progol

Thanks, Andrew, the blog looks great and will be very helpful; I'll definitely spend some time going through it.

I'm thinking now that I might use the day to explore some of the pueblos blancos between or near Ronda and Malaga, perhaps staying the night in one of them. That would give us a taste of some of the smaller towns, and I do like the idea of stopping in one for the night.

CGS

Paule, I haven't gotten to that part of my trip report yet, but I wish we'd had more time in that region. It is beautiful! And, as a sneak preview, I'll tell you we missed the Pileta Cave after all and it pains me! If you have time to see it, I'd love to hear about it. At our hotel in Ronda they told us it is really worth seeing.

progol

I'm hoping to see the Pileta Cave, and am planning 2 nites in Ronda so we can include a visit as part of a day trip. We visited a few caves in France In he Dordogne, and fell in love with them. So I'm definitely including this on the master plan!

I'm enjoying your trip report, CGS, and saving it for my own planning.

CGS

Good, I can live vicariously through you! As with many attractions, they stop running the tours midday and resume again in the evening, so plan it for early or late in the day.

We loved our hotel in Ronda - Hotel Montelirio - if you are still looking for one. I'll write about it when I get to that part of the report.

progol

Thanks, CGS, I'd love to read about your thoughts about the Ronda hotel.

I'm collecting names of hotels and will start to book them after I get my tickets. I'm finding that many of the hotels don't have their availability this far out, so getting information now is really helpful.

progol

Fellow traveler Maitaitom has posted his itinerary for next Spring, so it inspired me to post mine-- here's the now just-about-finalized-final-itinerary for next May's trip to Spain, focusing mostly on Analucia.

Tickets are already bought, and we fly r/t to Madrid on May 3, returning on May 24: 20 nights in Spain!

Itinerary:
Fly to Madrid, train to
-Toledo (2 nites)
Train to
-Seville (4 nights)
Travel,to
-Cordoba (3 nights)
Travel to
-Granada (3 nights)
Pick up car, drive to
-Ronda(3 nights)-- we will use this as a base to explore the Pueblos Blancos & one full day for Ronda
Drive to
-Malaga (2 nights) - drop,car upon arrival
Train to
-Madrid(3 nights)

I have now booked apartments in Seville & Cordoba (Veoapartment & airbnb), so those are not really changeable. I'm pretty comfortable with this itinerary now, but would welcome comments. I've got so many trip reports collected detailing restaurants, tapas bars anfpd flamenco clubs that I'll be plenty busy, I'm sure!

kja

Enjoy!

MyriamC

Sounds excellent!

progol

Many thanks!

I'm getting excited about this trip, and am having fun reading everyone's trip reports. Now I'm focusing on the delicious details of food and flamenco!

daba78

im looking into roughly the same trip but including the algarve in portugal we should keep in touch and change notes. My mother went from barcelona to malaga last year, she said malaga was really nice. happy planning, i can taste the Jamón already.

progol

I'm looking forward to the jamon, too!

Oh, and for those who didn't say it but were probably thinking it, I reduced our stay in Ronda to 2 days and now will end our trip in Madrid for 4 days.

After reading so many people saying, "I didn't expect to like it, but I really enjoyed/loved the city", it made sense to add another day.

And we still have 2 days in Ronda...

kja

"I reduced our stay in Ronda to 2 days and now will end our trip in Madrid for 4 days.... we still have 2 days in Ronda..."

That should work well! Ronda itself takes about a day, so you still have a day to explore the region. And with the extra night in Madrid, you might even have time for a day-trip to Segovia.

progol

kja -- just what I was thinking!

Paule