You’ve heard of Mijas, haven’t you? Me neither until today that is.

Mijas is a town about 15 miles or so up the coast (east) from Marbella, traveling toward Malaga. It popped up in a quick google search for “things to do in Marbella.” This is a beautiful part of the world and is a huge magnet for northerners (e.g., Brits and Germans) escaping the northern winters. And, unlike Florida, it’s equally pleasant year round. That means that there are tons of restaurants, gift shops and other beach-town kinds of enterprises. But that means there isn’t a lot of things of a cultural, historical or natural environmental things to do. Old town Marbella, for instance, has, by my count, two churches and a countless number of restaurant tables.

Mijas is somewhat similar. The downtown section is very much a beach town. There’s a signal tower and a few other things but it’s really a beach town, But five miles or less up the hill from downtown is the pueblo, a small, older part of Mijas that is quite beautiful in its own rights. The streets are narrow with blindingly white buildings. There are great views of the mountains, the Mediterranean and the town itself. There’s a church or two, a bull ring and a few other attractions but the big deal is to wander the streets, enjoy the views and beautiful weather. And yes, it’s built on the side of a mountain so there’s lots of up and down walking involved and yes, there are the usual gift shops and restaurants. But we spent a few pleasant hours there, including time for ice cream before heading back to Marbella.

Historically (you didn’t think you’d get out of this without a history lesson, did you?) Mijas experienced the usual Iberian succession of invaders. The prehistoric Tartessians were overcome by the ancient Greeks and Phoenicians looking for mineral wealth, followed by the Romans, Visigoths and Moors. Ho hum; the usual story. Mijas resisted the Christians at the siege of Malaga and when they eventually surrendered the people were sold as slaves. Next, the Costa del Sol back became the Costa del Pirates. Until the 1960s the village consisted mostly of shacks and poverty was rampant. Then the Costa del Sol happened and here we are knee-deep in t-shirt shops. And $500,000 condos.

The day started with our departures from Calle Valentuñana – two cars to the Malaga airport for their flight to Barcelona. For us, Enrique arrived at 9 AM to visit briefly with Jeff, Reagan and Carter and to meet the rest of the crew. We dumped the last trash bag, loaded Enrique’s car and headed out around 10:30 for Mijas.

Faithful followers of jonandjudy.com will remember that Enrique was our host for the Madrid portion of our Portugal/Spain trip in 2018. He’s the guy our folks brought in as a senior at good old Hillsdale High after Doug and I had headed out for parts away from home. So in that sense, we share a common set of parents.

We returned to Marbella by 3:20, in time to meet Javiar’s girlfriend, Clara, who let us into the garage and showed us the apartment It’s a nice, clean, bright two-bedroom one bath affair right on the edge of Old Town. We’re observing siesta and will venture forth for tapas or whatnot after a bit.

We kicked back and relaxed until 8 PM or so and then set out for a walk around Old Town, which is right at our doorstep. The purpose of our walk was to scout out potential restaurants for dinner, to do some window shopping and, for me, to find out what was around the next corner or at the top of the next hill. Eventually we sat down at Lateral, a tapas restaurant. We ended up with seven tapas plates plus two for desert. The Plaza Naranja was busy, the weather was pleasant and so was the company.

Tomorrow we’re off to explore Malaga.