Andalusia 4 -- Sevilla and Ronda

We had to check out of our apartment by 11 so we had a little breakfast, packed up our things, tidied up and decided that we had seen what needed to be seen in Sevilla. 

We felt like we stayed in an Ikea display 

Much to Charles' delight we stopped at Carrefour on our way out of town so that we'd have supplies for lunch.

 Once again, we were amazed by the glorious Andalusian countryside!  We decided to take some back roads to Malaga instead of staying on the main autovias.  Not too far out of town, I spied a lonely castle about 1/2 mile off of the road.  Of course, we had to go explore!  As we drove up, we were so happy to see that the gate was open, inviting us in.

 There were no guard rails attached to the crumbling stairways... Phin looked up at me and said, "I don't think we should be going up there.  I can see about twenty different ways to die!"  He did eventually go up, along with everyone else, but Archie and I stayed safely on the ground.

 Charles claimed it with his red Ikea blanket

 We wound our way through the beautiful hills, catching glimpses of whitewashed villages perched on peaks and nestled in valleys.  In the late afternoon, we stopped in Ronda to get a closer look.

 It's hard to see in these pictures, but there are cave houses built in to the hillsides

 The town has two sides straddled across a gulch

 This "new" bridge was built in 1793.  Ibby and Charles found a little path and went all the way to the bottom of the gorge.  They took some incredible pictures, but I don't have them at the moment.

 Matthew took the boys down into the bridge and then to a guitar store, so that left me with the two older girls.  We chose to visit a palace.

 A lovely doorway on our way

 This palace had many courtyards, gardens, fountains, etc.  It also was the city's museum so it documented history all the way back to 40,000 b.c.  There are skeletal remains and tools from that time period! I love that stuff!  And was happily analyzing timelines and charts while the girls grew a bit impatient with me.

 When we were finished, we browsed through some quaint little shops

 And eventually caught up with the rest of the family for some more views of the countryside and tasting of local delicacies.  We had some delicious almond/cinnamon pastries -- always my favorite.

 The sun was going down as we made our way out of the last curvy hills so we went directly into Malaga to find our next stopping place.  Directly, ha!  We drove in circles for a bit and then Ella and I waited at the apartment to meet the owner while everyone else searched out a parking spot.  Hey!  It's Ikea again!  Fun!  

 We made sandwiches for dinner and then Matthew and I were the only ones who felt like exploring so we had a fun little walk by ourselves.  Isn't Andalusia gorgeous?  We totally want to live there.