On our own in Ronda

Our plan to meet a driver and bus at 10:00am today had a small hiccup: a marathon running in front of our hotel that closed down the street.  We had crossed the street to buy some water at a kiosk, turned around, and suddenly found it difficult to get back across!  I ran across dodging the runners, and felt like I was in that video game where the frog hops from lily pad to lily pad, sometimes getting crushed along the way.

We had to walk with our suitcases a few blocks to meet the driver, who arrived in a giant bus -- one of those 30-person vehicles for the 8 of us.  Plenty of room to stretch out!  The ride to Rondo was about 2 hours and through lots of pretty countryside with olive trees and other agriculture on rolling hills.

We are staying at the parador in Rondo.  It is a bit confusing because of the modern facade, but actually it's a lovely, old, renovated building.  We all have rooms that look out over the "new bridge", meaning the bridge from the 1700s that took 40 years to build.  Lenny just read in the guidebook that the first one fell down soon after being built, which is why this is the new bridge. 

(Click to enlarge. Note the people on top!)

Rondo is divided in two parts separated by a dramatic deep gorge, and this bridge spans the gorge.  It is a massive structure, built from the ground up with blocks and enormous arches.  It is hard to convey the scale, and amazing to realize the ambition (and achievement) of the people who built it.

We didn't have any planned tourism today so we happily took off on our own.  We decided to walk down into the gorge from the north side of the city.  At the entry to the city were the old Roman baths that is now an archaeological site we visited.  I thought this was very worthwhile.  They had a short video with animations that helped you imagine what it was like.  I particularly liked the tower where a donkey walked around a circle, raising water on a conveyor-type system, that then dumped it into an aqueduct system to feed into the baths.

We then climbed back up out of the gorge to the city, which meant a heck of a lot of steps up. Many of the streets are cobblestone, which I have found difficult to walk on in my shoes, so I headed to a great shoe shop to purchase some more appropriate footwear. 

After some shopping and hanging out, we grabbed dinner on the side of the city looking out over the countryside where we had a nice meal with a fabulous sunset view.

Donna