Why Yes, I HAVE Been to Rivendell

I know I’ve already made a Lord of the Rings reference, but this time it’s actually deserved. 
  

This weekend we went to Ronda. It’s a little town in Málaga, Andalucía, a good two hours from Seville by bus. Some Celtic guy, possibly missing a few marbles, back in the 6th century BC decided to start a settlement on top of this enormous plateau, and voilà, Ronda (or as it was first named, Arunda) was born. The town changed hands several times over the course of its history, including back and forth between christian and islamic rulers, which has led to some pretty brutal history. The city’s position does make sense for strategic reasons: perched up there, any Rondan can stand on the edge of the enormous  cliffs and gaze out for miles at the surrounding land, at least before the ragged hills dissolve into mountains. 

There is, though, a deep canyon, smack dab in the middle of this plateau, that splits Ronda completely in half. Roughly 120m tall and probably only 30-40m wide, this thing is dramatically vast - and even cooler is the bridge they’ve built spanning it. Well, technically, there are three bridges crossing the Guadalevín river that carves through the bottom, but the Puente Nuevo (“New Bridge”, although it’s technically older than the good ol’ US of A) is by far the most impressive. It spans the canyon at the divide’s tallest point, arches reaching across one to the next to link the two halves of Ronda. The town’s white-walled houses cluster close to both ends and peer out over the edge of the cliffs. Spilling out below the bridge and tumbling down the hillside is a waterfall formed by the Guadalevín, and up above it, flocks of black birds tipped with beaks a vibrant orange color wheel between the arches. Yup, welcome to Rivendell: 

Fun fact about this bridge: directly above the central main arch, there’s a room inside that yellow brick, and it turns out that used to be where they’d stash criminals waiting to be hanged. Nowadays, there are only folks who choose to dangle from ropes - I watched no less than two big groups of people rappel down the waterfall, and boy, was I jealous.

For more pictures of Ronda, be sure to check out my MobileMe Gallery.