Benaoján, May 14 +15

 I had a plan.  It was to do a walk called the Montejaque Circuit.  But to do this (from where I am staying) you first had to go back up a very big hill, along a major highway, find the ayuntamiento (town hall) in said town, all of which would take a minimum of 40 minutes, more likely an hour or more, do the walk, which, when I read the description closely, made me a little bit nervous, and then, do the reverse highway route to get back to the hotel.  Even a modified plan turning The Circuit into out-and-back, lost its appeal, what with all that highway walking, so scrap that.  Instead, I decided to walk from Benaoján back to Ronda, a route different from the one I had taken Ronda to Montejaque.  A splendid decision!  

The walk was a combination of easy, kind of hard, interesting, and utterly boring, and all this in less than four hours!  

Why, what is this?  Someone left an herramienta (tool) in the road:

It may have been useful for fixing up this house, dated 1912:

But this house was quite inviting, what with the roses and open door:

Arriving in Ronda, I found that streets were blocked off because of some sort of race.  I also found out that the ice cream establishments don't do ice cream at 11:30 a.m.—bummer—and furthermore that no taxi seemed available for the return to Benaoján, most likely due to the race.  So...I WhatsApped Carlos, the very kind dueño of the apartment I had stayed in in Ronda, who gave me the number of Estaban, the taxista, but Estaban was in Malaga at the moment, so he gave me the number of another taxista, whom I had already called but who had not answered. After several tries, he did. But could I understand a word he was saying?  I could not!  I handed the phone to the woman in the bar, from whom I had just purchased an agua con gas; she and he sorted it out, the taxi arrived, and we were on the way!

When I came into my room,  something was scurrying across the floor.  A mouse?!  No, it was a gecko!  I had a pet!  But not for long.

At about 5:00, I felt the urge for another little walk, and so, apparently, did a couple from England because we meet on the path and walked together.  Soon, we had even more company:

It was a fine time for everyone to be out.