Excursion to Ronda & Malaga

Last weekend we went on our first excursion with our program to two cities in southern Spain, Ronda and Malaga. The first day we toured Ronda for the afternoon. Ronda is a small but gorgeous city in the mountains. Ronda is famous for a bridge that Ernest Hemingway wrote about in his novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, which takes place in Ronda. During our walking tour of Ronda we visited Los baños Arabes, the Arab baths. This was one of my favorite parts of the walking tour because of how amazing the baths are. These baths mimic ancient Roman baths in that they have three separate rooms, the hot room, warm room and cold room. The Arabic people would use these baths frequently in the past, men in the morning and women and children in the afternoon. These baths exemplify the Arabic influence in southern Spain, a very interesting part of Spain's history. When the Christians southern Spain the idea and purpose of the baths changed completely. The baths were looked down upon and became an area of town inhabited by prostitutes. After visiting the baths, which are now a museum, we visited a mansion in Ronda that had spectacular views of the valley below. The inside patio of this mansion was built to create a natural air conditioning and heating system in the house. The house always stays the same temperature, no matter what the weather is like outside, as they use a patio cover to control the amount of light that enters the home. Very environmentally friendly, I would love to build a house like that one day, imagine the amount of electricity they save!

After visiting Ronda for the afternoon we got back on the bus to head to Malaga. After checking into our hotel a group of my friends and I walked down to the beach to watch the beautiful sunset! The next day we went on a long walking tour of Malaga and learned all about the rich history of this city. We visited the Alcazaba, which is another palace like the Alhambra (the one in Granada). The Alcazaba has more Roman influence than the Alhambra and even has a Roman theater that was awesome to see. Malaga also has many museums dedicated to Picasso because he was born there. We saw many different signs dedicated buildings to him and explaining what he did inside those buildings, such as where he was baptized.

Overall I really enjoyed our trip to Ronda and Malaga, it was awesome to see other cities in southern Spain. We still have two more excursions with our program in November, to Alpujarras (a pueblo in the mountains of Granada) and another excursion to Sevilla & Cordoba (two more cities in southern Spain). My roommate Jill's parents and sister are coming to visit over Thanksgiving break. We just planned a trip to Barcelona for a weekend, which I am really excited about! We leave for Morocco next Thursday, I can't believe how fast it is coming up!