A City and Beach Vacation

Those are two places that I never imagined Karlo and I would spend our vacation time, but as it turns out, that is mostly what this place is all about. After our visit to the bustling city of Cadiz we spent the next day on our beach. It is still impossible for me to sit still on the beach for more than one hour so we took lots and lots of walks. I’m so impressed with how many barefoot miles I logged. The shore goes on forever and the rocks were so pretty it was like a giant treasure hunt for me. It looked like tiny bits of granite counter top samples washed up on the beach. When the rocks were wet they glistened in so many different colors and were perfectly polished after years and years of waves making them smooth. All I could do was picture them all as jewelry. I can’t lie on the beach more than an hour, but I can hunt for pretty rocks all day long. Good thing I packed light to accommodate for the 5 pounds of rocks that I want to keep!

In the later afternoon we headed up to Fuengirola for dinner. (Or was that considered lunch?) This was another beach side city in Costa del Sol, but really they all sort of start to look the same. From there we headed to a much more unique town called Mijas. This one was on the side of the mountain overlooking the sea. It was beautiful. The views from up there were gorgeous and the village was so quaint. Every building is painted white and stacked one upon the other. The best business in Spain has to be selling white paint! We strolled through the shops just before the sun completely set and the shops closed up for the night.

So after our relaxing “beach day” it was once again time for another city visit. Gulp. We drove 2 hours northeast to Granada. This was another huge city that is considered the gem of Spain’s Moorish heritage. There was way too much to see in one day so we thought we should start at the most famous part, the Alhambra, which is a medieval palace built in the 11th century. According to our guidebook, you need to book tickets to see this place one year in advance (during the high season) so we figured it MUST be good. Since it wasn’t high season we couldn’t miss the opportunity . . .

Well, we will never know just how good it is. It was a nightmare of waiting in line. First we waited 30 minutes in one line only to find out there was a separate line if you wanted to pay by credit card. So we bailed from the first line and went to the credit card line, which was shorter so that was a bonus. Only problem was they didn’t really mean ‘credit card’ but rather ‘debit card’ which we didn’t have. I could see the steam starting to come out of Karlo’s ears despite his very cool exterior. No doubt both of us had dwindling patience.

It was back to the even-longer-now main line for another 30 minutes of waiting until we both decided that nothing on Earth was worth the wait and we split. There went the morning. Uuuugh. But there was more that I wanted to see in the city so we braved another parking garage (crazy, I know) and headed out on foot. I was determined to find the streets that make up “Little Morocco.” This was a labyrinth of narrow alleyways lined with Moroccan shops and tea rooms. It felt exactly like we were really in Morocco. I was not expecting such Arabic influences in Spain. There was no shortage of Arabic writing on signs and even Arabic music on the radio. It was a very unique experience.


We had a nice lunch in the city square, took a short walk past some huge and amazing churches, and headed back to the coast. After the drive through the traffic I needed another beach stroll. We got changed and walked for miles as the sun set. It was so romantic. It went something like this . . . Karlo walking in the water and me 8 feet away, trying to keep drier. Karlo comes up to hug (grab) me and I yell, “No, no! Get away from me. Don’t touch me.” Karlo laughs his evil laugh, trying to pull me towards the water saying, “Don’t you trust me?” and I reply, “Of course I don’t trust you. Don’t be ridiculous.” It just doesn’t get any more romantic than that ;-)

If you would like to see more pictures from these outings, please click here.