Malaga, Alhambra and Gibraltar
November 2003
So, here we are sitting at table at the Marine Ball with our new good friends, Marty and Larry Doggett, when Anzie pipes up, ” we found this great deal in southern Spain — a condo at the Marriott Beach Marbella, two big bedrooms, separate baths, huge living room-dining room, fully equipped kitchen, health club, indoor-outdoor swimming pool right on the beach. You want to join us?”
Marty shouts an emphatic “Yes!” Larry immediately agrees.
Marty and Larry moved to Dakar from Abidjan, Ivory Coast by way of Washington after embassy personnel were evacuated from Ivory Coast because of the coup d’état. Larry is career foreign service. Marty spent many years working with the Smithsonian. Among other duties she conducted their educational tours to various spots around the globe. In their foreign service they’ve been posted to many spots around the world. Suffice to say, they’re world travelers. Interestingly enough, they met in elementary school in Bangkok, Thailand. Yep, they are second generation foreign service.
We flew from Dakar to Madrid to Malaga, with a stop at 2:00 AM in the Canary Isles, where we must disembark for a one-hour layover (we still can’t figure that one out.) Anyway, if anyone ever asks, “Have you been to the Canaries?”, we can say “Yes”. It just ruined a good sleep.
In Malaga we pick up a rental car, previously reserved, from a guy with a cell phone whose office is a seat in the Arrivals terminal. Despite the inauspicious registration process, the car, a Ford Focus, worked just fine.
We bypassed the sights of Malaga and made our way up into the mountains when it began to rain… hard. Traversing some fairly narrow hairpin turns we passed some exquisite views. Too bad we couldn’t see them because of the heavy rain and fog. Within three hours we arrived at our destination, Ronda. Ronda is an ancient mountain village complete with Roman ruins. The “old” village is separated from the “new” village by a 300ft. deep gorge, which was finally traversed by a bridge only in the late 1800’s.
We arrived at our B&B, EnfrenteArte, in the old village. This lodge is unique in two aspects: architecture and service. Architecturally it reminds one of Escher. Remember the artist who was famous for his optical illusions, including multi-level structures whose stairways ended up on the same level? EnfrenteArte tumbled down the side of the gorge in eight different levels. From the street level lobby the elevator took us up four levels of living quarters. Each room is dedicated to an artist or writer. Ours was the Gauguin suite, painted in azure blue semi-gloss with mango orange trim, complete with paintings by the Tahitian ex-pat himself. Doggetts had the Hemingway suite with a subdued khaki décor and photographs of himself with renowned toreadors. More about bullfighting later.
A courtyard separates the main lodge from another section, which includes a few tower rooms that overlook the gorge and mountains, recreation rooms (pool table!), pool, hot tub, secluded terraces, bars and entertainment areas. This section, which is connected to the main lodge by a series of bridges, staircases and even stepping stones over a pond, descends at least five levels. Thus the Escher connection.
From the lobby you descend two levels — pub, dining room. Everything is self-service. We introduced ourselves to the several kinds of Sherries for which the area is famous. Breakfast is served until noon, with an open kitchen. Lunch is served until 3 PM, after which you can help yourself to whatever is left over in the glass-front fridge. When we arrived at 3 PM we helped ourselves to a variety of cold salads, and made sandwiches from meats and cheeses. It was here we first discovered “lomo carne”, a dry sausage made from smoked pork loin. Delicious!
After a nap we explored the city, in the pouring rain. We hit the first of our many “tapas” bars. Here you interrupt your drinking to nosh on small plates of whatever the restaurant is offering that day. It may include fried squid, octopus, fresh anchovy, sauteed fish roe, boiled snails, ham, sausage …. The list goes on and on. Besides sampling gazpacho wherever we found it, tapas became our main nourishment.
A Brief History of Spanish Cuisine:
We’ve all heard of “paella”, “gazpacho” and “tapas”. It’s the story of their origins that is interesting.
- “Paella” originated in the rice fields of Northern Spain. Paella is a large pan. Rice was cooked and served in this paella into which was also dumped whatever was available — rabbit, snails, veggies. It was lunch for the fieldworkers. As it became more popular it moved to the seacoast, where it became the seafood paella that is so popular today. Oh yeah, Columbus introduced tomatoes and green peppers from the New World. Today you can’t have a paella without these staples.
- “Gazpacho”: The Roman soldiers always traveled with their own supplies of olive oil, garlic and salt. When they stopped for a meal, they would mash up any local bread they could find with their other ingredients, along with water, to make a mush. It wasn’t until old C. Columbus came along with his tomatoes and peppers that gazpacho came to be as we know it.
