So it was breakfast at 04:00, wash the breakfast dishes, dump the trash, leave the keys in the apartment, and trundle our luggage down via Firenze to Corso Umberto and up to stazione di tren where we boarded our 06:11 elettrico tren a Roma Tiburtina. Not a fast train but we hit 80 mph on flat land which was seldom. Don't expect there ever will be a fast train through the Apennines. Quite a few tunnels. Many a bucolic scene went by along the rivers we followed up and down. Ducks, sheep, goats, horses, pigs, hay baling. Seemed like a dozen stops but we flashed past more than two dozen abandoned rural train stations. Did notice the support columns of the raised roadways had exposed rebar and not certain if it was from general decay of the cement or from the latest earthquake as we were passing near the epicenter in Amatrice. After 4 hours on the train we pulled into Tiburtina and scurried over to another platform for the next train to Leonardo da Vinci–Fiumicino Airport for a 3 hour wait for our Vueling flight (it was very late) to Malaga.
Maybe Vueling changed the pitch between seat rows from our previous tortures in 2014. I could put my knees straight out and only barely brush the seat back in front. To our good luck the plane was only half full and, like many others, I jumped back to an empty row and stretched out. Did not sleep much. Watched our descent toward Malaga. Huge amount of smog over the area. Fires up north near Alicante where we stayed in '11. Flew over the mountains we would drive next day.
Taxied to our Malaga hotel and arranged for a rental car for noon next day. Started the day with the usual good breakfast at the hotel. Checked our suitcases since we would only be two nights away. Negotiated our car rental, including a TomTom GPS which served us well and we were off in our Skoda car. I think it may have needed a tune-up as it was not always responsive to the accelerator pedal. When we got the car there was a bit of misunderstanding as to the amount of gasoline in the tank and had to find a petrol station before heading too far up the hill.
Up and up we drove on narrow, winding roads with some very sharp turns that required a bit of horn honking to ensure we did not slam head first into the oncoming traffic. Doubt the roads were always two asses wide in places. Pulled over a few times to allow larger trucks to go by. The hills of Axarquia were very, very dry. Several years of drought. Many almond groves on the sides of steep hills dried and died. Hate to see Spain's olives diminished by "The Global Warming" trend. In 2011 Spain was the largest olive producer and likely still is but seemingly less so now than 2011 when we viewed the area west of here from trains and buses.. Dying cactus plants. Many century plants that mostly seemed OK. Hot but had to tamp the a/c down to keep climbing.
Finally arrived in the village of Comares at about 2:30PM. TomTom put us within a meter of the lat/long Sharon had keyed in from the El Molino de Los Abuelos hotel's website. El Molino de Los Abuelos means the mill of the grandparents and had been an olive oil mill in the past. The building still had the lingering scent of olive oil. The dining room contain the old mill which had three large and quite heavy-looking cone-shaped stone rollers attached to a shaft driven by steam and once-upon-a-time by a single donkey with elaborate power shafts and gears.
It was hot outside but cooler in the old olive mill building. We checked in and had lunch - we were the only diners at what is a Michelin rated restaurant
We walked out onto the patio (balcon) which overlooked the Axarquia valley below and the Mediterranean but the sea was completely obscured by haze from the fires up north. And it was warming up.
After lunch I felt exhausted from the drive up and early train ride so went up to our room which was not so cool as the dining room. There was no a/c since they never needed it at 2,300'+ and our room overlooked the central plaza and faced west.
I slept a bit but it kept getting hotter in the room. Opened windows and tried to induce a cross draft but there was not a bit of breeze. Hotter and hotter. Wunderground said it was 99F and I think the haze was trapping the heat even up this high. Hot all night. I used to stand watches in navy engine rooms that ran 135F in the tropics but after 4 hours I could return to my air conditioned space for sleep or paperwork. Had endured nights this hot a few times but was then a 23yo stud.
Still deficient on sleep, I returned to the room which was somewhat cooler -- maybe low 90s and slept some, through lunch. Sharon walked the village, took photos and bought a beer. It was a bit cooler that night and we were feasted upon by mosquitos. We slept some but I was still exhausted the next morning.
I actually recommend the hotel -- it was just the unseasonable weather that ruined it for us. High yesterday was 78.7F.
We checked out and drove back down the windy, twisty, narrow road along the ridges.
Next two days I slept quite a bit. Breakfast at our hotel and lunch somewhere in Malaga. First at our favorite vegetarian restaurant in Malaga: Vegetariano El Calafate, where I had a wonderfully tasty black bean soup, Sharon had a wonderful white gazpacho that was wonderfully overloaded with garlic (aglio, ajo, one of our favorite spices). Restaurant highly recommended.
We had a bit of a wait until the restaurant opened so we sat in a nearby cafe that was part of a courtyard in the Arab quarter of Malaga. Its name is La Invisible. Interesting mix of graffiti art and political posts. It was a humid day and it was nice to relax in the shade and listen to the gurgling of the water fountain.
Yesterday I felt much better. Walked over to the bus station to pre-purchase tickets and see that we could roll our luggage there. Sharon had found a thin crust pizza place online so we walked over, the other direction to it and I talked them into holding the mozzarella (saturated fat) on a margherita pizza and adding extra tomato sauce and olive oil. It was delicious.
Our last lunch was at a place we happened to stumble upon during our search for pizza-Tandoori Mexican, yep that is its name. I had a good aloo gobi (cauliflower and potato in a spicy sauce. Sharon had a nice spicy vegetable karachi.
Tomorrow we are off to Marbella. Want to stop on the way over to the bus station to photo the wonderful, clean market
