Pileta Cave and Arco de la Frontera

Leaving our cliffside town of Ronda, we drove 12 twisty, winding miles to visit the Pileta Cave. The cave was high up the mountain, so we climbed innumerable uneven stone steps, huffing our way to the top. Inside the cave was more uneven ground (wet) and more steps.

The group was all Spanish-speaking except us, and the guide offered 2 sentences of heavily accented, rapid fire English for every 300 sentences in Spanish. No matter. We'd read about the cave and much of it was repeating what we'd read. On the walls were cave paintings by prehistoric people up to 30,000 years ago. The majority of the cave (where most of the paintings are) is not open to the public. In addition to some stick figures of animals, there were quite a few calendars (just black lines in groupings), including fertility calendars of 10 lunar months (9 calendar).

Onward to Arco de la Frontera, where we'll stay 2 nights. Charlie wanted to take the scenic route, which turned out to be over and around mountains and hills; winding, twisting, and driving on perilously narrow roads, mostly 15-20 mph. He decided that the more direct and faster route was actually more scenic because, while it was also through winding hills and mountains, it had wider roads so he could actually look at the scenery!

Like all the other cliffside towns, Arcos has an old and new town. Also like other cliffside towns, walking is either steeply uphill or steeply downhill on narrow cobblestone streets! We strolled through old town at dusk, noticing that many buildings are dated to the 1500s. More exploring tomorrow.Read more