My 2006 Trip To Spain

Once again I headed out to Spain for a couple of weeks of work (and play on the weekends and the bits of the evening I didn't work for). I went and did various Stuff, and as per usual took photos.

These photos are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.5 License.

Around Malaga

Malaga is a bit of a mix. The old town is really nice, and has some very beautiful places. Some of the areas around the town where they've planted small gardens are nice too. However, the port is something of a dump, with what you'd guess was the port building actually being derelict and a building near by falling down (or being knocked down...it's hard to tell). Overall, though, I enjoyed my time there.

Looking down the main street - the old town is left of this	Near the port	The port
A boat leaves the port	The main shopping street	The odl town near the cathedral
More of the old town by the cathedral	Curious building near the Picasso museum	Plaza de la Merced
This long grassy track runs through Malaga	Looking over one of the main roads through Malaga

Malaga Cathedral

The Malaga Cathedral is impressive both inside and out. I did have a look around the inside, but photography is forbidden so I've no pictures of that. If you're there, though, it's well worth paying the couple of euros to have a look around. Built on what was the site of a mosque when the Catholic kings entered Spain in the 16th century, it actually never did get finished - it only has a North tower and is known by the locals as "the one-armed".

The tower	Top of the tower	One of the entrance doors
Outside the main body of the cathedral	Another entrance	Closer look at the east side (I think!)

Malaga Castle

The Malaga Castle is in two parts; currently you can't get from one to the other directly. I only saw the one part, which took me quite a while to get round - it's way bigger than any other castle that I've visited in Spain. As you go up you see better and better views over Malaga, some of which I've tried to capture here.

The castle behind a main road	The first statue when you enter	An old Roman theatre
One of the lower towers	One of the many gardens in the castle	Looking along one side of the castle
Walking through the castle	An archway	Looking out to the port
Another of the gardens	A castle tower and the port	Looking over Malaga one way...
...and an other...	...and yet another.	The upper part of the castle that you can't get to from here
A bull fighting ring	Another garden with a chapel at the back	Looking over the city to the cathedral
Another city view...	...and another...	...and yet another.
Scary me wearing a geeky t-shirt. As usual.	More towers	Some nice gardens by the castle
The (closed) walk to the other part of the castle

Walk Torreblanca - Fuengirola

After my day in Malaga I got off the train at Torreblanca and walked the rest of the way back to Fuengirola. Less than an hours walking.

The bull on the hill at Torreblanca	Looking along the Torreblanca coast...	...and again.
Fuengirola port in the distance	A monument along the way	Another monument in Fuengirola
The sun sets, casting a haze	The Fuengirola port building	Looking from Fuengirola back towards Torreblanca

Peurto Banus

An exclusive little town full of expensive restaurants, even more expensive houses and yet more expensive yaughts. Oh, and lots of pretty girls. They probably cost their partners a lot too. ;-)

Expensive boats...	...expensive cars.	Wonder how many million that big boat cost?
Random towerage	One of the many nice, clean streets	The fancy hotel, seen from the beach
Appartments and restaurants	The nicely paved sea front	Just outside of Peurto Banus
Some statues in the town center

Marbella

I visited Marbella a couple of times, once the sea front and the next time a nice park. The sea front didn't do that much for me, but the views up to the hills from the park were nice.

The harbour	Some weird monument thingy	And another one.
The beach	A nice park in the north of Marbella.	The view while I sat eating strawberries with Tore. Mmm...

Peurto Cabopino

This is a nice quiet little place located on the way between Fuengirola and Marbella. It has some pretty big sand dunes that you can walk amongst.

A big sand dune, and the sea in the background	Looking to the west...	...and to the east.
Random tower. No idea what it was for.	The beach	The small port

Walking at Alora

Alora is in the Spanish countryside and, being some way inland, is off the tourist track. Or at least, off most tourist's track. It does give you a much better idea of what life in Spain really looks like though. Also, it's good to know a little Spanish if you go there since English isn't spoken anywhere near as much as it is on the coast (I know a very little bit, but enough to at least have a conversation with the guy at Alora Castle, where I also went, and order some food in the locals bar). There aren't really any signs to tell you where to go either, so you have to make it up a bit. I walked through one part of the village and then found a farm track that seemed to go up a little way into the hills and guessed it might be worth following. It turned out to be a good gamble - I walked a long way along it and it did indeed go quite high, giving some really quite nice views of the surrounding area. The random dogs that wanted to bark at me and in one case come and say hello weren't much bother, though I wasn't so keen when a load of horses decided to charge a fence I was stood on the other side of! Later I went back and to the other part of the village, which is the other side of the train station.

The castle on the hill	Taken from the train station	Another one from by the station
A village I walked through	Looking accross farm land	More farms
The soil is a kinda odd red-ish color, and is like sand.	The track I was wandering along	Some farms - think some dogs ran after me about here!
Looking away from Alora	A load of cactii growing on the hillside	A view on the way back
Looking towards the other part of Alora I'd later visit	A similar shot	Walking towards the town to the other side of the station
Climbing up towards the town center	The town center of Alora. Yup, that's it!	Taken from near the castle
Another view from by the castle	The part of the town I'd been in earlier	Looking over the countryside
The road into Alora and a river

Alora Castle

The castle at Alora is pretty small and takes a good uphill walk to get to, which is fairly tiring in the sun. It also happens to be a place of rest, so I didn't take that many photos out of respect. The best bit is if you carefully climb up some steps into a tower, where you get some wonderful views of the surrounding countryside and the rest of the castle. Anyway, it was worth a look and it didn't cost me anything to look around. When I said I was from England (in the best Spanish I could muster together) the guy who ran the place said something about Tony Blair, though I'm still not sure if it was good or bad. :-)

Walking up towards the castle	One tower, taken from another	A chapel
Inside the castle grounds	Looking down on Alora station	Alora

Fuengirola Zoo, Again

Wanting to satisfy my love of monkeys/chimps, I couldn't do much better than make another trip to the wonderful Fuengirola zoo. I didn't take so many photos of last time, and yes, I did spend a very long time watching the monkeys and chimps. :-)

One tiger goes up to the other...	...and says "wake up", and the other one says "get lost"...	...and so he goes away again.
A parrot	Another parrot	Monkey hanging out
A young monkey - this guy was very bouncy and kept pulling the bigger monkey's tails!	Awww....	"Look at these guys sleeping lazily"
"Guys! Get up!"	Dude, chimps are so cute!	Daddy chimp gives baby chimp a piggy back
Clapping chimp	Jump!	"We're cool 'cus our tails are longer than all the other monkeys!"
Leapord	An orang u tang hanging out...	...and having a little climb.

Walk Torremelinos - Benalmadena

I took a walk from Torremelinos west along the sea front to Benalmadena. The two towns have pretty much merged into one now, so I'm really not sure where the boundary officially is. I only knew I was in Benalmadena because I recognized the beautiful port (which as one resident proudly told me won an award for being the best port in the world). I drank a slush in Benalmadena and wrote my postcards, which was nice, then got slightly lost finding the train station, but got there without too much trouble in the end. I'm still not quite sure which turning I took wrong...

Walking down from Torremelions station	Torremelions beach	A ship with a massive sound system that you could hear from land
Looking towards Benalmadena	Benalmadena port	Benalmadena port and shopping center
Taken inside the shopping center...	...and again.