Espana in general, Alora in particular, and Charles and Linda's house exactly

That would be C & L's house exactly there in the lower center on the picture taken from the ridge line of the mountain behind their house outside of Alora. Not picked up is how steep the cliff/hillside is that drops off in front of their house down to the road in the center of the photo. There is no access to that road.  

Same photo taken without telephoto. Their house is the right most of the three that are visible in the lower part of the photo off the ridge line, picking up view to the north and east.

Same north and east view as above photo but this time from Charles and Linda's back terrace overlooking the cliff/steep hillside.

Edith and Charles on a sunny day walk. Sunny days have been a rarity here this week as we have had unseasonable rains, according to the locals.

This was one of the guys who said it had been raining a lot. Don't know who the guy with the bald spot ii the back of his head is.

See a rainy day. This is their house from the road that leads to their drive way. I don't know why but we did not end up with interior photos or traditional tour of the house photos. Come see it yourself.  It is very nice and Charles and Linda are wonderful hosts.

On a cloudy, but not rainy, day as Charles is out on the Ponderosa as he calls it showing Patt and me the south 40. He is raising olives and some oranges on this portion of his ranch.

Pondering expansion of the Ponderosa.

Leading Patt and me through one of the meadows on an east facing "hillside" as he calls it up from an overlook that is just "over here".
 

I did manage to clamber up one of the large rocks that mark the top of the ridge line. If you note the extreme top right of the upper cloud there is an airplane flying toward Malaga, as do lots of them.

Alora, or "Virginia City" to Charles, and it is worth a blog, but that will have to wait for another day.

Malaga is worth a blog too but gets only one or two photos as we went there for a day and in port were several tall ships. Among the masted sailing ships the most interesting was a Russian replica war ship of the early 1700's or late 1600's.  

Note the old cannons stowed along the side. There were 10 openings for cannon on each side. as well as anchor opening in front. It would have been crowded, noisy, and probably dangerous to be on that ship with cannons being fired from it, much less towards it.

Charles and Linda were so taken with the Russian battle ship they took a selfie in front of it. Here they are checking it out. Be sure to come to their house and ask to see it. They have recently remodeled their house to feature selfies they have taken over the past couple of years and it is a hoot. As previously mentioned they are marvelous hosts and a great brother and sister-in-law.

Oh yes, it was raining in Malaga too. Just like Penang, Spain has a rainy season.

Italian Coast, picturesque towns

Our last couple of days in Italy were spent on the Italian Coast just north of Sestri Levante and the five famous picturesque towns of Cinque Terre. Famous for among other things their colorfully painted houses, hung on cliffside next to the sea, their wine, their cuteness and their marketing skill I suppose.

This first stop however is Sestri Levante where we visited with friends of Charles and Linda. Had a delightful visit and walk along the shore. It is that pretty even though it was somewhat coolish weather.

Left to right Marcos, Josephine, Linda, Patt, me and Charles, and operating the camera is Gordon.  Marcos, Josephine and Gordon and friends of C & L from Lima and other local days.  Had a great time visiting and enjoying Italian dining.  They also provided guidance on visiting Cinque Terre towns and accessing the train for the short ride there.  

And that is one of the towns, name of which I never got. Patt knows them all. I do not think we got to that one.

We did get to one that required steps, lots of steps up from the train that we took to get to these towns.  Access by sea is when you get to "see" the towns in all their glory, but is difficult to arrange on short uncertain notice so we opted for the train as did about all of our friends.

And that is another - fill that baby up with vacationers and you got yourself some fun.

And a little kid knows how to get around. He had a good idea. Run when you see an opening. An incredibly large number of tourists did not and thought it would be a good idea to bring the family pet along for the day. A lot of our friends do indeed have large pets so the place was full of dogs, not all of whom were glad to see one another.

Here were are at the train station getting ready to funnel into a stairwell. This is just one of the many points during the day in which we got to share space with others.

Here is one of the more popular destinations, Corniglia, the second of the five towns going north to south as we were. We missed two of them (once you have seen 3 of 5 on a crowded day - you've seem 'em all).  

See all those seals on the beach head in the photo below, no actually they are people and for a brief moment we were there too. The place was crowded! Pretty but crowded. Liberation Day comes but once a year and a five day weekend is a good one. Glad we were a part.  Liberations Day as I understand it combines liberations from the Nazi's after WWII with other liberations of Italy from France, (Napoleon?)  Popes, and more).  A sort of collection of days like 6 Flags over Georgia but this is Italy.

Photo repeated on purpose. Just because it was an impressive crowd and this is my best crowd picture.

Our hotel was full but away from the most crowded part of the scene. All the restaurants and such were full and the nightclub nearby was going loud and late.

My Dad would NOT have approved of the pruning job on this Sycamore tree. There were whole groves of sycamores pruned like this one all over Italy, and well as I recall, France too.

And the view from our hotel room deck.

