ANDALUCIA, part 1 - MARBELLA

Marbella, Old City

                                 

Saturday is a travel day—Marseille to Madrid with a 5 hour layover in Madrid where we meet up with our friend KG and the final flight to Malaga. Our bags arrive, the car is ready, and CA drives the A7 30 km toward Marbella and the Marriott Marbella Beach Resort. The resort is actually just a bit before Malaga on the Mediterranean near a village called Elviria.

Marriott seldom disappoints and on arrival we are delighted. Everything is beautiful—two large bedrooms with two large bathrooms, a full kitchen with a granite bar that opens into a full diningroom and livingroom, with a nice-sized terrace overlooking magnificently manicured gardens. If you squint to the left, you can see the sea.

There are indoor and outdoor pools, a mini-mart, a lovely restaurant and a carryout pizza/sandwich shop. Just a short stroll toward the beach, there are two chiringuitos where we can have fresh seafood and paella.

Sunday is fair and sunny, and by noon we are on our way up into the footfhills to picturesque Benahavis for a Spanish lunch. Our waiter brings bread, olive oil, and pâte as we peruse the menu. We choose gazpacho, seafood soup with just a touch of saffron, and a lukewarm(!) salad with julienned vegetables and lovely tuna for starters. Then, sautéed chicken breasts with wonderful olive oil and garlic and the fish-of-the-day with a shrimp sauce. Each plate includes a potato, baked, smashed at bit, and then deep fried in olive oil; and mixed green vegetables.

We wander through the streets, walking off our meal and enjoying this Pueblo Blanca. By the time we wind our way down to the A7 it is 5:30pm and, while we check out Puerto Banus, everything but the restaurants are closed and will be again tomorrow for a bank holiday—the Day of the Immaculate Conception.

Back at our villa, we each find a quiet corner or beach and settle in for the evening. There is no room for dinner, so we postpone our paella for one more day.

We wake up Monday to rain and wet and fill our time brewing coffee and making toast. We have yummy raspberry jam from the local supermercado. We discuss our options for the week ahead, and as soon as the weather clears a bit we head for the market day in Marbella.

We meander through a maze of vendors selling wonderful fruits, vegetables, olives, sweets, pastries, and spices. We choose large salted almonds, dried papaya and pineapple; macaroons, and lovely fried dough dipped in chocolate or filled with sweet cocoanut. We get sweet red cherries, tomatoes, and radishes. There is also a flea market with knock-off designer purses, wallets, and belts. They are very bad knock-offs and no one is tempted. I buy tights for the little girls and two poinsettias for our villa.

Poinsettias are used as border plants here—such a great seasonal touch. There're also twinkling white lights scattered around the resort property, and each town hangs lighted garlands over the main shopping streets—we saw the same in France.

We search out the old city and are delighted by the narrow, cobbled lanes and alleyways lined with brightly-painted buildings with ironwork balconies and flowers and plants in containers everywhere. We stop for tapas and enjoy sangria with our shared small plates. There are artichokes with anchovies, meat balls in tomato sauce, chicken curry, aged goat cheese, and sausages simmered with onions. A black & white Illy coffee—espresso with a scoop of vanilla ice cream—is the perfect ending.

Marbella is a lovely seaside community and we wander down the promenade where we see vendors roasting fish over open fires on the beach, cafes, and bikini shops. The sun is shining brightly over the Mediterranean and the promenade is lined with well-manicured topiary trees. It's a good day to be in Spain.

Tonight we plan on paella from one of the three chiringuitos on the beach just down the lane a few hundred meters,but for now we have again found quiet spots for individual activities—the things you do on a beach vacation.