Calpe

Got our first glimpse of the Mediterranean as we drove out of Andalusia. We were meeting up with Carlos in a couple of days, and needed to make our way over to Barcelona. The drive would have been too long for one day, so we decided to go off plan and head to the Costa Blanca somewhere halfway along the way. We stopped at a smallish town called Calpe which has some nice beaches and some really cool rock formations just off shore. The drive took the better part of an afternoon, so we pretty much crammed all of our activities into one day. We started off the day with a little morning hike up the Peñón d’Ifach, which is a 1100 ft. high rock that towers over the Calpe skyline. The views from here were spectacular, but the way up was a bit treacherous. Parts of the way were closer to light mountaineering rather than hiking. Still, we saw lots of people trying it in less than optimal footwear. One lady even made it halfway up in heeled slippers! From the top, I was able to plan out our beach activities, as we had a 360 degree panorama of the two bays below. I spotted an interesting looking cove below that looked like a great place to explore, so we headed down and got to some swimming. The water was cool and sooo clear! I swam around some rock outcroppings to the cove I had spotted earlier… only to find out that the people hanging around there (literally) were all naked. I had stumbled into a nude beach! I should have known better. I quickly turned back. This was enough adventure for one day.

Check out the pictures:

 http://picasaweb.google.com/richmosko/Calpe

…and here is Calpe on a map:

 Click Here to see Calpe on a map of Spain

One last thing… we had some paella out here and it was fantastic. I didn’t realize that normal paella didn’t have shrimp, but instead was a hearty concoction of chicken, deer, and rabbit. Mmm rabbit. So sweet and delicious. Who knew?

Tags: Spain,Calpe,Beach,Paella