The hotel we stayed at was very good value for money - especially as we were only wanting somewhere to wash and sleep. This morning we were up and out of the hotel by just on 8am. Walked up to the bus stop and caught a bus into Toledo and walked down to the gate and bridge across from the ‘mainland’. We then walked back to the square and caught the bus back to the hotel - luckily we managed to get back by 10.40 and so had time to shower before we left. We had to make a few photo stops along the way as we hadn’t been able to get a photo on the entrance when we went in via the bus. My legs were quite tight today and I am sure will be a little like that tomorrow - the hills in and around Toledo are rather steep to say the least. Add to that sitting in the car for another 6 hours certainly doesn’t help arthritic knees. Our driving today saw us take our total driving for 3 days to just over 2000 kms - with another 2 ½ weeks still to go !!!
We had a good trip down to Malaga from Toledo. Gloria got a little confused at times because they have built new roads since the maps which she has loaded and so would occasionally tell us to “Go to nearest road” even though we were on the road already and she would show a picture of us travelling along nothing !!!
Once again, the scenery kept on amazing me. From the barren flats on one side of a hill to the forests on the other side. Then every now and again, you would see a cathedral standing out way above the houses - a very Mediterranean feel along the way with the olive groves and white houses.
We got into Malaga at about 5.15 but it took us a little longer to find the resort as Gloria didn’t recognise the address (she can be quite difficult like that). Anyway, we eventually found the resort - it is too big and too commercial for my liking. Having said that, we went out to try to find a laundry as we have run out of clothes waiting to get to the time share with the laundry - this one is different from others we have stayed at where we have had a washing machine and dryer in the room - this one there is a laundry on the 2nd floor but you have to leave your washing there for them to do and return the following day for the princely sum of 15 euros per load - geez we won’t be able to eat if we get all our washing done here !!!! So, off we went to explore to see if we could find a Laundromat (the lady at reception said you won’t find any where you can do it yourself - you have to leave it and pick it up the next day). We did find one - but we had to leave our washing there - the good thing was it was only 8 euros per load !!!! What a pity we had only taken our ‘have to wash’ pile and not all the washing that needed to be done - we didn’t want to spend all night doing washing so thought that we would only take the absolute necessary pile. Anyway, we can collect it on Tuesday at lunch time so will take whatever we have up until then and get it all done as the people there seemed very nice.
I cannot believe how much like Surfers Paradise this place is - not what I expected at all. I am not sure what I thought it would be like but certainly nothing like it actually is. There are pommies galore - red as lobsters walking around. The tourist strip is just like walking down Cavill Ave except it is a gazilloLn times longer. We had fish and chips and pork chop and chips for dinner tonight - there is no shortage of places to eat / drink and the prices are certainly more reasonable than what we have encountered since arriving in Spain - no doubt thanks to the number of pommie visitors to the area !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
After dinner we decided to have a walk along the beachfront and stopped at a drugstore to get an ice-cream. Al came up to me with a bottle of Amarula and said “Guess how much” “30 ?” “No” “60 ?” “No - you could get 6 bottles for that” - it was 9.80 euros (approx $17 rather than the $30 at home) so he bought a bottle as well as a range of beers for him to try when we have a quiet drink one evening (hopefully before we leave for home !!!!!!)
This morning when I woke Kaitlin up I said tomorrow would be a rest day as we have had a really big week since leaving home last Sunday morning. She sounded very pleased to hear that as we have had quite late nights as then early starts each day. When we got here and were talking about what we were going to do according to what we had wanted to do as well as the suggestions that Ignacio had given us, we realised that we actually don’t have any free days while we are here - the extra two days we took to stop at Toledo (well worth every minute we were there) cut into the time we have here. So we have a day trips to each of the following : Malaga, Marabella and Ronda, Granada, Cordoba and Seville.
Tomorrow we are planning to catch the bus into Malaga - apparently the parking can be a bit of a nightmare so think we will get the bus in and out and just have our walking shoes on for in-between the bus trips - we are hoping this won’t take all day and we can have some free time in the afternoon. Hopefully the trip to Marabella and Ronda also won’t take the whole day as they are a lot closer than the other three. I can’t believe the windy roads that abound in Spain - it doesn’t seem to matter where we are (apart from on the freeway of course) but the roads are always really narrow and really windy. I took a photo in Toledo where they have actually cut away part of the wall to allow side mirrors through the corner !
There are some computers downstairs with an internet connection but no way for me to upload anything so will just send short e-mails and upload the travel diary to our blog when we get home.
http://picasaweb.google.com/kal20m/ToledoMalaga23Sep07
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