Connected!

Time is flying here in Tarifa - we are having fun getting to know the town and surrounding areas. And, I am exciting to report that we now have a mobile phone, after almost a year of being out of reach (except when I go to Internet cafes.) To call us from the US, dial
011 34 663 731 938. If you can't visit, at least you can call!

Not much else to report (so much for the excitement of world travels!) but we did visit one of the lovely "white villages" - called Vejer - nearby. Matthias also caught some fish - pictures (or proof) to come. This week, we plan to do some hiking. It has rained a bit here, and Matthias hopes to find some mushrooms. We are also going to Gibraltar this week - a pretty short bus ride away (and, it counts as a new country for me, right Jen??)

Will write again in a few weeks. Until then, feel free to write....or CALL!

More from Tarifa - and el Pimpi, too!

I know the last entry was pretty lame, but I really just wanted to get our address down and get out of the internet cafe. I'm writing this entry on paper first, while sitting on our terrace facing the sea and the coast of Africa (sickening, I know.) We signed a 3-month lease on a one-bedroom apartment here - we plan to stay for five months, be we were told that it wouldn't be a problem (or extra cost) to extend the lease, and, typical of me, I took the shorter option in case we find something cheaper and better in the meantime (but I can't imagine that we will and it isn't necessary anyway.) We've got a good kitchen - all pots and pans provided - a washing machine (a luxury for us), the tv gets about 10 channels for a variety of Spanish novelas, and the plastic patio furniture is more than adequate. We just bought a grill and fishing pole for Matthias...so we're all set.

So here we are at the southernmost tip of Spain (and perhaps of europe.) Matthias is very happy to get to relax, although his idea of relaxing - as I'm sure I've mentioned before - is hiking 15km into the mountains. And I'm already looking at little side trips: Morocco is only 15 km away (but the ferry is EXPENSIVE at 60 Euros r/t); Sevilla is about a two-hour bus ride away; and Portugal, well I haven't gotten that far with the research yet.

Being at the tip of the continent, at the Atlantic side of the strait of Gibraltar, it is always windy here and a haven for kite and wind surfers. I imagine that will make it pretty cold during the winter, but at least not when compared to New York or GErmany. and, I'm going to look into taking Spanish classes over the winter, so we'll see how that turns out.

Now a little about our trip here. We did take the bus from Germany and it wasn't all that bad. We both slept okay and enjoyed the view (from the highway) of the French countryside, the Pyranees mountains, and the coast north of Barcelona. We got to Barcelona on time, but when we went to buy train tickets, the tourist class seats were sold out. So we ended up in a sleeper car for two on the overnight train to Malaga. Not great for the wallet, but nice for sleeping, and we arrived in Malaga feeling good and refreshed.

We decided to look in Malaga for apartments, just in case Tarifa (which we both had our hearts set on) didn't work out. Unfortunately, since we arrived on Sunday, we couldn't get very far with the search. We saw a few signs, bought the newspaper and called a few phone numbers, but couldn't find anything to view that day. WE decided to leave for Tarifa the next day anyway, having found a couple of affordable listings we knew we could come back to. The only thing left to do was to visit my favorite bar/restaurant...El Pimpi, and to make Matthias wait up until 9:30 or so when it opened. He gave me a hard time, especially when we got there shortly after 9pm and he thought it would be open already (but I just wanted to get there early to be sure to get a seat at the bar.) Fortunately, at 9:25 other people showed up to wait, and although the doors didn't open until 9:50 by which time Matthias was fuming, all anger subsided when the olives, peanuts and beer were placed before us, the spanish music started playing, and we orded our fresh seafood - gambas al Pimpi and gambas a la plancha. I wasn't sure if it would be as good as I remembered (8 years ago!) but it was....even Matthias didn't want to leave until around 1am! He is also willing to take the bus back to Malaga one day just to go there.
(click on the link to see a photo at El Pimpi from 8 years ago: http://www.geocities.com/jrosenyc/pimpi.html)

But for now we are quite content to eat seafood from the supermarket, the fish market, or the sea (when Matthias goes fishing) and prepared by Matthias in our kitchen. We hope someone will come visit us here - either soon while the weather is stil quite pleasant or over the winter to help me celebrate the big 4-0. Until then, take care and I'll write again soon.

a few more pictures from our apartment and Tarifa at the following link: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jrosenyc/album?.dir=80e2re2&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jrosenyc/my_photos

Hola de Tarifa!!

Just a quick note to let everyone know that we found a place in Tarifa. It's a one-bedroom apartment, right on the beach (yes, there's a sofa-bed in the living room....so please come and visit!) I fell in love with this town from the moment we got here. It's somewhat touristy, but mostly with wind- and kite-surfer types, so it doesn't have the high-rise resorts found in most towns outside of Malaga. And there's also a good local scene and an active fishing port. We can see Africa from our terrace and we are about 35 minutes from Tangier by ferry (or so the ads say.) We don't have a phone, but here is our address in case anyone wants to send us a snail mail greeting!

Calle Mar Cantabrico
Apartamento 16-A
Los Lances Playa 1º fase
11380 Tarifa CADIZ
España

Next update will have photos, I hope.