Andalusia tour
Welcome to the second Andalusia tour of 2022. on the arrival day we took off to downtown Malaga with Bob and Stacey and their niece Bonnie for a city tour in this beautiful city Strolling along the beautiful park along the harbourside , up to the old ruins of the moorish castle Gibralfaro we enjoyed the splendid viiews and of course didnt forget to take a nice coffee and pastry. Conclude the tour with a relaxed lunch we drove back to the hotel to say welcome to the rest of our guests. After the welcome brief and bike handover and a very animated dinner, most of the guests went off to their rooms to be fresh and fruity for the first riding day
Time to saddle up the ponies!! With a very nice riding temperature and a blue sky we headed up towards the mountains of Malaga. Rightaway into the twisties and switchbacks! Immediately: a great riding day for this nice group. First coffeestop to get the taste of good spanish coffee and a nice lunch at the beachside along the Costa del Sol took us rightaway into the relaxed Spanish life! Second part of the day we headed up north into the next great mountain roads towards or final destination of today: Grenada and of course a good cold beer and reviewing the day is also part of it!! Finally a good dinner in a very nice restaurant concluded our first riding day!
Today it's an early start because we are going to visit the pearl of Grenada: the Alhambra. We take cabs from the Hotel at 8am to meet our guide Carlos and by 8:30 we are already inside walking around the beautiful Palace gardens. The history here is amazing, as are the views and Carlos has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the place which we struggle to keep pace with. After visiting the fortress we walk back down into the city centre to have a quick coffee before heading out. The city traffic isn't so bad and we are soon out on the highway heading towards Chef Ted and our picnic lunch. After lunch we head through the olives groves on the small twisty roads that are typical of the region. We stop for a quick drink at the Iznajar reservoir, which at this poin in late summer is looking very empty!!! Then its onwards to the hotel where everyone is looking forward to a boot beer after a warm afternoons ride.
What a great day we had. So much impressions in one day.... El Torcal ..., the very impressive views on the garganta del chorro, pueblos blanca ......simply all great! safe back in Arcos de la Frontera, a great ( extended) boot beer and a super nice dinner...that s what we want!
We head out of Arcos and everyone breathes a sigh of relief that it's not wet and we ride down the tiny cobbled streets! We stop at the Gualalcacin reservoir where Mike opens the gate and we all walk past the "No Entry" sign and then make a quicku-turn when the official comes out to talk to us :-) We look for the fighting bulls but unfortunately they are not around today so we further south to our coffee stop Alcala. The roads here are not in tip top condition - bumpy and with a lots of cracks but we are still having fun. We head towards the coast and the wind starts to pick up and it actually becomes pretty gusty before we stop for lunch on the beach at Bolonia. After a relaxing hour os so we head south to Tarifa before we start to turn to the North again to make our way up to Ronda. There's a bit more traffic on the roads but we manage to navigate our way past, and the roads now are super smooth sticky black ashphalt and we have a blast up through the mountains to finish off our days ride. Then we head to the bar for boot beers - this group sure knows how to party :-)
What a pleasure it is to ride but also to have a relaxed time with this group! Today everyone slept in a bit and we rode off into the mountains for a leisurely ride through Grazalema national park, and of course had a relaxed coffee break at the center plaza of Grazalema. Then followed the way up to the Puerto de Las Palomas pass where chef William prepared us a nice picnic. After we had filled our empty stomachs we made a loop passing Zahara and head east again towards Ronda. Having a couple hours of relaxing time was very nice. At 5 pm we walked into town to have a super nice dinner right at the edge of the deep gorge which divides Ronda in two parts. Great evening with great company
And here we are: already on the final day...! But the good thing is: we still have an awesome riding day ahead of us! A big loop from Ronda towards the Mediterranean Sea and back up north onnthe famous A-367, which is very well known amongst motorcyclists. A fantastic road full with nice curves and sweepers and also spectacular views. A nice coffestop in the morning and the lunch close to Ronda, we took the mountain roads in south eastern direction down to Malaga At Mijas a fast stop for a well deserved ice cream we followed the road for the final stretch towards the coast. A last fantastic riding day of a fantastic group with fantastic weather!! Thank you all for being with us last week Hope to see you all again somewhere down the road at some time ! Ted and William