Another day walking around Ronda

Yesterday was the first day in a week where the sun was shining (not raining), so we took a drive into Ronda to get some more photographs. Today, and that also means this long weekend, is also a bank holiday in Andalucia so we needed to get some groceries organized, go to the bank, stuff like that.

First stop was the bank where I flirted in bad Spanish with the lady behind the counter while she deposited some cash into our account. That was fun, harmless, but fun nevertheless. I was even complimented on using Spanish without a dictionary and that gave me a warm glow for the rest of the day. "Quiero deposito es me cuenta, por favor", she brightly smiled at my stumbling Spanish and replied "Cuatrocientos" after she'd counted the money, "Si, Cuatrocientos" said I with a big beaming smile. Gee, banking is so much fun!

Once we actually got into town our first stop was the lottery man. We really want to win lotto, and the Euro-millions is one of the biggest, although this week its only $14.7 million Euros, which for my US based readers is about US$21.5 million. Even so, I could still find ways of spending it, I'd just have to live a little less luxuriously than I would want to.

Lunch came early, siesta is real in this part of Spain so if you want a coffee and something to eat many of the best places close at 2pm. There is a really nice cafe in Ronda called 'Chocolaterie' which is a franchise for a French company. They're famous in these parts for the range of chocolates in the counter, I think they're even mentioned in the Lonely Planet guide. We ordered two "cafe con leche grandes" and a couple of local paninis with ham and cheese. Now I need to describe the bread roll, it was square, about the size of your hand, wonderfully soft but grilled to crunch up the sides, it was a bit oily and had herbs and small pieces of black olive embedded in the dough. Mmmm, just thinking about it making me salivate. Next time I'll take a picture.

Our walk took us along the main shopping precinct towards the bullfighting arena which I still haven't photographed, and then to across Puente Nuevo into the old town which is where we took almost all of our photos. You can check out my latest batch on my Flickr if you like.

The old town of Ronda is built up on one side of the gorge, and the wall and gate you see in the top photo is part of that although most of the old city wall has been pulled down since the reconquest. Walking around Ronda you see snapshots of what historical Ronda would have looked, an old doorway, a cobbled street, part of the castle wall those sorts of things. Over the next few weeks I plan to go into a couple of the museums and get some more history of the city, but to satisfy you for now, the mural you see here shows Ronda as it is now. To the right is the old town, and to the left the new town which is about ten times bigger and where the majority of people live.

The photo you see to the right is one of the little side streets in the old town, very pretty with cobbles and old style houses. Ronda is one of the biggest Pueblos Blancos (white town) and as you can see from this picture they are indeed white-washed, with ornate wrought iron window sills. The brick building you see in the background is one of Ronda's manastaries.