- “Tapas” comes from the word “tapar”, to cover. Way back when the tavern keepers often covered the wine glasses with small saucers to keep out the fruit flies. One of the more enterprising wives of an owner decided that she would put those saucers to good use by serving small portions of various hors d’oeuvres. Fairly soon the taverns began to compete with each other based upon the quality of their tapas. Today you will groups moving from one bar to another on a planned “tapas circuit”.
Anyway, that’s the history according to Anzie … and we’re stickin’ to it.
Welcome to Ronda:
Ronda is known as the spiritual birthplace of bullfighting. Pedro Romero, a local boy and the founding father of bullfighting in the late 1700’s, supposedly killed 6000 bulls. We visited to Bullfighting Museum, which is attached to the Arena. The museum describes the history of bullfighting, harking back to the Minoan and Roman times. They used to let several bulls free in the town square and allow those less intrepid townsmen have at them with whatever weapons came to hand. It also features the more famous toreadors – Dominguin, Ordoňez and several Romeros.
We walked down the block to a beautiful church, Santa Ana. We arrived just at the start of service, so we stayed. I felt a few “quells” upon hearing Latin — strictly nostalgia from my childhood days as altar and choir boy at St. Patrick’s. I’m still a recovering Catholic, and always will be.
Regretfully the bullfighting season was past. I was looking forward to meeting up with a bull — preferably a small, timid, “Ferdinand” – type. However, having experienced a bull’s horns up close and personal during the running of the bulls in Pamplona way back in the ’60’s, and consequently becoming an aficionado of the sport, I was happy to tour behind the scenes of the arena.
We then adjourned to an adjacent restaurant, El Escudero. Commanding an excellent view of the gorge and not-so-distant mountains, it was one of our culinary “finds”. I savored grilled baby octopus atop a goat cheese risotto. Companions had gazpacho (excellent!) and stuffed eggplant (also excellent!)
Service was professional.
After lunch we began our descent back to the beach. We passed through several villages of brilliant white houses topped with terra cotta or earth tone tiles. Each begged a closer look. We could have spent a week just touring these mountain towns, but, alas, another time.
Three hours later we arrived back on the coast AutoRoute, and civilization. And such an over-abundance of civilization it is. Condo developments stretch, cheek by jowl, from the beach up into the mountains. Billboards, in English, beckon you to check out this or that beach or golf complex (over 70 golf courses!). There doesn’t appear to be a bare foot of beachfront property from Malaga fifty miles south. And yet, construction still runs at a furious pace. Spain’s national bird should indeed be the construction crane. We discover that Costa del Sol is a favorite vacation and retirement spot for Europeans, Brits especially.
We arrive at our destination, Marriott Marbella Beach. It’s everything we expected, no surprises. Probably 100 condo units in five strings stretch perpendicular to the beach, complete with underground parking. Our ground floor unit overlooked a swimming pool and well-manicured gardens. Aside from some Spanish architectural accents, I’m sure it looks like Marriott developments the world over. We toured the grounds, bought some supplies in the over-priced grocery, and ended up in the bar for drinks and tapas, again. We adjourned to our home to begin what was to be a marathon “Hearts” competition.
The next four days I will highlight:
Monday: Walking tour of Old Marbella.
Every turn lures you further. Plenty of cute boutiques. One great tapas bar, “Antiqua Marbella”, off the Plaza Naranjos. They won our gazpacho competition! Shopped at Super Sol, a supermarket. Bought crudités, including capers the size of olives, plus pasta. Home for crudités, pasta and Hearts.
Tuesday: Granada
Stopped at a truck stop for breakfast along the route. Sure enough the bar is open, and Anzie strikes up a conversation with a couple of old farmers who are knocking back shots of homemade liqueur, which is the house specialty. They give her a couple of samples, which I share. I then buy them back replacements, as a courtesy. I’m sure we could have spent the whole morning there. In any case we departed, our attitudes well adjusted.
We arrive at Alhambra — the castle to beat all castles. This humongous castle/garden complex was begun in the 7th century by the Moors and was completed by the English in the 17th century. The Moorish influence is so evident in the intricately Byzantine decoration in plaster, wood and leather. The sophistication of the water system that feeds the many fountains and reflecting pools is amazing, considering its age. The gardens are Versailles-like in their geometric precision. Yet their multi-level divisions, combined with some cozy pavilions, render them much more intimate.
Figure three hours for a complete walking tour. Be sure to rent an audiophone.
Well worth the trip!
Home for a dinner of tapas, followed by Hearts.
Wednesday: Toured old Malaga.
Visited Picasso Museum. Recently opened because Pablo spent his first 14 years in Malaga. All of the works on display are gifts from Picasso’s relatives. In evidence were plenty of his flounder women, with both eyes on the same side of the head. Either he didn’t give away his best stuff or his relatives were reluctant to relinquish his best. Either way we had seen much better Picassos elsewhere. However, some works from his early teens really stamp him as a prodigy. He was so prolific that his pieces could fill a Picasso museum, should there be one established, on every continent. There are already two that we know of in France alone.
