Los Cocos son locos: Our first weekend in Alozaina

We spent our first weekend in Spain in Malaga which is about the size of Milwaukee. This is our first weekend in Alozaina, and it's quite different here. Alozaina is about the size of New Glarus, population ~2000. We went grocery shopping yesterday afternoon not knowing if anything would be open on Sunday, and there was no bread to be found. Not at the bakery, not at the small markets, not at the big market. Literally, no bread. Lesson learned: get out shopping early on Saturday if you want bread on Sunday.

We are slowly figuring out the ebb and flow of life in Alozaina but have yet to figure out when to dine out. We went out for tapas on Friday evening about 5 PM. Several places were closed, and the rest of them were empty. We think they eat at 2 and 10 PM here. Maybe next week we'll get it right?

We have been cooking most meals at home so we can get the girls to bed at a reasonable hour. We made a menu and shopped at the big market yesterday. Most people here have rolling cooler bags to haul their groceries home, but we just use our backpacks. Here's a pic of us carrying home our purchases: food, wine and the ever-important jumbo pack of TP.

We get sun on our upper porch from 3:30 to 5 PM, so we decided to enjoy it with some appetizers (amidst the laundry). Haila made guacamole. We also had meat, cheese and local olives, and then Shawn made paella for dinner. It was delicioso!

Several people have asked for photos of our house, so I'm including a few. The photo below is the front of the house. It has tile below the windows. As you can see, there is no yard. You literally step from the street into the house. The street is really narrow, only wide enough for one car.

Our main living area is one room, with the kitchen on one end, the living room in the middle and the wood furnace and dining table on the other end. The kitchen is tiny but quite functional. There's not a lot of storage, probably because they shop often if not every day.

The house does not have central heating, so we have to build a fire in the furnace to warm the room up. There is one bedroom off the dining space and two more upstairs. We bought a space heater for the bathroom as it's very cold otherwise. I am sure it's nice in the Summer to have a cool house, but it sure is cold in the Winter! Brrrr!!!

I am fascinated by the dogs in this town. Most of them are off leash and just follow their owners around. They never bark. They show no aggression. They sit outside the shops waiting patiently. It's awesome.

These two appear to be the mascots at Aliah's school as they are sitting at the gate every day. As you can see, they are on a leash, but they sit quietly and watch as parents and kids ramble by. I am not sure who they belong to, but they are just so cute! If dogs were allowed in our rental, I might just adopt a pup here.

There isn't much for green space here in town, at least not that we've discovered so far. We visited a "park" near our house on Friday. The photo below shows the girls at the gate to the park. The view is amazing, and I think it would be a great place to practice yoga but not so fun for the kids. We'll keep looking.