Day 85: Beach West of Malaga (Cycle)

It's been a while in gestation but, I have a plan! I have decided to return to the UK via Madrid. The reason being I once was going to visit in the 90s but the trip had to be cancelled and, thus, I never did make it to the Madrid nor the Prado Museum. So I'm going to go there on the way home!

In the meantime, there is more cycling to be done; because we can and we love it!

Today's excursion was to El Torcal Alto at an altitude of 1225 metres: Starting at about 2 metres above sea level - although my Garmin GPS was indicating an elevation of minus 87 metres!

Since I was primarily concerned with the climb I hadn't found out anything about the mountain. So didn't appreciate that it was both geologically interesting (the mountain is formed of limestone and, thus, was once under water) and had a restaurant and visitors centre: I was interested in the geology and enjoyed the ice cream!

Here's a view from the summit:

On the way there I passed through Almogia:

And at roughly the half way mark I got my first glimpse of the summit:

On returning to my van I discovered "the neighbours from hell" had moved in next door! Fortunately, they eventually became "good neighbours" at about 8pm when the country music was turned off; the alcohol induced loud talking/shouting ceased; and they retired to their motorhomes; so relative peace and quiet was restored!

• Distance driven: 0
• Distance cycled: 102 km
• Weather: Similar to yesterday.

Today's route: