FuengirolaALL – Beach

Our hotel was 1.5 blocks away from one of the 2 major bus stations in the city, San Pedro Sebastian.  We headed out past the little restaurant that we’d frequented and a quick stop at the one known ATM in all of Spain that seemed to be able to read my worn bank card to withdraw the maximum and hopefully hold us over until we found another.  The bus station wasn’t really a bus station, but more of a road that they’d closed down just for bus and trolley traffic and an underground to the metro.  We knew we wanted the C2 to the train station, but didn’t see rhyme or reason as to where the C2 would stop.  Kate asked someone who seemed to be in the know.  They pointed us to the bus shelter across the street.  We navigated our luggage through the construction that was underway on the trolley tracks and arrived just as a C2 bus was waiting for us.  The bus was nearly full so I stood with the luggage.  Theo and Zeke wanted to stand too as this was a double long split bus with a sort of turntable in the mid-section that was bordered by accordian type walls.  They thought it would be fun to try riding on the turntable mid-section.  The bus had signs that said keep the windows closed for the air conditioning, but many were already open as the AC was evidently not working.  Most of the buses we were on throughout Spain had AC, but several did not.  It was early enough that the heat was not stifling, but being Seville it was already plenty warm at approx 10 am.  And the packed bus stuck in the early morning traffic didn’t help.  We’d covered the distance of about 1 block in 4 minutes as the bus driver worked his way out of the bottleneck of traffic and pulled a right turn which seemed to finally free us.  Just in time too, I’d noticed a few hand fans already waving and even a couple of natives looking like beads of perspiration were close to forming, as we finally got a little air circulating in the bus.  Kate had heard a Chinese couple ask for directions to the train station so we kept a close eye on them, not knowing exactly when we should depart.  BTW, that’s the major difference between taking the bus and the metro.  The metro is much easier to navigate as there are far fewer stops and the stops are very clearly marked.  The buses run every direction like a spiderweb through the cities, tough to know exactly which bus to catch and where to catch it and tougher still to know when to get off.  I noticed a large train-station like building off the right-side and saw what appeared to be a drawing of a train on the building.  A medium-sized parking lot full of cars and the Chinese pair departing convinced me this was our stop.

It was.  We’d planned much too much buffer time on our trip to the train station and had about 2 hours to kill.  There were a few stores so we walked about and shopped.  Choruses of ‘no touching’ later we’d exhausted that option, leaving only people watching and old fashioned talking.  The train station was not air conditioned and also was already getting warm.  We knew the train itself would have air so we headed down to it as early as possible.  Unfortunately too early as the train was there but not yet boarding passengers.  First came Maeve’s ‘I have to go potty’ then, after Kate had left with her, came Theo’s.  So I left Zeke and Jane with the luggage and made the long run back up the escalator ramp to find the nearest bathroom closed so hurried back past all the shops to the far bathroom.  When we got back the train was boarding.  We found our seats and waited in Air Conditioned comfort.  The train ride to Malaga was mostly non-descript.  Closer to Malaga we seemed to need to break through a mini-mountain range so the scenery was a little more interesting.  We arrived in Malaga and faced our next test.  Where to find the bus station.  Kate noticed an info desk and asked a lady there about Fuengirola.  She directed us outside.  The train station in Malaga doubled as a fantastically large Mall that would’ve been fun to spend a day searching through, but we knew there may be a last bus out of town, so we kept moving.  Once again we heard the potty call and quickly scanned for the nearest bathroom. Not having seen any since we left the train station into the mall, we were a little concerned.  Zeke noticed on the kiosk a nearby bathroom upstairs, but the only elevator or escalator or stairs we could see was inside a store!  That was new to us, but we took it out of necessity.  After our ride Kate noticed a sign that said something about please don’t use our elevator unless you are our customer.  I imagined some fine print about kids needing a bathroom so excused our trespassing at least in my mind.  The bus station was supposed to be half a block from the train station, but due to construction we had quite a time finding our way there.  And once we got there, despite all my previous research on the web, they told us to go back to the train station.  Sure enough, a new option was available.  A tram that ran from the train station straight to Fuengirola and best yet, our train ticket allowed us to transfer without a fee.  Only problem… where would we end up?  We knew the bus station in Fuengirola was only blocks from our hotel.  But where was the train station.  Luck stuck again as we stumbled off the train nearly into the bus station.  Whew!  From there, Kate’s Spanish got us the rest of the way.  The hotel had water problems and had to put us into 2 separate rooms instead of our apartment.  Promising that if they didn’t have it fixed by tomorrow they’d put us up in their penthouse.  The kids were pretty excited to hear this, and I’ll admit even I was hoping.  We let the kids check out the new TV stations… their new favorite cbbc, which was Brit TV for kids.  Including Horrible Histories, where the topics included the laundry practices of Romans, and Stupid Deaths.  All of it based on real history.  And most of it potty humor.  They loved it.  We ate a quick bite and decided to just walk down to the beach and check it out.  It was late enough in the day that we decided we didn’t need sunscreen.  I don’t know what we were thinking, but the kids, despite us asking them to stay dry in their street clothes, got completely soaked from head to toe.  I guess we were just enjoying them enjoying the ocean.  I know I enjoyed the enthusiasm and excitement that I saw from each kid as they met the ocean.  Especially Theo, who nearly immediately started attacking the waves much like he did in the Dells wave pool when he was 4.

On the way back, with every kid soaked, Kate offered to let the girls get their hair braided.  Maeve nearly fell asleep during the operation.

   We found out the lady braiding the hair spoke 5 different languages and was working on English as her 6th!!

The boys and I were heading back to the hotel when we spotted freshly roasted almonds and couldn’t resist.  We decided to take some back to the girls and wait for them to finish.  I tried to shake the sand out of Theo’s pockets while we waited.

The next day we decided to invest in some beach goods… A sun umbrella, a couple of towels, an inflatable bed chair, a sand mat, a pair of paddles w/ ball, and our best purchase a blow up puppy dog for Maeve (and don’t those braids look good!!)

BTW, the above photo was taken in our penthouse rooftop pool.  Yup, they’d been unable to fix the water problem and came through on their promise.  We were a little excited.  The view from the rooftop was fabulous…  With the beach on one side of the rooftop and the hotel pool on the other side.

That night Theo came up with the idea of sleeping on the rooftop.  After a little thought, I said sure why not but that we’d have to keep it our secret.  He couldn’t have been more excited.  I asked him if it was OK if we invited Maeve along and he agreed.  We had only the 2 reclining pool chairs to sleep on and with Maeve with me it was tough to get sleep.  It was an awesome clear night and we enjoyed connecting the dots on some stars and seeing a few planes, even a couple that “collided” as they headed opposite directions, and even spotted a few satellites.  Theo said, I sure am glad they weren’t able to fix that water leak and then soon dozed off to sleep just as the moon was rising over the ledge of our building.  I tossed and turned a bit with Maeve trying to find a comfortable position.  I must’ve gotten some sleep as I remember the moon in about 4 different positions throughout the night until finally I saw the sky start to lighten and watched as the sun rose over the far off mountains that are only visible when the sun is partially hidden behind them.  Here’s Maeve and I awake the next morning, with Theo still wrapped up tight in his blanket.  There were absolutely no bugs and only a few seagulls flashing white overhead.  The breeze picked up a bit overnight and by morning I was getting a little cold as was Theo.  You can see the moon had crossed completely behind us by this morning shot (the moon is above and left of that chimney looking protrusion)

We spent much of our days at the beach and a few swims at the hotel pool and our private pool.  Water has always agreed with our family.  We did make a trip down to the castle.  A walk of about 30-40 minutes on a hot muggy day.   It was nearly too long for me.  Mostly the castle was a bust, except that we crossed a bridge to save the day and Theo and Maeve through their flowers to the fish who instantly hit them then spit them back out.  Later we created a story on the train about Harry, Roger and Penelope rabbit.  Zeke added a part about the fish throwing rocks back at the rabbits on the bridge in retribution for being fooled.  Theo, Maeve and I also played superhero on the way back and saved the bridge from collapse as the cables were “starting to shake violently”.  In reality it was just harmonics on the cables.  Interestingly enough, the vibrations were dampened and eventually subsided by simply holding onto the cable firmly.  Theo and Maeve weren’t big enough to pull if off, but superDad was able to.  About 10 cables later, I exclaimed “I wish the world would just stay saved for once” ala Mr Incredible knowing full well that the wind would soon start the wave in each cable again.  Our work done, we headed back up the beachfront in search of a bathroom for Jane and cool drinks for All. 

We also bumped into a leather store and spent way more than what we intended to spend.  We were only there for wallets for the kids, but found some good shoes for Kate and I and then Kate found the perfect leather coat, which she looks incredible in.

We did some carnival rids solo with Maeve one night and then with all the kids a 2nd night.  They all especially liked the bungie jump…

At some point during the week Kate was helping Maeve count past 10.  For whatever reason, Maeve latched onto the sound of 15.  Here’s Maeve doing her quince song and dance,

a dance she repeated many times throughout the week.

Janie met and talked to a Brit girl on our final day, and they talked and they talked and they talked.  I didn’t have the heart to say we have to leave.  They exchanged emails.

We also met an ex-flamenco dancer on the beach.  A very kind couple that we passed much of our beach goods down to.  She particularly enjoyed kids and gave Maeve a beautiful flamenco song and a big lipstick kiss.

We left Fuengirola knowing we’d gotten the most out of our beach experience.  Shell collecting, burying daddy in the sand, several sand castles, modifications on sand dikes to help keep the big waves off our beach towels, and lots of paddle ball… our record 53.  And one of my favorite memories… We could clearly see the waves from our hotel room.  Each day was the same with tiny waves and every so often 1 to 2 foot waves crashing in.  But in our 2nd or 3rd day you could see the waves were larger.  From our hotel room we could see boogie boarders picking up the waves out past the buoys.  When we got down to the beach we could see that the normal wave was 1 to 2 foot and the larger waves were 3 to 5 feet. There was even one smaller athletic boy who was able to surf the waves standing up.  He was obviously very athletic and he finished each of his rides by diving off the board with a somersault into the water.  We planted our umbrella and set our sand mat in the newly created shade.  As experienced Fuengirola beach goers we knew not to start too close to the beach, as by later in the afternoon the tide would rise and force us to move further inland.  Maeve quickly set off with her dog with Theo and Zeke and Janie played some paddle ball.  Soon however we were all in experiencing the big waves.  And at one point Zeke and Maeve were paired up, with Maeve riding her perrito (puppy).  We were all watching for the next big wave, trying our best like the boogie boarders to guess which wave would turn out to be a good one.  I found the best technique to be watching them, and when they would turn I would turn.  Zeke found that often if a big wave would crash the warf further out, then it would also materialize into a larger wave at the beach.  But not always.  Anyway, one of the largest waves we’d seen that day, maybe 6 feet, popped out of the ocean.  Zeke had been helping Maeve over the crest of the wave, and with this wave he attempted the same.  But with the size of the wave the perrito slid away from him.  By the time I noticed what had happened Maeve was already nearly at the shore.  That’s right, she and Perrito rode the wave nearly all the way in.  The next wave finished the job and she was at the shoreline.  Zeke had swam and run up to her to see if she was afraid.  But she was grinning from ear to ear.