First Week in Almuñécar and Las Alpujarras Feb.11-17

Backtracking  to when we first arrived in Spain. We flew into Malaga ( pop. 560,000 ) and were met at the airport by Chris & Barbara, who took us to lunch for paella at a beach restaurant in Nerja and delivered to our house in Almuñécar. Great hassle free way to start our stay. They always rent a car for the  2-3 months they are here.

Driving anywhere here is great. The foothills of the mountains come right to the coast and you often can see snow covered peaks in the distance. The drive from Malaga to Almuñécar ( pop. 23,000 ) is about 45 min. In that distance there are probably at least 10 tunnels 200 to 800 meters long thru mountains and the same number of viaducts over gorges.

The first outing we had with Chris & Barbara was to Las Alpujarras, a 70 km. stretch of valleys on the southern flank of the Sierra Nevada mountains.This area is comprised of arid hillsides split by deep ravines alternating with oasis like white villages set beside rapid streams and surrounded by gardens, orchards and woodlands.

It was a fantastic hour and a half drive to the villages of Bubión and Pampaneira. We had lunch, the menu del dia (menu of the day which consists of 3 courses with wine and bread, for ~$12). Chris and Barbara have been to many places in their 10-12 years of coming to Spain and know the best places to eat.

Everywhere you look is a postcard. Most of our fabulous photos are on the broken camera. Elaine and I have both read two books borrowed from Barbara by English writers about their experiences living in the Las Alpujarras, one from the 1920's and the other from the 1980's. Interesting to get a perspective on how remote these places were in the past considering it took us an hour and a half to travel 50 km. on narrow but decent roads.

One of the photos below shows the interior roof of a house in the Alpujarras. The roofs were constructed as flat roofs using a method used by the Berbers of Northern Africa. Many of the people who settled in this region were from Africa. What you see is logs covered by flat rocks and then covered with a mortar of some kind and then just small rocks/gravel to finish it off.

Some random observations from our first week:

We fit right in here!!  Most Spaniards have short legs!! If you see someone tall they are probably from northern Europe.

Stores open from 10:00-12:00 and then 4 :00 or 5:00 until 7:00 or 8:00. The streets are empty from 2:00-4:00. People are home or in the restaurants. Those walking around at this time are probably tourists.

Many of the streets in the old town are steep and narrow and do not have car access. You see small dump trucks no longer than our half ton trucks.

The street we are on is narrow . Our neighbor across the street has regular evening conservation with a neighbor on our side of the street from his roof top terrace.

One evening around 9:00 six horses arrived in the street below us while one of the riders went into the restaurant across the lane to come out with a round of beer for all riders.