Spain

Scottie finally corralled all of us into renting a villa in Marbella, Spain for 3 days in September. Turns out it is only about 2 km from Juergen and Alison’s place so our itinerary is:

• fly to spain
• train to Malaga
• rent a car with Blair and Diane
• 3 days in Marbella with the gang
• Christy and I go to Morocco for 10 days
• return to Spain for 2 days with Juergen and Alison
• fly from Malaga to Toronto via Zurich

We took the Red Eye flight from Toronto to Madrid on Tuesday night, 9th of September. Bus downtown from the airport to train station where we got a SIM card and found Blair, Diane, David and Kelly Smith and took the bullet train to Malaga (the Smiths in First Class!). From Malaga, we rented cars and drove the one hour to the villa which is between Marabella and Estepona.

The villa is huge and spectacular. Well, it could be spectacular. Owned by a Russian oligarch, it has been mismanaged for a while. Lots of things not working, including the pool, the hot tub, the microwave, the door locks (twice people get locked in a room and have to WhatsApp to get help) and our rooms smell like a sewer. Other than that, it’s fine.

Great to see everyone again, the first night we spend out by the pool after a quick dinner not far away.

On Wednesday, Blair, Diane, Christy and I took the car down to the beach area while others went elsewhere. We walked the beach and stopped for lunch at the Marbella Beach Club. Food spectacular, service spectacular, price spectacular but nobody complaining.

That night we had a caterer come in and cook for us. Great night with lots of laughs and pretty decent food. Nice not to have to travel.

On Friday, the four of us took the car up to Rhonda which is a beautiful little town in the mountains behind Marbella. Had a great lunch in the old town then walked around a bit. Some great hiking and cycling around here, tho we didn’t do any of that!

Back at the villa, Christy and I take the car to drop off some of our gear at Juergen and Alyson’s which is just around the corner. Lotsa stuff we don’t need but we will need to travel light and luckily they have room (boy, do they have room) to store a couple bags for us for 10 days.

We don’t stay long and head back to the villa where we hang about in the afternoon with the gang. Some are going out for dinner but we discover that with yesterday’s leftovers and all the stuff people brought, we have mountains of food so we set up a buffet that sates everyone.

Eventually a dance party breaks out inside the main house.