Today is a day off from the sightseeing momentum. Enjoying a day by the seaside in Nerja. We are in a quirky campsite, well established with fruit trees etc and with well separated pitches. We are camped under an avocado tree and managed to get a free windfall this afternoon when we returned!
We are a 5 min walk to the beach, so headed down there this morning for our dog walk. Dogs are sadly not allowed and there was not the usual critical mass of local dog walkers flouting the ban to allow us to join in.
We spent the morning lounging on deck chairs by the van having breakfast and trying to do some forward trip planning and booking. We are still waiting on the results of Lizzy’s tissue sample following her mole / spot removal over a week ago. We managed to avoid going back to Quarteira in Portugal just for stitches to be checked after sending photos by email. We now need confirmation if there was any malignancy in the tissue removal that it has all been removed. If not we will need to return, so we do not want to head any further East until we know.
We headed into Nerja at lunchtime, we had seen a couple of horses riding up the road behind us with the riders in traditional dress. We wondered what was occurring only to find there was a fiesta in Nerja today and if we head in now we should see it. We walked along the beach until we hit some shade for the dogs and headed toward the centre. There we found a very long queue of floats and hundreds of locals dressed up for the procession but no horses. There was big crowd, all the women in variations of flamenco dress. Everyone was in groups chatting and having fun. The music was thumping. We had clearly found the party. There was great family atmosphere as all generations were involved and enjoying the event.
We managed to fight our way through to visit the famed Balcón de Europa and enjoy to fabulous views but it was hectic everywhere. The sun was getting warm and Lola was ready for some shade so we dived into a tapas bar so we could have a late lunch. The only spaces were in the sun, but provided shade under the table. We thought we could bear the heat better than the dogs, so they stretched out under the shade of the table.
We managed to order an impressive grilled fish combo and some tapas starters. However, they were obviously very stretched after the fete. Food eventually arrived but by now we were feeling the heat and eating quickly to get away.
We paid up and decided to get a beer part way back to break up the walk in the sun. We got into a very typical British Costa del Sol bar called The Ship. The name of our old local. We were soon chatting to the lovely Irish couple beside us, Sue & John on their hols for 2 weeks. We exchanged travel and life stories and enjoying a leisurely Sunday afternoon. They had got to see the horse parade earlier and were kind enough to share the video. Before you know it the one drink on the way home had turned into a few more.
However, we have a trip planned tomorrow so we did not want to be late. So now back at the van watching some Heineken Cup rugby.
In for a Penney 