Yesterday we stayed in the apartment for the first part of the morning.  We had a meeting with Philippa, who is our personal contact here. She brought us a bottle of wine, some maps of Marbella, a restaurant guide, and gave us some all-important suggestions of area must-sees. After she left it was almost noon and we decided to just go back to Marbella because, unfortunately, it was raining quite hard.

We tried a few tapas bars, finally settling on La Taberna Del Pintxo, which had been one of Philippa’s suggestions. They have a really neat system there for tapas. First, every table gets olives, which are home-cured and fresh.

If you want cold items, you simply go up to the bar and take them. The cold items are mini gourmet open-faced sandwiches. We each had one to start.

Then, as you sip your small glass of beer or wine, waiters bring around hot tapas items. If you want one, you just take one. They know how much to charge you at the end depending on the color of toothpicks on your plate. We had a quesadilla and some fried shrimp in sauce on baguettes. It was the perfect amount of food and drink and we were able to sit, unbothered for over an hour. Also, the total bill was only 14 Euros!

The Spanish take their siestas seriously. Shops are absolutely closed here from 12-4 p.m. So after lunch, which was almost 4, we decided to drive back toward the resort. The rain wasn’t letting up and so we pulled into a little neighborhood grocery store somewhere in the hills and bought things to make for dinner.

The weather report is a little unclear for today, but for sure there will not be full sun like our first day. So we’re planning on charging up the camera and going to one of the must-sees on our list. Gilbratar, maybe, or Pueblos Blancos.