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Friday, 10 November. The plane arrived in Malaga at 8:00 a.m. We were met by a GCT representative who put us in a taxi to Torremolinos. Unfortunately, we could not get into the Nautilus Hotel right away, so we were taken to the Tropicana. This hotel, while adequate, was not in the same class as the Nautilus. It also turned out to be very inconvenient, as we soon learned. We had just walked into the Tropicana when a GCT representative told us we had to leave for the Nautilus in 10 minutes for the orientation briefing. We couldn't even clean up or change clothes. On the positive side, Jane's brother, Tom, and his wife, Kyoko, were there, too, and we were very happy to get together finally.
It was a 15 minute walk to the Nautilus. We got there after nine and had terrible seats.
That, combined with the heavy accent of our tour director (Angel), made it difficult to
understand much of the briefing. Afterwards we had to rush back to the Tropicana the clean up
and change, rush to a "dine around" restaurant (La Fragata) for lunch, and rush back to the
Nautilus for the two o'clock bus tour of Malaga.
The weather was warm and sunny as we walked from the Nautilus to the Tropicana, so we dressed lightly. When we got out of the bus in Malaga, though, it was overcast, windy, and quite chilly, especially at the higher elevations. (I came down with a bad head cold the next day.) We visited the cathedral, constructed beginning in 1499 and incorporating an even older mosque.
After a stop at the port, we went up to the Alcazaba, the old Moorish fortress above the city (begun in 1065). The view of the city was spectacular. There was also an interesting model of old Malaga that provided a good perspective on what we had seen.
The bus then took us through the old part of the city where, among other things, we saw the house where Pablo Picasso was born. We were back at the Nautilus Hotel before five so no one would miss the free evening happy hour. With Tom and Kyoko, we decided that we'd eat dinner at the Tropicana so we wouldn't have to go out. We still hadn't had a moment to rest since arriving in Spain, and we were very tired. Unfortunately, there was a big mix-up because the hotel restaurant was not on the "dine around" list. They finally served us, but we were treated very rudely and had a terrible meal. Then, at long last, we got to bed. |
