Seville, Tarifa, & Ronda Spain
August 9th- August 11th, 2019
Hola de España!
Yes, we are back in Spain! First stop: Seville.
Seville is a lively city with a charming city center. Exploring the city took up most of our day and then we did some shopping at a nearby mall as we still don’t have many clothes. We packed light bringing only one carry on bag from the U.S.! Not only is the shopping good, but there is much to see in the city center such as the Plaza de España and the Catedral de Sevilla.
Side note: When we first spent time in Spain, I was nervous to speak Spanish (the little I can remember from college). The Spaniards speak very quickly and with an accent I am not used to, as I learned Spanish commonly spoken in the Americas. However, after being in Portugal and not knowing much of the language at all, I figured I should just go for it and try to converse as much as I can! It has worked out great and this would be my advice to anyone wanting to travel; at least try and learn some words, it seems the locals appreciate it!
Therefore, as we walked the streets of Seville, I practiced my Spanish while ordering “gofres con Nutella” and “helado” (waffles with Nutella and ice cream). The ice cream and gelato has been a 10 out of 10 everywhere by the way. We watched a street performer as we ate and tried to sit in the shade as much as possible because it was hot! Since we’ve come south, it has been at least 30 degrees celsius everyday! 🥵
Unfortunately, Ben caught a bug somewhere along the way, so when we woke the next day, I drove to the next destination while he slept. We drove down to Tarifa, which is located at the southern most tip of Spain. This was awesome because we got to see Africa from across the sea! Ben immediately responded to this by singing, “I bless the rains down in Africaaaa!”
It was pretty cool. We looked into going across, but it would have been pretty expensive, so we decided to take that trip another time! Tarifa is a wonderful surfer town with lots of beach shops and scuba diving excursions. As we walked the beach, we were able to go into a few fortresses and a few chapels. In one chapel specifically, we found something amazing; we found (drum roll…) Black Jesus! We were so happy we nearly yelled in the middle of the church haha. Since the area has citizens coming in from Africa and Europe they have both depictions in the same chapel. It was really neat to see that this specific church cared less about what color skin He had and more that people could worship in the way that they wanted.
That afternoon, we headed for a small swimming hole that we had researched called the “Cuave de Gato” (The Cat’s Cave) which is a nature preserve near Ronda. Lots of people were there enjoying the cold (and I mean COLD), crystal clear water to escape the crazy heat.
You could see where the water fell down from the nearby cave, but unfortunately we weren’t able to go into the cave without doing a spelunking tour which was available just up the road. It was beautiful, and funny to watch everyone’s faces as they got into the cold water!
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