mountains so that people could get away from the bandits that roamed the plains; there was even a bandit’s museum in Ronda!
We headed out for walk around the town after checking into our hotel and were surprised to find everything closed! We thought ok, maybe it’s holidays or things are closed on a Monday. But after 5pm everything opened and the town became alive and very vibey. Our first taste of Siesta time! We did not find Siesta time to be very big when we were in Barcelona and Madrid last March but in the Southern parts of Spain Siesta is very beeg. In every town we visited everything was closed from 2-5pm. So you would think that things opened early in the morning. Nope. Shops only opened at 10am. General opening times were 10am-2pm and 5pm-8:30pm with some variations. We had to learn to plan our day around Siesta time!
Ronda is a lovely quaint old town that bridges a deep valley. Sights include the Puente Nuevo or new bridge and the bull ring. The bridge starts at the very bottom of the valley and goes all the way up to the town, about 100m; an impressive feat of engineering for the early 18th century. Ronda’s bull ring, or Plaza de Toros, is the oldest and first purpose built bull ring in Spain. Although we are not fans of bull fights it was still interesting to walk around the inside of the ring and see the holding pens, the equestrian arena and other livestock areas.
On one of our days in Ronda we did a road trip through some of the other white washes towns. We enjoyed the leather shopping in Ubrique, the views of Gibraltar in Gaucin and being rock rabbits around a ruined Moorish castle in Jimena de la Fronteria. Driving around the narrow streets in these towns is not for the feint hearted! It was really nice driving around the mountain areas and seeing white-washed towns pop up around corners, it is very scenic. We also saw many wild cork trees with the bark stripped off to a certain height and also many wild olive trees. Green olives are a favourite tapas in many areas.
The most cloud we had the whole holiday! Having breakfast on the beach in Torremolinos.
LBJs sharing our crumbs =)
Our little Ford Fiesta Rental! We didn't realise how many windmills Spain has! But we didn't see any of the old style ones like you get in the Netherlands, only the new turbine types. Fortunately we didn't have a lot of wind, only on the last two days.
View of the valley and white-washed houses in Ronda
The Puente Nuevo in Ronda
View of the valley from the top of Puente Nuevo in Ronda
Boibs at Ronda
Bull outside the Plaza de Toros Ronda
Plaza de Toros Ronda
Stairs in the bull ring
Ruined Moorish castle at Jimena de la Fronteria
Typical round Moorish arches in the Mudejar style
From Ronda we headed to Jerez de la Fronteria which is close to Cadiz and is in the Sherry producing area. We stayed at a really nice hotel on a sherry farm or bodega a little out of town. It was so peaceful and quiet and with beautiful landscapes especially with the colours at sunrise or sunset. Jerez was a great place for chilling and reading our books. The restaurant at the hotel was also kewl except for the lack of English… but they tried really hard =)
We drove through to Cadiz and spent the day exploring! Cadiz has a very North African feel with its narrow streets and flat roofed houses. We visited the Cathedral with its golden dome of yellow tiles and enjoyed panoramic views of the city from Torre or Tower de Poniente adjacent to the Cathedral. The rest of the day was spent exploring the narrow streets, walking along the seafront promenade, trying to get into very closed old castles and walking in the parks.
We didn’t explore the town of Jerez that much but we did make a stop at the internationally known Royal Equestrian School. Think university for dressage riders, carriage riders and saddle makers. Since we visited on a Friday we missed the Lipizzaner show which happens on a Tuesday and Thursday. But we did get to watch the training session, check out the leather saddle and equipment studio and walk around the grounds and old manor house. It was a little quiet being holidays & two days before Christmas but one friendly security guy took the two of us around the stables and showed us the tack room. It was really nice of him to show us and be so friendly. We met one of the 5 Spanish horses going to the Olympics in London later this year. Keep an eye out for the Spanish horses in the dressage category!
Bull cut outs dot the country side. As do fields of solar panels.
View of Cadiz Cathedral from the promenade
Bron at the top of Torre de Poniente
View of Cadiz from the tower
Tower bells
Boibs at the top of the tower
From Jerez we moved onto Sevilla! We really enjoyed exploring Seville although we didn’t get to go into too many things since we were there over Christmas and most things either closed early or weren’t open on the 24th, 25th & 26th. We only really had the morning of the 24th to do touristy things. But we really enjoyed exploring the streets of the city. Sights we saw include the Torro del Oro, the Plaza del Toros, Plaza Nueva, Plaza Duque de la Victoria, the Cathedral, the Real Alcazar, Plaza de Espana and the old city walls (our hotel was right by the city walls and we had a view of them from our room). We loved how the Moorish architecture was integrated into the city and many buildings had the round Moorish arches. We also loved the orange trees full or ripe oranges that lined the streets in Seville and in many of the other cities we went to.
We really wanted to go into the Cathedral but it wasn’t open any time we were able to go. We did however hear the bells doing a special peal for Christmas. Wow! Super loud! We did however go into the Real Alcazar which is the old Moorish Palace. We really enjoyed the Real Alcazar! We loved the mix of the different Moorish arches, the running water, the colourful tiles, the fancy carved plaster work everywhere, the fancy ceilings and the excellent use of water, space and light. There was also a massive garden which we explored a bit. It was a little taste of what we expected the Alhambra in Granada to be like so it whet the appetite a little.
On Christmas eve the hotel put on a special dinner for out-of-towners who didn’t have any family around which we went to. It was a really good deal for a 6 course meal including wine and champagne. For starters we were served Iberian cured ham with hard cheese followed by 6 loungostines each (!) and soup. Mains was fish done in a mussel sauce with veg etc. Dessert was a wicked chocolate torte and a big plate of chocolates and other goodies. Was hectic! The barman also kept our glasses well topped up with white wine. We felt like we had a good session of the usual Christmas over feeding =)
Christmas day itself was very quiet. Not much was open but we did have a nice walk through the quiet city. We also enjoyed a seasonal Starbucks coffee, one of the only things that was open, lol.
And on the 26th it was time to move onto Cordoba! Watch this space for the second installment on Southern Spain: Seville to Malaga =)
Seville's Cathedral
Random building in Seville with typical Moorish architecture
Nativity scene in Seville. Most towns we went to were really festive with strings of lights in the streets, Christmas trees, trees made up of lights and the hotels also generally made a lot of effort and had lots of decorations up. Was nice and festive =)
The Real Alcazar
Plaster work and tiles in the Real Alcazar
Some of the gardens at the Real Alcazar
Plaza de Espana
Bron at Plaza de Espana
Orange tree lined streets!
Our favourite pose, chilling in the sun in the park =)
In other news the Netherlands is still as windy and gloomy as when we left. We were back at work on Thursday so it was a nice slow two day week to ease back into things. This week will be way more hectic! Justin had his first cricket practice of the season yesterday and is feeling very stiff today! Lol. So it is back to smelly sweaty cricket gear on the balcony, oh yay. Also Bron’s contract at the TU Delft ends at the end of January but she has been offered another year contract in the same department. The lady who went on maternity leave (Susanne) is back on the 16th of Jan and in Feb we both go to a 4 day week. Yay, can’t wait! =) So that was good news to hear just before we went on holiday. Super glad that we will both still have a job in this current economic climate.
Today, Sunday, we had one of Bron’s work colleagues Marijn and his wife around for lunch and board games. Was a fun afternoon =)
Until next time! Hope you are all well and have a good week!
x
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