March 28, 2012

Day 8

Today is our rest day. We stuck with our last plan from yesterday, which had us going to Malaga. It's only a 40 minute drive to downtown from here, so it's the easiest trip we could do anyway. Richard pointed out Paul Allen's big boat in the harbour, and we walked in to the shopping area of downtown and grabbed a couple of tables to start with cafe con leche before going our own way. The pastries looked pretty good so I had some of those as well. 

The plan was to meet back by the carpark at 2pm, it's now 11:30. I left my money for the coffee and headed off on my own. I had a tourist map and wondered how far I could get while still doing some shopping for souvenirs. Got lots of pictures of narrow streets, churches, a roman amphitheatre, and whatever else I felt like pointing my camera at. 

 

 Roman Amphitheatre

Got my intended shopping done, and was on schedule to meet everyone at 2pm. I was pretty thirsty for some beer, but I knew table service wasn't the quickest, so I just headed for the meeting spot. No one was there when I go there, I checked to see if the vehicles were still there, and they were, so I looked for beer.

There was a little cafe right nearby that had self-service beer and food plates. I got in line and was joined by Roxanne who just got there. Beer was 1 euro for a bottle or a draft, and food was 6 euros a plate. We sat down with beer first, then Roxanne got a plate of thinly sliced ham, then we were joined by Heather. I got more beer for us and a plate of breaded and spiced chicken, there still wasn't anyone else there at 2:30. At some point we realized that there was a beer special: bucket of 5 bottles for 3 euros! Roxanne went and got a bucket. Just then most of the others showed up and we shared the beers.

Next up was a drive to a coastal area called Torremolinos. We walked for about an hour on this big empty beach. It occurred to me that the weather today at the beach was the best you could hope for at Queensland beach, and it would be packed there. Here it was like a ghost town. Then the drive back home and a little more relaxation before our planned evening out for dinner in Villenuava del Trabuca, a little town about 7kms away. Some of us had a lot of sun, Heather had a very interesting pattern on her chest from a necklace that she had been wearing, she acted more than a little embarassed about it, but considering the biker tans that most of us will have, hers was more of a novelty than an aberration.

On the way to dinner we stopped at the local bike shop for some more roadie specific shopping. This bike shop is in a guy's garage, has about 20 bikes in it, and everything else behind the counter in his work stand area. Two carloads of us showed up at once and Pepe essentially let us have the run of his shop. We were all behind his counter, pulling jerseys out from under his counters, trying stuff on, handing it around, doing the best we could to find a few deals, or at least find something to buy that wasn't identical to something we could get at our LBS. By the time we were done we probably bought 25% of his clothing stock, and he'd paid his bills for the week.

Taking over Pepe's bike shop

Dinner was in a local restaurant where you ordered drinks at the bar first and had tapas before sitting down for the meal. 

 Tapas and beer

 Appetizers

We had reserved a table, but being Wednesday night we were pretty well the only guests. When it came time to order dinner we needed help from Nathalie, Andy's daughter, as the menu wasn't completely bilingual. Colin, Jamie and I ordered Paella to share, and we ordered a couple of platters of mixed starters. 

 Paella

Real Boar's Head

Needless to say there was wine flowing at the table. There was a lot of food, by God there was a lot of food. Everyone was sharing food from others plate's as they took a while to arrive. We were done eating all we could of Paella before Roxanne and Heather got there dinners at all. Roxanne had wild boar steak and Heather had roast chicken. No one ordered the meatballs made with pig brains... not sure why.

Andy had a little task for us during dinner: Since our little time plaques for his wall needed nicknames for everyone he handed out little pieces of paper and pens to all of us to come up with names. It got going kind of slowly, but as the wine flowed more and more little cards were filled out and stuffed in Andy's box. All to be voted on by best reaction on one of the following nights. Apparently our old nicknames won't do, we need new ones that mean more to people from the current camp.

Rick had taken a collection before dinner to pay for all of our meals and also for Andy, Tracy and Nathalie. He also warned us that Andy would insist on paying his own way. To settle the matter Rick challenged Andy to an arm wrestle; it was hard fought but Rick managed to take Andy down in a show of resounding inevitability - he wore him out.

It was midnight by the time we got back, and I hit the sack. Tomorrow is supposed to be another "flattish" ride, but we'll be climbing Puerto Del Sol which we can time if we want. It is also a general strike day in Spain, so we might see some local riders out, something we haven't seen much of since we've been here. Nothing like another timed climb!