So, Malaga. I chose it because, when looking at a map of Spain, I saw it was in the South, and South generally equals warmer. As I have since discovered, Seville is actually the hottest city in Europe, but that being said Malaga was not shabby weather-wise. Definitely warmer than Portugal.
But back to business.
First impression of Malaga: not super impressed. Perhaps it was the bad directions provided by my hostel, or the 30 minute walk lugging my heavy backpack from the train station, or the dried out (and frankly quite ugly) riverbed after several cities full of fountains and gorgeous rivers. To follow includes a complete 180 degree shift of opinion in just three days.
I finally made it to the hostel, and set myself up in a coveted bottom bunk before heading out to get an orientation of the neighborhood. It's pretty much the first thing I do when I arrive anywhere; I do a circle around home so I know, of all else fails, I can make it back to square one. So I dawdled a bit befored deciding it was time for some dinner, so I set myself up at a patio table right on the square near my hostel and ordered a selection of croquettes and something called chanquetes, which are fried baby fish. Chanquetes are tasty, but it's basically just fried batter because the fish are so small you can't really taste the flavor. In my humble opinion. Anyway, they're a local delicacy and I can knock it because I've tried it.
Here's the main square in Malaga where I had dinner.
I turned in early the first night, and the next morning considered going on the walking tour, but skipped out in lieu of going to the beach. On the way I found these absolutely stunning garden pathways, and this is when I started thinking, yeah, I like it here.
Then I got to the beach. I wound up spending several hours walking up and down.
It was more than a little windy.
By the time it got around lunchtime, I started heading back. I stopped at a bench to enjoy the ocean for a minute before heading inland and while spacing out heard a British accent say, "are you ok there love?" I never did get his name, but we chatted for a few minutes, and for some reason it sticks in my mind. He came to Spain to teach English, but failed the certification, so he's been stuck trying to figure out where to go from there. Despite all this he had such a positive attitude and faith that the universe would work itself out as long as he maintained good energy about it all. I really do hope everything works out for him.
I wound up stopping to eat near the Picasso museum (which, I'll admit, I didn't get to this trip), where I had the menu of the day. To start I chose a mixed salad, which was exactly what I had been craving. Vegetables are highly underrated. I followed it up with boquerones, which are basically local anchovies that are either marinated in vinegar or fried. I tried the fried first, and here they are.
They were actually pretty tasty. Not a blow your mind kind of meal, but good.
I then trekked back to the hostel (the long way, because, as usual, I got lost) and wound up taking a nap for something like three hours. It was magical.
Woke up just in time for dinner so I wandered back out and ate padron peppers and artichokes with shrimp in a "spicy" sauce (please review my comments on "spicy" food in Europe in my last blog post). I did like the sauce for the artichokes even if it didn't live up to my spicy expectations.
Upon returning to the hostel I walked in to find I had new room mates, a group of five Dutch guys and gals taking a weekend trip away. I liked them instantly. Stephan, Mart, Vincent, Annemarie, and Ingeborg (the names took me at least several hours to really remember). They invited me out with them and we went for pizza; I didn't order any food but did share a bottle of wine. We wound up going back to the hostel after and decided to go on the walking tour in the morning. Before bed Stephan told us really silly bedtime stories to make us laugh, which became a tradition for the remainder of our stay,
The next morning we spent wandering around Malaga with our tour guide, Brian, who was an absolute wealth of information. I learned a boatload of information about Malaga's history, which is pretty amazing overall. When the Catholics came in to reconquer Spain, Malaga took an unbelievable amount of time to fall. It had the location - basically an impenetrable fortress at the top of a hill. Malaga has a couple quirky elements to it as well, take the cathedral for example:
Note the tower on the left, and the unfinished tower on the right. They call it La Manquita, which translates basically to "the amputee" or "the one armed lady." That's right kids, they never finished it because, naturally, someone ran out of money, and now the locals don't want to finish it because they view it as uniquely theirs.
Here are a couple other photos from the tour.
Unfortunately this is too small to see it but there were about a million birds flying over the harbor. It was like an Alfred Hitchcock movie.
The Dutch and I then went towards the beach, taking a lifetime to get there because someone was always stopping to look at something or wander off. But we did eventually make it there, and relaxed until we lost the sunshine.
It was a really nice, relaxing afternoon.
After leaving the beach we decided to head up the fortress to see if we could get some good views of the sunset. It was a bit of a hike but boy, was it worth it!
The bullfighting ring.
It really was a moment, frankly a whole day, I don't think I'll ever forget, with amazing people.
That night we had dinner at another tapas place, and this one was a "order a drink and get a free tapa" kind of place. I was introduced to tinto de verano, which is similar to sangria, but for me at least, less headache inducing. I ordered a few drinks, ate the accompanying tapas, and helped Inge eat a salad that was big enough for three of us to not finish. Several hours later we went out for the pub crawl with our trusty tour guide Brian, which included visits to two bars, two beers, discounts, two shots, and entry to a club. It was an appropriately ridiculous night, where we met lots of people, danced, and drank unnecessary amounts of alcohol. By about 4am we went to bed (with a couple bedtime stories), to get up at 8 to catch our collective airline flights. It was a miserable walk in the rain to the train station (where I got lost, again...), but I made it to the airport to catch a ride to Lisbon. Which almost, almost brings us up to date!
I will write all about Lisbon in the next few days, but suffice to say I've had a lot of fun so far.
That's it for now, signing off.
~Swan
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