Ronda

It's been HOT lately in Madrid.  We've been watching a lot of World Cup games, I've been having frequent  Spanish lessons, and we've been doing our best to avoid doing anything in the heat of the day, much like the rest of the country.  Lucky for me, I have a few amazing friends who have offered to have me over to hang out at their pools in the afternoon sometimes, and I've been diligently working on my tan :)

I just looked at the calendar to help get you (and me) into the right mindset for when we visited this town, and I honestly can't believe it was May 22nd when we were there.  Brian had a 3 day weekend, so we decided to head down to the southern coast for a few days to hang out at the beach and explore a bit.

It took us about 7 hours to drive to our hotel, so that night we laid low in our super awesome suite, sitting on the balcony & sipping some wine.  I really hit it off with the lady behind the desk, and she upgraded us to a "ocean view suite."  I looked at the normal rates for this room (550 Euros) and we only paid a fraction of that price.  Here's a couple photos of our weekend retreat location:

(By the way, I there was no view of the ocean - maybe like 1/2 a mile away we saw a glimmer, but we weren't going to complain!)

Those of you who know us, know that we're not really sit on the beach all day long kind of people.  We like to be at least a little bit active before we feel like we've deserved our rewards of good food and drink.  So, Saturday morning, we went driving into the mountains to visit Ronda, a small hill town.  The first bullring ever built was in Ronda, and we went on an excellent self guided tour.

The bullring in it's entirety, all the way around.

The large holding pen where the bulls hang out before their big performance.  Can you find Brian?

After the bulls hang out in the large holding space, and get all good and grumpy for being in the hot hot sun with a bunch of ugly, sweaty, nasty smelling other bulls, they're led down this series of shafts to the main arena.

Underneath the seats, they had a museum to the bullfighters & bulls - costumes, paintings, photographs, and here, you see a very cool drawing/sculpture of a bullfight occurring, with posters from previous year's bullfighting festivals in the background.  I picked up a couple of posters I hope to frame later...

Thank goodness no rushing bulls were coming my way...

Spectators can buy seats in the sun or in the shade - these in the shade would be much more expensive!

Sweet detailing on the columns.  Extra points:  What style of columns are these?

Another main entry gate into the ring.

My guy contemplating a future in bullfighting in case that John Deere thing doesn't work out for him...

We have yet to see an actual bullfight - in Madrid, they all happen in May, around the San Isidro holiday, which I posted about before this.  Hopefully we'll get to experience this piece of Spanish culture before we need to return to the US.

The city of Ronda also has some stunning views.  Do you see the people out on the viewing platform?

There is this huge bridge connecting the two sides of town - it used to be used as a prison, and people would be thrown from that center door as their punishment for crimes committed.

I don't think I'd want to be thrown from up here.

Ronda is known as one of the White Hill Towns, you can see how all of the houses show why the city has that name!  It's deep in the south, so it gets HOT here, and they have to do whatever they can to stay cool!

One last look at the lovely Ronda... And then we went to lunch & then the beach :)

What post would be complete without a little food...from our beachside restaurant?

Clockwise from top left: What we affectionately call Bienmesabe (it tastes good to me) A marinated, fried white fish that is probably one of our very favorite dishes in Spain; clams; Rosada fish; Kate attempting to eat the tiny clams.

Here's the crazy thing about the southern coast - it has been invaded by Brits.  Seriously.  Our hotel was absolutely chock full of British people.  There was an authentic british pub next to our hotel that we ate at one night.  To redeem ourselves and get back our Spanish flair, we spent the next day in Tarifa, the southernmost point in Spain, and even in Europe for that matter.  More photos on that in the next post.  I have to keep you coming back for more, right?