Obama!!

Our first day in Marbella. We planned to take it easy. We slept in and woke up just in time to make breakfast at the resort restaurant. Now everyone knows that Spain is a pretty laid back country, but they serve breakfast 9-11 or 10-Noon. Lunch begins at Noon if you're lucky but usually 1. And 8pm is the earliest you could possibly think of eating dinner. Most shops close 2-4pm or so for siesta. It's tough to be an American used to eating breakfast at 7, lunch at Noon and dinner at 6.


But we had our breakfast and a little bird joined us at our table. After breakfast, we walked over the road to the supermercado, but it was closed. Ah, Sundays in Spain. Not ready to throw in the towel, just yet, we walk over the highway to the centro de commercial and there we find an OpenCor that is indeed open "todo los dios". We spend about 50 Euro buying breakfast stuff, fruit, veg, and stuff for a few lunches or dinners. We walk around and check out the place and see that there are quite a few pubs and restaurants and they will all be showing the same football (that's soccer for you Yanks) game at 1500. We decide to come back and watch if nothing else comes up between now and then.

After taking our purchases back to our condo, we decide to head to the beach and explore some of the neighbourhood. It's a short walk, past clay tennis courts, to Tony's cafe on the beach. We head down the steps, past the palapas and towards Marbella. After walking for a while, we decide to turn around and walk back. But when we get to Tony's, we keep walking toward Fuengirola just to see what else there is to see. We stop when we come to a jetty that will require me to climb rocks to pass and head back to Tony's.

We sit on the patio and drink dos canas while watching the waves and the people. There are quite a few people on the beach considering it's November. There is even a woman sunbathing topless! BRR. I am fascinated by the two English guys surf fishing near the restaurant. Would they really catch anything? Would it be worth eating? Or do they just want an excuse to sit on the beach and drink beer?

While we are sitting there, African guys selling bootleg DVDs, jewelry, and knockoff watches and handbags, are constantly stopping by the table to sell to us. We tell all of them "No". One asks if we are Americans. When we say yes, he says "Obama!!" We say "Yes, Obama." He says "Obama is very good man. He will be very good President of America." We say "Yes, we think so too". So he walks away smiling saying "Goodbye Obamas!!"

Before we finish, we realize that it is nearly 4:30pm and so we have missed the football game. We head back to our resort for a short siesta and then Happy Hour at the bar. Our bar has Happy Hour every night 1830-1930. Everything is half price, except bottles and some cocktails. We pretty much stick to Sangria. It's lovely and fruity and fizzy. We sit at the bar and chat up the bartenders. They give us free shots. Sometimes, they have made too much of a cocktail that another customer ordered. Sometimes, they have made the wrong cocktail. Sometimes, they are just experimenting or learning and want to see what we think. But we prater on with our very bad Spanish which makes them laugh so it's all good fun.

Tipsy but happy, we head back to our condo to make dinner, watch the BBC and sleep. It's an early start tomorrow. We are going to another country - Gibraltar!