Help Me Ronda

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The receptionist in the Hotel Polo forgot the first rule of hotel keeping this afternoon:

"Never start a fight with a bloke who has climbed 6000 feet to get to your hotel and hasn't had a beer yet".

They teach this before the coffee break on day 1 of hotel school but maybe she was off sick or something.

We had completed most of the check in formalities when she said "I see you have bicycles, we do not allow bicyles in the building.....it says it in the small print of your booking".  She helpfully suggested we could lock them up in the public car park.  Our bikes are now safely in the hotel and the receptionist has usefully filled a gap in her training.

Last night we visited a Chinese Buffet, a popular choice of ours as regular readers will know.  This one was better than most with a wide choice of nicely cooked food including.....and this is the gold standard for such places.....crispy duck pancakes.   We staggered out an hour later to go shopping for looser trousers.

Today we cycled to Ronda.  Ronda is 60 miles from Malaga but, crucially, up a sodding great hill.  I suppose technically it is up 3 sodding great hills but the brief downhill interludes barely registered, so great was my suffering and misery.  I am told that the scenery was off the scale but for me to have noticed that would be like Anne Boleyn saying "ooh, that is a nice shiny axe".

Ronda is absolutely heaving.  I know it is a popular tourist spot but exactly what has attracted many thousands of visitors on a Saturday in February has yet to be ascertained.  

I have now had a bath and a beer....okay 2.....and might go down and build some bridges with the receptionist.

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