Spain and Beyond

Daily Drena: The car is going to stay parked for a while after this.

In attempt to use up the gas in our car, we took another drive. We tried to check out some ancient ruins, but they closed at 2pm and it was 2:30. Bummer.

http://www.rondatoday.com/6202/acinipo-ruined-roman-city

Instead of returning home with our heads hung low, we made a spur of the moment decision to keep driving and make a big loop. This got us into the tiny town of Setenil, and somehow we found ourselves being funneled down into skinnier and skinnier streets with no way to bail out. We tucked in our mirrors and held on tight, but suddenly came head to head with a(nother!) parade. We had to stop before we ran right into the parade and a passerby gestured and spoke in quick Spanish telling us how we could bail out. The only way out was a 6-point pivot around another car and up a steep street, quickly before the soldiers ran us over. After experiencing the lack of uphill power from before, we had visions of getting swallowed in the parade, drummers pounding at our windows and our car shaking like a cartoon. However, Diego maneuvered expertly and we narrowly escaped, just in the nick of time. Needless to say, after making a huge loop around (out of our way, but safer) to try to make it through the town a second time, we stopped in Setenil to touch solid ground again and let our hearts return to a normal resting state. This town had restaurants built into the huge rocks, using the rocks as a cool overhang for shade.

Later, instead of driving from our B&B to Ronda downtown to watch the sunset from the gorge, we decided to walk again. Much safer that way.

Daily Drena: Adrenaline!

Today we tried to make our car worth its money and drove 45 min through the mountains to a 15k trail (“Salto del Cabrero”, just outside of Grazalema). It was a perfect sunny day and the views were absolutely stunning. Again, multiply the beauty of the photographs by 4 to get a more accurate representation. The trail was surprisingly crowded, with a lot of families hiking out for picnics. It must be a very popular trail for the locals, and really is the first time we’ve seen locals actually do much hiking at all. The parking lot was full, which meant we had to park on a somewhat steep hill, apparently too steep for our little Blacky.

A very nice lady helped us out of our newfound predicament, which consisted of the front of Blacky being two inches from sliding into the neighboring car, on a steep hill when we knew Blacky didn’t have enough juice to go backwards, which is how Blacky got to be two inches from the neighboring car in the first place. Drew (Diego) was pushing, I was gassing it in reverse (although not supposed be driving) and we knew disaster was about to strike. Our savior lady obviously was European and familiar with these tiny engines. Diego utilized some Spanish before they converted to English. She told us to put a rock in front of the wheel, and summoned some guys to help push.

It was an adrenaline-inducing close call and we definitely need to rebuild up our karma after that one. We were very, very lucky we got out of there with two cars intact, although we left some of our tires on the hill. Oh well, it’s just a rental car. 🙂

Later, instead of driving to town for the planned paella trial, we decided to walk. And guess what, we both approved of the paella! Finally, a success with the food!