Visited a real bodega. This is an ancient wine-tasting concern. One long zinc-covered bar separates the patrons from the white-coated sommeliers. Behind them is arranged an impressive array of large wooden wine barrels, each labeled with the contents. These are “Malaga” wines, which are not really wines at all. The whites are sherries; the reds are ports.
We entered the bodega as complete innocents. We didn’t know one wine from the other. After several samples at $.60 each we left better educated, if a bit tipsy.
We learned that the white is called “vino fino”. The standard is “dulce”. The “seco” is less sweet. We set up five different whites and arranged them by color. Sure enough, the lighter the color, the dryer the taste.
Thursday:
Larry and Marty took a health day – hit the Health Club; played tennis; walked on the beach; read.
Anzie and I returned to Old Malaga. Toured a museum of musical instruments. Shopped. Hit a couple of tapas bars. Revisited the bodega. Filled our liter water bottle with half “dulce”, half “seco” for about $2.00.
Friday: Gibraltar.
Less than two hours from Marbella. The first sight of The Rock in the distance is impressive! We elected to drive over the border into Gibraltar, which is a British colony. Bad idea! Takes forever and parking is expensive. Best to park on the Spanish side and take a bus.
Gibraltar is one huge shopping mall. Hundreds of stores line the pedestrian-only main street, including Marks and Spencers. Even though everything’s tax-free, prices didn’t seem to be all that low. The advantage is that we could find merchandise that doesn’t exist in West Africa — like horseradish, chutney, lamb’s wool sweaters, studs for my tux shirt, a 220V toaster.
Enough about shopping. We took a guided tour of The Rock. Inside it are 50 miles of tunnels. Included is a fully equipped hospital, which was built for WWII, but never used. We visited a cavern, complete with stalactites and stalagmites, plus a huge amphitheater, which is used for concerts. Probably seats 400 people. The acoustics were fantastic!
In the 1700’s the Brits defended The Rock against the Spaniards. We could still see the equipment they used to pull cannon up the steep sides of the rock. Word has it that Spain is still chafing to acquire this strategic spot.
Our guide, Pepi, is a Gibraltarian. He drove us in a minivan. Glad he was driving. At one point we traversed a spine that was only wide enough for the van, with a 1000 ft. drop on either side.
Further on we came upon a family of the legendary tail-less apes. Legend has it that the British will lose control of Gibraltar when the apes leave The Rock. These apes are frisky. They climb all over the vehicles. One jumped on a tourist’s head and shoulders. The guy didn’t panic, which was good. Apparently the apes can do some damage, if threatened.
From the top of The Rock, we could see the coast of Africa only 9 miles away. Serious studies are underway to dig a tunnel between the two coastlines ala the “Chunnel”.
Back to Marbella for dinner at the “Fuego Lento”. We shared an excellent chateaubriand. Also bought Christmas tree ornaments.
Saturday: Mijas
We visited another pretty mountain village – Mijas. It’s perched on a mountainside with a panoramic view up and down the Costa del Sol. Picturesque narrow streets bordered with connected row houses, each with a flowerpot at exactly the same height on the wall, sprouting a geranium. Plenty of photo ops. On our promenade we had an occasional peek through open doors that revealed how these houses cascaded down the mountainside in different levels.
Discovered a great little restaurant with two names: “Bar Corro” and “Alarcon”. Great tapas including an extraordinary fried eggplant served with honey.
Ended up the day on the front terrace of “Le Papillon” restaurant to watch the sunset just down the beach from our digs. It was so clear that we could see the silhouettes of Gibraltar and the African coast of Tangier. Sundowners, a light dinner and to bed.
Sunday: Malaga-Madrid-Dakar
Nothing special about our trip home except meeting Pierre du Jardin, Dean of Suffolk U., in the Madrid airport.
Looking back at our trip to Spain, I realize that my perspective has changed radically. After Africa, Spain pales by comparison. Upon reading this missive you will note that, unlike our forays into Africa, we didn’t have many memorable “people experiences”. We saw “things”. Face it, Spain is Western Europe. Costa del Sol isn’t that much different from the French or Italian Riviera, except that more English is spoken. I hate to sound jaded. I try to maintain my sense of wonderment. But I will look upon our trip to Spain as a “nice” vacation, even somewhat memorable. However, I look forward to exploring more of this vast and diverse African continent, where every day is a wonderment.
Maybe if I had found a bull to fight my attitude would be different.
A la prochaine and our very best wishes to you and yours for the coming New Year.
Chuck
