directions_bike by Chris Riches -

Adra to La Herradura

The temperature in the morning started off relatively cool, but was quick to rise in the strong sunshine and once I had passed through the busy town of Adra, the route went alongside the coast for most of the day.

The coastal scenery varied from grey isolated beaches to steep cliffs, to beachfront resort towns, where there were some fairly large waves.

I stopped in the middle of the day in Castell de Ferro, for a rest and to get some water and ice, then by the middle of the afternoon the air temperature cooled slightly as the cloud cover increased.

Entering the Granada province, the area of coastline was called the Costa Tropical. The Sierra Nevada mountain range extends to the coast here and the landscape was notably greener. The mountains looked impressive and the highest parts of them were covered in cloud.

The largest single climb was right at the end of the day, with the road winding up out of Almuñécar and then descending in to La Herradura where I was staying at the campsite.

Distance: 56 miles

Maximum temperature: 27 degrees C

Castell de Ferro

Playa La Rijana

La Herradura

directions_bike by Chris Riches -

La Herradura to Malaga

The journey from La Herradura to Malaga crossed from Costa Tropical to Costa del Sol.

I paid the bill at the campsite and left quite early. There were a couple of steep ascents out of La Herradura to start off the morning, and a tunnel where the acoustics hugely amplified the noise of any traffic in either direction. After the tunnel I was overtaken by a couple of German cyclists with panniers, and one later informed me that they had cycled there from Germany in about 22 days. Compared to France it was rare to see any other cyclists with luggage so it was interesting to chat with them.

The cliffside coast road provided nice views towards Nerja, where I diverted to have a look at the town and the steeply sloping seafront area. The town was quite characterful with white traditional style buildings overlooking the sea and narrow old style shopping streets.

As I got closer to Malaga the terrain flattened out with much more development along the coast, including some new construction occurring in the town of Los Llanos where I stopped at the bakery for lunch.

The route then headed inland near Rincón de la Victoria, up a steep path and then dropped down in to a town called Jarazmín on the outskirts of Malaga on the other side of the dry riverbed. The scale of the city started to become apparent as I was cycling alongside the beaches and the city was on my right, it stretched for miles before I reached the city centre.

After checking in to the apartment where I was staying I visited the old part of the city with the Cathedral, Alcazaba and Roman Amphitheatre. There was a small protest about AirBnB near the Roman Amphitheatre. I then walked down through the gardens to the port area with the Pompidou centre and the Muelle Uno shopping area. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to visit any of the cities museums but found that Malaga had some similar elements to Cartagena but was much bigger and there were fewer signs of dilapidation around.

Distance: 45 miles

Maximum temperature: 28 degrees C

Costa Tropical looking towards Nerja

El Acueducto del Águila

Nerja

Malaga

Roman Amphitheatre and Alcazaba, Malaga

Cathedral, Malaga