Friday, November 13

It is our grandson’s seventh birthday today!  I do miss not being home to celebrate it with him.

I forgot to mention the surprise we had yesterday morning.  We were still in bed, with our balcony door open to enjoy the ocean breezes and the view, when we were shocked to see workmen standing on our balcony!  Remember, we are in a penthouse apartment on the seventh floor!  Turns out they are painting the building.  There was a bit of paint smell yesterday but we thought they would be finished and we could put up with it for one day. Well, today we discover they are putting up more scaffolding, for more painting….

We contact the owner to see what is going on and plan a day trip to Ronda.  The apartment is very nice otherwise.Ronda is one of the Pueblos Blanco, or White Villages that is located about an hour from our Airbnb apartment in Algeciras.   The white villages are fortified hilltop towns and villages that are whitewashed in the Moorish tradition. Ronda sits on a massive rocky cliff and it straddles a deep limestone gorge.  Because it was so heavily fortified and difficult to attack it was one of the last Moorish towns to fall to the Christians in 1485. It is still hard to realize that all this was happening before Columbus even set sail to discover the Americas! There is just so much history here.Ronda’s bullring is one of the oldest and most important bullrings in Spain, built in 1785.  The dream of every matador is to fight here at Ronda.

We sit and have our lunch near the bullring, overlooking this valley below the town.

Then we wander along the cliff top and stop at a view point to take a few photos.
A bit further along at another viewpoint I am a bit horrified to realize we were standing on a balcony like affair hanging out over the gorge.  Look closely and you will see this liitle balcony. It doesn’t look very sturdy to me!The Puente Neuvo, or the New Bridge, was built in the 18th Century, and connects the newer part of town to the oldest area of town.  We walk across it, and of course stop for even more photos. It is an amazing bridge, 120 meters above the river below.

There is a stone staircase of 231 steps down to the river in the Gorge.  I was trying to convince Bob that we should walk down but once we saw this sign we changed our minds.Instead we walk through the old town, popping in and out of the shops to see what we might discover and then head out to find the Puente Viego, or the Old Bridge which was built in 1616.  Today it is a pedestrian bridge and I stop to sit on “The Moor’s Armchair” right in the crook of the hairpin turn on the road to the bridge.

This Old Bridge spans the same gorge as the New Bridge, just in a different place. After crossing the bridge we head up a path towards some terraced viewing platforms and garden areas.Another view of the Old Bridge and the country side beyond the town, and the terraced gardens.This is the New Bridge from the terraced gardens below. Notice the white houses tucked into the cliffs in the shadow of the bridge.We wander through more of the Old Town, and I marvel at some of the places we find cars parked.On the drive home the air is very misty and there is this great example of arial perspective. Check out this link if you aren’t sure what arial perspective is all about. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerial_perspective
My camera has been giving me problems this entire trip.  There is dust inside it that causes the spot visible in the sky in this picture and sometimes the settings just start jumping around and changing all on their own! One time it started taking every picture in triplicate! I am hoping it will keep working until the end of this trip.  Any suggestions for a good camera?  I think I will need to buy myself one for Christmas when I get home.