Storyline: Winter 2025: Portugal and Spain
Ronda, one of the white towns in Andalucia, is beautiful and dramatic. This small, mountaintop, compact town perched on both sides of the deep Guadalevín River Gorge, has a lot going for it. The old town, dating to Moorish rule, with narrow streets and cobble stones, is on the southern side of the gorge.
The 15th century new town is connected to the old town by a stone bridge, Puente Nuevo (completed in 1793). It looks like band-aid over a dip cut. (Hmm. Looked more like one of those watchamacallits…I know… a BRIDGE! – A.)
Stunning views! Well, if there is a new bridge, there must be an old bridge too. Puente Vieja, completed in 1616 is a pedestrian bridge that connects the two parts of the town.
All this is of course new in historical terms. It is believed that Ronda’s origins date from the Bastuli Celts, who named the place Arunda. Rulers from many origins took turns: Celts, Romans, Moors, Visigoths, Christians.
One can see it in the mix of architectural influences. Orson Welles, Ernest Hemingway and other famous personas are said to had spent many summers as part-time residents of Ronda’s old quarters.
And so, on Jan 21 we boarded a relatively early bus from Sevilla to Ronda, our next (second) Spanish stop. It is about a two and a half hours drive. The bus windows are not clean but we can see the views changing to mountainous ones. The blue skies, the white clouds over the mountain.
I even unknowingly took a photo with a deer in it (just zoom in and look to the lower left quadrant). Our daughter is telling us we should have stayed longer in Ronda. Once in Ronda and we could see why.
In the first post of this storyline, I mentioned the short-tempered bus driver. Seems like many of them were gruff. Not our Ronda bus driver, though. There were two spots for the buses to Ronda. When the bus arrived at one of them, I got in and showed him our tickets. He said (in Spanish of course) that yes this was the bus, but he’d start loading 10 min before departure.
There were many people already lining up. Although we are both far from being judgemental, we both dislike (or should I say hate) the way the Asian tourists just push through everyone. They’d literally bump into you and push you away to get to where the hell they want to be. This theme will come over and over again during our travel. Fortunately for us, most of them were lining up for the other bus, so we started the line in front of ours (the destination sign has gone dark and only I knew it was the right one because I talked to the driver). Next arrives a couple from Toronto. Crazy! Here we are half the world away from home and chatting with a retired couple from our city! They are staying in Seville for 7 weeks and loving it. Going on a day trip to Ronda.
The bus departed at 10am. We had lots of time if we were to wait for our 3pm check-in time. We sat in the front seats designated for the seniors (one can’t book a seat for these buses, but at our age no one contests the seniority. Besides, we were at the front of the queue). We prefer the front seats for two reasons. One, I have a motion sickness, and two we can see from the driver’s window which usually is cleaner than the side windows. Lovely scenery!
Somewhere mid-trip, the road was closed both directions by the police as they were checking every vehicle. Our driver calmly pulled onto the spot the police pointed to and opened the luggage compartment. The sniffer dog went through all of them. Then two of the officers and the dog boarded the bus.
First in Spanish, then in English one of them said “Don’t move, don’t touch the dog”. They asked someone (we couldn’t see since we were told not to move) if they had permit to stay in Spain… The person(s) they were talking to probably showed the documents and policeman was satisfied. The dog sniffed some backpacks, moved to the end of the bus, checking and sniffing and got off from the back door.
Shortly thereafter we were allowed to continue. We had no idea what they were looking for, but they probably had a tip for something or someone.
And so, we arrived at Ronda’s bus station with only a 15 min delay. I have arranged with our hosts to drop the luggage off at the apartment. It was literally 5 min from the bus station. Once in the apartment we were pleasantly surprised to see the apartment was ready for us. Apparently, the previous guest had left early enough and the cleaners prepared it for us. (Unfortunately, we could not return the favour upon our departure, since our train for Cordoba was at 5:21PM.)
With the early check-in we gained a full afternoon to explore the city. They have lovely pedestrian area. And even the narrow streets, where driven on, had some sidewalks. We were in the “new” part of town.
First thing after checking in was to have a bite to eat. We are used to lunch at noon hour and dinner at 6pm. This would give us an advantage of finding a good spot. Looks like the locals eat a bit later. We observed a 2pm crowd peak. Most of the restaurants close at 3pm or 4pm and open again at 8pm or 9pm. Ha, we are in bed by 9 or 10pm… So as in Seville, and many other times and places we’ve been in Spain before, we’d have our main meal for the day (often share the 3-course menu del dia) in the early afternoon and have a light dinner at home.
Our host had given us tons of recommendations including his favourite bars, restaurants, and cafés. We walked downhill to the pedestrian area and saw the first recommended tapas bar. However, the high stools with no backrest were not for our old bodies. Apparently, it was popular since every time we walked by it was very busy. We found a place across from the tapas bar and had our first lunch in Ronda. Nothing special, just some food.
Later that day we’d discover a good and quite busy restaurant for dinner. Las Maravillas. It was on the busy pedestrian and probably tourist area close to the bull ring, so it worked all day. Many others on side streets were closing at 3pm. Yet, even this perhaps overpriced restaurant working all day, was full of locals.
The food was good and even their sangria was decent (see my Seville post about sangria). We had a jug of red and something we think one can only get in Spain. Patatas bravas. For my Canadian readers, think of the Quebec’s poutine but with crisp roasted potatoes and mildly-spiced sauce (they call it salsa here) instead of gravy and cheese curds. The salsa is not always the best and often plentiful as it was in this case, but nevertheless we liked them. (We remember the ones we had in the past in Catalonia, but it was years ago.)