Walking down "West Beach Drive" towards the restaurant we had chosen for dinner.

Our beach was rocky with black sand on a windy cold day.

Charles not stumbling on the breakwater constructed of large chunks of waste marble, yes marble, like what was used to make all those statutes and stuff.

Volterra, Siena, Chianciano Terme

As is true for nearly all of the towns/cities we visited, they were built on mountain/hill tops. Few had as dramatic a set of steps as did Volterra. Admittedly, these were from the visitors parking lot and it is possible to drive into town, but they have an effective screening system for visitors.  

The old - what did you expect - town hall, in continuous use since the 10th century. Same room, same furniture and probably same issues. New way of making money though, charge tourists to get into the old city hall chambers.

We happened upon a day in which visitor screening must have been working very well as we were some of the few visitors and the byways and streets were pretty much ours.  

It looks like it and it is, a 2nd century Roman theater, with seating for 10,000. Immediately behind it was a series of Roman baths with pools of various temperatures.  

Now this part of town even predates the Romans and is an Etruscan spring that the Romans preserved and goes back to some early BC date. Patt and I are bundled up. That is us though.

One of our favorite meals, outside San Gimignano, no pasta - pork ribs, roasted potatoes for Charles and me, Linda did opt for some pasta, gnocchi as I recall, and Patt a pizza, but all excellent with a Sangiovese wine, limoncello and a grappa (for me) as after dessert drinks.

One of Siena's large piazzas with one of the famous towers. Siena was a rival of Pisa and Florence and as did all the other cities its power ebbed and flowed but eventually fell under the influence of Florence and Rome.

Should have had photos of the country side before now, but it is beautiful and we enjoyed our rides to the various towns where we visited and stayed.

The roads have been fun to drive. 

 There have been miles of vineyards.

Wheat fields and olive orchards.

There have been many movies filmed in this area of Tuscany, The Gladiators with Russell Crowe, The English Patient with Ralph Fiennes, Under the Tuscan Sun, Diane Lane, etc.

Oh, in Chianciano Terme, there was a 100 kilometer cross country national park to park through small town to small town race. I got a chance to enter and did. That is me in this photo right in the background. You can barely make me out. It was fun to watch a bit of the racers as they came through town according to Charles, Patt and Linda. They were a bit spotty on the cheering if you ask me though.

San Gimignano, art, a well appointed church, some of Rome, and a car

There is a little bit of history around most corners of a drive through the country side in Italy and I suspect most builders or operators of backhoes have dug up artifacts. Well some of the artifacts are just right out there in your backyard or the side yard. We were driving down a country lane and low and behold an aqueduct, a long Roman aqueduct, right there in the middle of the wheat field, right where you would expect one.

And I ought to recognize Charles and the Beamer he rented for us. A talking GPS unit too. Like Jason Borne, I noticed the brakes are a little soft on the front right, but other than that, we are ready to drive down a set of steps. Note the acqueduct in background- in case you missed it.  

That is San Gimignano, photo taken from the drive up to our B&B. San Gimignano was one of the cuter small historic towns we visited. It was full of various craftsmen and artisans, glassblowers, jewelers, metalworkers, and so on. Its history includes fighting in Italy's internal struggles and being a player in the fighting between the Guelphs and Ghibellines. The Ghibellines supported the Holy Roman Emperor against the Pope who was supported by the Guelphs in various civil wars that were often fought between individual cities.

San Gimignano had old church towers and a rather small footprint inside the city walls which were still intact. The  homes or palaces also had towers and were a feature of many towns as individual families built them for defense against either the Guelphs of Ghibellines depending on whomever they supported as the case may be and whenever the fighting brook out, towers were necessary for self defense. 

And there were old fort walls to climb in case the city was attacked from neighboring towns and past internal problems were forgotten.

And knights in shining armor to pose with.

A really well decorated and appointed cathedral.

With the best floor carvings yet.

And a Michelanglo chapel with St Peter here in the lower niche and there were Bernini statutes in a chapel and a Donatello statute of St John in another.

There was also a building with some old frescos. We got your basic knights jousting in one, the one in black armor guy getting the ole busteroo.  

Incredible complex ceiling and archway wall story boards with biblical stories. Not real sure how the knight jousting fits, but in olden days I am sure it did, especially with the Crusades and such.

And in town there was a modern art gallery, yes MODERN ART.

I loved it. This is from Mrs. Allen's 4th grade I think.

Tricks, this is not modern art it is actually just an old marble sink and water spigot from the buildings former life, some modern art is in the in upper left. The photo I have of it I will post on demand.

More modern art, great depth of field in this one.

And a window looking out onto the town with two pieces of art on either side.

A radiator under the window, not modern art.

I like the old masters, though the jewelers and glassblowers in town were pretty awesome too. One of the jewelers had been commissioned to do a chalice for Pope John Paul II.

San Gimignano was one of my favorite towns. Volterra was another, as was Barga di Lucca.