Andalusia Spain Adventure Guide

Ralph Waldo Emerson was not a big proponent of travel. He once wrote that people “…run away to other countries because they are not good in their own…” With all respect to the father of Trancendentalism I say bull$#!* Emerson. You got this one wrong. This is what I was thinking as I was standing on the balcony of our place looking out over El Tajo Gorge (pictured above) a few days ago in Ronda while listening to one of my favorite instrumental songs. I was inspired watching a flock of birds dive bomb repeatedly through the gorge with it’s overgrown bluffs and trickling beauty. More felt possible. People had settled this area since at least the neolithic age and Ronda was here in the 6th century BC. That’s over 2500 years of stories.

The draw of this place is still strong as is the need to build great bridges.  Celts, Phoenicians, Romans, and Moors all ruled from this same view.  Hemingway saw an image of fascist sympathizers being thrown from these cliffs when asking For Whom The Bell Tolls.  When Napoleon invaded the peninsula, the spot that I stand was a base for guerrillas and bandits.  What I would say to Emerson is that it’s only really real when you are here.  Hence I might offer a different set of alternative quotes along the lines of: If you seek to understand the world, you must get out and see it.  In order to understand your own country you must spend time outside of it and then return.  In order to understand your identity you must take away all guard rails of your culture and familiar relationships. Strip back reputation and habit, and then see who you are and how you behave anonymously.  

In defense of the father of the American Renaissance, when Emerson wrote this quote he was fed up with the chic trend of educated Americans flocking to Europe for a summer and then coming back and looking down their noses at the simpletons who had never been.  In his time this type of travel would have even more so been about social class and wealth than about making a choice.  In some ways this is still a modern debate as social media showers likes all over the awesomeness of travel while free thinkers and home bodies alike argue that the hype is overblown.  After all an idiot at home is still an idiot abroad.  While travel is no miracle tonic, I still offer that it is an amazing teacher for the curious, the open minded, and the thoughtful.  This recent trip of mine was not some backpacking trip through the middle east alone.  It was 2 weeks by car with family in the golden Van Gogh-esque fields of Andalusia Spain.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, here is a million words on Andalusia in about 2 minutes set to my lame Spanish guitar playing (best fullscreen):

When I set out to plan for this trip, I had envisioned quite a bit of on the fly planning and even working in some travel along with my vacation.  However, I quickly learned that this region is to Europe what the Mayan Riviera is to the USA and Europeans do love their reservations.  Hence, I ended up booking quite a bit more in advance than originally planned lest everything be sold out.  For example, seeing the Alhambra now requires booking at least a month in advance.  Since seeing this Moorish marvel is on my list of adventures, the dude abides.

Malaga

We connected through Casablanca (“here’s looking at you kid”) to Malaga where we started our trip in a giddy sleep deprived delirium wandering the cobbled streets where every alley way was a photo.  We dusted off our very rusty and very Mexican form of Spanish and tried to add a lisp to sound like Spaniards. Then we hit up an awesome Tapas bar.  I was quickly reminded that Spanish wine is amazing and that every bar is a Tapas bar in Spain.  When you order a drink, they bring you a tapa gratis.  While this may be intended to prevent over imbibing, for frugal me it meant “hey if I drink enough I get dinner for free!”  With wine cheaper than coca cola, you may notice a theme of me often holding a glass in the video above.  We saw the Cathedral and the boys got a kick out of our hike up the hill to the Alcazaba and Gibralfaro Castle (above).  Shout out to Millennial Revolution who climbed this same hill.  My 8 year old did it too and all I had to do was bribe him with a frozen lemonade.  

I do love cubism when it refers to painting as opposed to endless work from a cubicle as a way of life.  The Picasso museum was great in this regard and my 10 year old asked me why Picasso always painted bulls, naked women, and roosters.  I also told them that Picasso used to pay for things with sketches late in life when he was super famous.  The kids thought this was amazing and actually tried to pay a dinner check with a drawing to one confused waitress.  With amazing food, walking only streets of old town, and a pretty great beach 5 minutes from downtown Malaga was a blast.  I then picked up a rental car (using my costco credit card free coverage to save over $100 on insurance) and promptly got lost in the maze of one way streets and construction but somehow we escaped Malaga and headed to Frigiliana and the beaches by Nerja.

