Rota, Spain; Day 16

We spent most of the day in another coastal town in the Western Andulisia part of Spain called Chipiona. It lies about 10 km (6 miles) north of Rota.

Our destination was the lighthouse which is the tallest in Spain. We were geared up to climb the 350 spiraling stairs.

Before we got there the kids called out from the backseat of the rental car to stop at a playground at the entrance to Chipiona’s city center.

It turns out that our kids are a little too old for most swings and slides. See Lisbon, Day 2 for evidence of their behavior on swings. If, however, the playground has a zip line then they will remain entertained for hours.

Mom and Dad sipped a couple of café con leches and waited them out. Eventually, we had to drive them to move on to lunch nearly 2 hours later.

Chipiona is like Rota in that there are lots of apartments with ground-level restaurants fronting the beach. It was a beautiful day with clear skies and light winds.

After eating a little snack/lunch, we continued walking up the beach to the lighthouse. The kids found another playground but no zip line meant that their interest waned after a short while. Finally it was time to climb the lighthouse to take some gorgeous panoramic photos of the Spanish coastline.

Or, not.

It turns out that the lighthouse closed 45 minutes earlier and will re-open in five days. Sigh…we really need to stop getting waylaid by playgrounds, beaches and snacks.

On this 13 month world trip we have happened upon unexpected events and once-in-a-lifetime moments which couldn’t be planned or anticipated. Today was just fate’s way of taking one experience back. No big deal (the kids would have complained about the stair climb, we tell ourselves). Plus they liked that zip line park so much maybe we’ll go back.

Our visit to the Féria yesterday was fun but we missed the lights at night – so back we went after dinner. Today was also 2 for 1 tickets for carnival rides which gave Mom and Dad a much better price point. The weather tried REALLY hard to rain on us and it came pretty close, we got about 10 minutes of light sprinkles. Somehow, what looked like a nasty weather system went around the Rota fairgrounds and left us with a very pleasant evening.

We rode a few rides and played some carnival games too. CreeperKitty was a pretty good shot with the cork shooting air rifle. He nailed 2 key chains and was pretty happy about it.

We stayed just a little while after the lights went on then took our 10 minute walk back to our apartment. We were all happy but pretty worn out after today’s Adventures exploring a new town and a familiar fair.