Oh we also love grilled octopus when properly cooked and often have it, if on the menu. We liked this one.
Later I’d ask Alejandro, our host and he’d give us his perspective. With his permission I’ll post it later in perhaps a summary post. Pity we couldn’t meet him. So far he’s been the only host who speaks English. Our Sevillian host Barbara, tried to satisfy our curiosity answering our questions through the Booking site we use. The app translates it to the desired language, but sometimes things get lost in translation.
After lunch we are onto our discovery walk. There were stunning views from Alameda del Tajo. Some of the areas were closed, we assume due to high winds, because the following day with even higher winds most of the park paths were closed. We’d return for the sunset.
Next to the gardens was Plaza de Toros de Ronda, with one of the oldest bullrings in Spain. The bullring works as a museum, but again neither of us is a fan of bull fighting, so we didn’t visit it. Another day we’d have drinks at a bar on a rooftop terrace across the road, just for the vistas, and see the interior from above anyway.
Day two in Ronda we’ll cross the new bridge, and attempt to descend down the valley on the stairs and trail zigzagging the old town side of the gorge. Very strong winds. After crossing the Puente Nuevo and walking towards the stairs, a folded heavy patio umbrella of a restaurant almost hit Alex’s head. It was stopped by a wall, but it was close.
“I love Ronda! Did you go down the steps into the canyon (the water mine) and whisper in the Sala de Secretos?” Alex’s nephew Michael asked when we posted a photo on Facebook. “Shhh” Michael, no we didn’t. Alex’s falling toenails (we think because of his chemo-drugs) and my aching knees gave in before that.
Looking up, we still had to make it back, so we decided on the latter. We read that there was a place from where one could get an elevator down and back up, but it was closed. Nevertheless we did everything else we could.
After we climbed back on the trail (Alex’s phone indicated that we climbed the equivalent of 53 floor that day) it was about time for lunch. We found a sunny patio in the old town and decided to try it. Local cuisine.
And guess what, they had sangria! White for me and red for Alex. It was decent – but also the first time we had to pay by cash. Fortunately, we had exchanged for some Euros in Sevilla. We soaked the sun as much as we could before continuing on the cobble streets through the old town.
Down the hill to Plaza Duquesa de Parcent, by Iglesia de Santa María la Mayor, Santuario de María Auxiliadora, Convento de Santa Isabel de los Ángeles,
downhill to the Arab Baths Archaeological Site,
still downhill towards to Puente San Miguel
from where one could see the stables deep down the gorge.
And then up the hill to the old bridge, Puente Viejo.
One could go up and down the hills for days in this maze of houses perched on rocks or hanging on an honest word over an abyss.
Up the hill from the old bridge, we called it a day.
We were still quite far from our area and limping with sore legs and feet and Alex with bloodied toes.
Next day was a quiet one. A laundry day. We always plan for it to be a few days before departure, since in Europe they use drying racks and one needs time for the laundry to dry.
After breakfast and laundry, with our muscles sore we decided on local discovery. Walked by the train station to plan our departure.
We would have about five hours after checking out to spend somewhere with our suitcases. The seafood restaurant Alejandro recommended looked too small and we were there too early. Nothing here opens at noon unless it’s a café tapas bar. This one opens at 1pm, so we’ll leave it for the following day. But there are other places around. For dinner we again went to Las Maravillas. Had to try the Andalusian ox tail, advertised everywhere and again this place was open all day.
The day before our departure we went for lunch at the seafood restaurant (Cerveceria bar Los Casadores). The owner recommended a course of dishes with the seafood caught in the morning. We were his first clients.
Then came an Asian group. The locals began arriving around 2pm. Our five-course menu was exceptional. We even talked to the owner to find us a table where we could store our maletas (suitcases) on our departure day. There was also a delicious dish of fried eggplants, like chips (French fries), but not that greasy. Nice and crispy.
There was one more thing we wanted to do that day. Hotel Catalonia next to the bullring had a rooftop patio with exceptional views. Coffee for me, scotch for Alex (my annual dram – A) and shared some cakes, enjoying the views.
Ronda cried for us. The day of the departure was rainy. At times it rained heavily. We checked out at noon and walked to the train station. Across from it there was a hotel. We knew one could store luggage at the bus station, next to our accommodation. But dragging even small carry-ons in the rain back and forth didn’t seem convenient. As we walked by, I decided that it wouldn’t hurt to ask the hotel staff if they could keep our luggage for a few hours. What a great idea! Walking to the door I saw a sign that said they can store luggage for 3€ a piece for 24h. That’s that. They also had a café where we could kill some time after lunch.
Then we walked to the restaurant. It was closed however the owner saw us and let us in. Kitchen wasn’t working, but we could have wine. Which we did, waiting for the chef to arrive. It really is a small restaurant, very popular with the locals. As we were inside, the skies opened and it poured. When they were ready, we ordered one dish after another. His fried eggplants were the local Ronda specialty. We liked it the previous day and we asked for them again. Or was it we were reminded of the must have item. It was Saturday. By 2pm the place was jam packed with local families holding prior reservations and many more were turned away at the door. In a lull of the rain, we thanked the owner and took off, allowing for someone else to have lunch. But this was when (if we understood him properly) he said that they only have one seating. They were closing the kitchen at 3pm.
We walked up the street to the hotel café, had some coffee and sweets for Alex, and waited for a dry break close to the departure time. As the rain gave way to a drizzle, we retrieved our suitcases and crossed the street to the train station. Half an hour later we were on board and on our way to Cordoba. Farewell Ronda. We will miss you.
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