Frigiliana / Nerja

I kind of suck at sitting on a beach so after about 20 minutes, I searched for snorkel gear, failed, and then started reading Don Quixote.  I had been sitting on this 700 page monster for quite some time and thought that reading it while travelling the same towns that Cervantes wrote about would be pretty awesome.  Nerja was beautiful but very developed and loaded with British expats.  I enjoyed everything in my English breakfast except the beans.  Even tasteless bangers have their charm but why beans?  The water was brisk but totally swim-able.  Before heading up the hill to Nerja, we stopped at a super market where we made numerous mistakes like failing to write down what bakery items were in our bag and not adding a tag to our produce.  The cashier was not impressed.  I was, however, impressed by this rack of hams:

At every meal we ate, ham was somewhere on the menu and iberico bocadillos (salty aged ham sandwiches on fresh bread) are sold everywhere.  Even gas stations sell hot baguettes for your bocadillo craving convenience. Suffice it to say Andalusia loves its ham and iberico is pretty damn tasty.

Frigiliana was simply awesome with it’s laid back charm and tiny 8 foot wide stone paths to get around and we had a laid back evening with other families out and about in the town of 3000.  Followed by a meal with this view:

Weird side note is that we rented an old house while there that I posted about last week a bit.  While I was sitting on the bed reading, the wardrobe door opened on its own and then slowly closed about half way.  Weird I thought.  Later that night I thought I heard one of the kids crying but they were both asleep.  The next day, my lady told me that she kept hearing someone doing dishes downstairs but when she went into the kitchen it was empty, of course.  Not once but repeatedly.  She didn’t sleep all that well and felt uneasy all night.  I slept fine but am glad she didn’t tell me her story until the following day.  I am not really a believer in the paranormal but that doesn’t mean I am not afraid of it jaja.  Those were some strange occurrences.  

Granada

Just before leaving for this trip, a friend of mine (Mr 1500days) mentioned a blog called Bucking-the-Trend by a fellow midwesterner who had lived in Granada for awhile.  I checked it out and it is awesome.  I even hit up Jed for some tips.  Thanks to Jed and check out Bucking The Trend for more on Granada and some Spanish adventures if interested.

Through the magic of Airbnb and hotels, we booked most of our places to stay on this trip.  We had a lot of fun staying in off the beaten track and unique places.  Since we needed beds for 4 and preferably 2 bedrooms, this often proved cheaper than hotels as well.  In Granada, we found a really cool apartment right next to the cathedral with a view of the Alhambra as well:

The Alhambra is considered Granada’s love letter to Moorish culture and it feels like winning to complete another item on my list of adventures by touring this architectural masterwork.  The Alhambra complex is almost a half mile long and covers about 35 acres.  It is almost like an entire ancient city including, a defensive fortress, 30 towers and over a mile of defensive walls.  Inside are palaces, gardens, government administration buildings, a court of law, religious buildings, and even bakeries, kitchens, etc to support all who lived and worked there.  

There is a theme not only in Andalusia but globally where awesome things were built on hills and then conquered repeatedly over centuries by others who added and built on or appropriated the past and leveraged it to show their own present greatness.  The Alhambra is no different.  I guess adding to it is better than destroying it.  Incidentally, Napoleon’s troops tried to blow up the Nasrid palaces of the Alhambra but some wounded hero inside disarmed the bomb.

We approached the Alhambra climbing a hill and entering through the door of justice.  Though this is now the back door, it is the way one would have entered back in the day.  

The gardens of the Generalife are still awesome today and the whole complex echoes with the babble of water and fountains. There are over 5 miles of aqueducts and hydraulics which was an engineering feat for arid Southern Spain.  

The fortress of the Alcazaba delivered amazing views of the city and also gave some insight into what it would have been like to attack or defend this place:

The palaces are an assault of beautiful detail that is impossible to fully take in:  

 The Alhambra is an amazing site and this came through in the visit.  At the same time, it is a greatest hit for many with literally millions of visitors per year.  I found the many many large tour groups to be distracting (partially because I kind of loathe large tours).  Like everyone else, I found myself attempting to time and crop photos to make it seem less crowded than it actually is. 

Some of the most striking views of the Alhambra are from the miradors of the surrounding hills and I wish I had a bit more time to hike around those. I think I love Turkish take away joints just as much as tapas and we hit up many of them on this trip.  We also took in some Flamenco dancing while in Granada:

We stayed right downtown but loved the Sacromonte Gypsy quarter of Granada and just walking around some of the quieter streets away from the louder and more car friendly downtown.  Our last night there, I heard thousands of people singing and decided to get out of bed and do a mini adventure.  What I found a couple blocks away was this:

I have no idea what was happening but my limited Spanish interpreted something about how futbol will never leave Granada and general cheers for victory. Anyone want to enlighten me further?  With that we were off to Iznajar…

What will happen to our heroes for the remainder of this Spanish adventure?  Like some cheesy Batman episode from the 60’s tune in next week for the exciting conclusion of this trip (because I am still jetlagged and did not finish yet). PART 2 HERE