Weather news from home yesterday morning was an affirmation of our winter getaway. Wind chill values of -20C! Although we knew an Arctic outflow was coming, it was mild when we left Vancouver on Wednesday. Now we hear from Marianne that we have some frozen pipes at home.
Air France flights were good. We chickened out and upgraded to Premium Economy at the airport and were very happy we did for the 9 hour leg to Paris. A wee glass of champagne to begin the adventure did not hurt.
We were bussed to another area of the Charles de Gaulle airport for our 2 hour flight to Malaga on a much smaller plane, arriving in the early afternoon. We had pre-booked a bike shuttle van to pick us up and were relieved to see both bike boxes and our big hockey bag appear on the baggage carousel and the driver waiting with Jim’s name on a sign. So far so good.
After a short drive along a major highway, we headed down a steep hill towards the sea into a residential area known as Pedregaleio Playa, a beach to the east of town, to our AirBnB.
We couldn’t be happier with our accommodation. It is like a little cottage with its own walled garden though it is part of the owner’s house. Ground floor is always better with our bikes. The garden has lots of interesting tropical plants with the largest cactus I have ever seen. Our street is lined with oranges trees loaded with fruit, the type of oranges for marmalade, not eating. We were greeted by the very nice owner, Eva who speaks excellent English.
The only deficiency is the coffee equipment - a very small French press and a very small electric drip, not quite sufficient for us coffee addicts. So we have improvised with the drip filter and the teapot.
But there is the very friendly resident feline, Kali. Sorry Stanley and Zephyr.
After settling in, we headed out to explore the neighbourhood. Felt good to walk after so much sitting. We are only a few blocks above the beach so soon found ourselves on the long promenade along the Mediterranean. My google search tells me it is 25 km long and it is very wide with bike lanes. We headed east away from town and passed many restaurants, some perhaps closed for the season or until the late dinner time but others busy with people drinking wine and eating grilled seafood. Wood fire grilled sardines on a spit called ‘espetos’ are a traditional dish here and the beach has many little huts with wood fires in elevated metal boats to prepare these. It was a warm afternoon, about 16C and I had to happily shed my jacket, still thinking about the fridgid temps at home. But I can imagine how uncomfortably hot it must be here at other times of the year.
We picked up a few provisions along the way. There are lots of nearby shops in this neighbourhood - Carrefours, bakeries, fruirerias and farmacies. Neither of us were particularly hungry after so much sedentary eating on the plane so we opted for bread, olives, cheese and a very good Spanish red wine provided by our host, eaten on our little patio enjoying the evening light, in a kind of stunned fog that we are actually here. Sunset is about 6:30 - so great to be back in longer days - but sunrise is later too at 8:30 am, perhaps because of the mountains behind us.
After being up for over 24 hours we were beginning to flag, so packed it about 7:30 pm, woke up at 12:30 am, read til 2 am and then slept til almost 8, feeling ready to explore our new world.
We awoke to a cloudy day in Malaga, 14C, cooler than when we arrived. While Jim tackled the somewhat daunting job of putting the bikes back together, I went for a long walk along the seafront.
I was glad of a light down jacket as it was quite windy. The Med was not that blue, probably due to it being overcast and was pretty choppy. The parasurfers were having a great time and there were lots of other people walking, running, biking and using the outdoor exercise equipment in various little parks along the way.
The tropical foliage is wonderful - big palm trees, banana plants, orange and lemon trees, bougainvillea in different colours, bird of paradise, orange trumpet vine and all kinds of succulents and cacti.
The promenade is fantastic, apparently extending for 25 km along the waterfront, a real delight to walk. I could see the port and the main town of Malaga ahead. It would be a long walk but a short bike ride. There are lots of buses too and tickets bought at the tabac shops are very cheap apparently so no need for a car.
In Malaga, among the traditional Spanish architecture there are many “modern” apartment buildings that reflect little of their surroundings, just part of an ongoing development boom that began with Franco on the Costa del Sol. It worries me that our present NDP government seems to be willing to sacrifice thoughtful design and community impacts in their panic to be seen as doing something about housing and I wonder what our landscape will be left with. There are too many examples everywhere of what can result from unfettered development and the coast of the Mediterranean is a perfect example. I was wondering about the potable water supply here as well as we are supplied with bottled water to drink. However, the tap water is apparently fine to drink though 70% of the population uses bottled or filtered water due to taste issues because of it’s hardness and mineral content. Malaga’s tap water comes from two sources. During most of the year it comes from reservoirs but in the summer and during droughts, this is supplemented by desalinated water. Both sources provide safe drinking water. Further, Malaga has a good recycling system - there are large containers for different materials in various street locations - but I read that many people and public places like restaurants don’t recycle adequately. Therefore most plastic ends up in landfills and consequently in the groundwater, rivers and the oceans as micro plastic pollution. Sigh…
In the afternoon, the bikes looking like bikes again, we cycled down to the promenade and towards town. The beachfront is clear of buildings except for the odd restaurant. The other side of the road paralleling the beach is completely developed with stacks of apartment buildings and hotels built up the hills.
We got as far as the big marina, the fabulous coloured glass box of the Pompidou Museum of modern and contemporary art and a beautiful park. Further on is the port.
We could see the promenade continuing but decided to call it a day so we could get home before dark. About 6:30 we headed out again and walked again in the other direction. Although it was a Friday night, there were few people as yet in any of the restaurants even as late as 8 and those that were seems just to be drinking. Dinner in Spain is very late by our standards and rather than eat in touristic isolation, we opted for some good paella and pasta takeout at our local market, and will work up to a late dinner another night. It was fun to see the sardine and fish grilling fires on the beach in front of the restaurants. Manãna!
This featured blog entry was written by Jenniferklm from the blog Cycling in Andalucia.
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