Malaga
To Rafa and Paco
Malaga is sweet as its own wines, tasty as the fried fish, which they say is seasoned differently from the rest of Andalusia, finest, as the exquisite eaten raw clams. Malaga is the essence of ancient cultures in the Mediterranean Andalusia.
Essences that in the old town, between the heights of Gibralfaro and Guadalmedina River runs through the main artery Marqués de Larios Street, which has become a nice walk in the heart of the city. Here is an architecture that combines modernist and Art Deco elements, facades with round corners. It may be a simple way to prevent the devil to hide. Larios is transformed when it reaches Constitution Square, from there on it becomes Granada Street, the old Real street named so because the Catholic Monarchs entered this way when they took over the city in 1487. The square of the constitution had welcomed the council offices until 1869 when finally, in 1911, moved to Casona del Parque neo-baroque building. It was also named Plaza de las Cuatro Calles until after the promulgation of the Constitution of the Cortes of Cadiz in 1812 happened to be the current name for the first time. Before returning to this denomination was renamed Freedom, Federal Republic, April 14 and Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera.
Since the last renovation in 2003 the whole area is free of traffic and the Genoese fountain was reinstalled facing to the narrow entrance of the Chinitas Passage which occupies the place where the convent of the Discalced Augustinians was and a little theatre which closed in 1937, the Café de Chinitas. Next to the square is still the home of the Consulate and the Old Jesuit College. At the end of the Granada street is Plaza de la Merced with an obelisk at its centre and the birthplace of Picasso converted into a foundation.
The nearby Plaza del Obispo share the Episcopal Palace and the facade of the Renaissance Cathedral of the Incarnation, the Manquita, the faulty, a nickname gained because the South bell tower remained unfinished. After was considered that precisely that fact gave it a personality and a sign of special identity.
Very close to the cathedral is the church of St. Augustine and the Picasso Museum and just behind the ancient Jewry, between the streets of San Augustine and Alcazabilla. The latter was also closed to traffic after the opening of the tunnel of the Citadel in 1999. In it you can admire the Roman theatre which was not discovered until 1951. Behind it the walls of the Alcazaba Moorish fortress and just behind the chairs and tables of sidewalk cafes, including the old Pimpi tavern occupying the space of the Palacio de Buenavista former stables and that have been space for flamenco gatherings and starring social circles as the one of writer Gloria Fuertes in the seventies.
Along the seafront Paseo del Parque was built up over the years in an area reclaimed from the sea. There looms the buildings of the old Customs House, the neomudejar Old Post which now houses the Rector and the neoclassical Bank of Spain and the City Hall. In its gardens grows Mediterranean and subtropical vegetation, including statues of some famous personages from the city. Before arrive to Malagueta Bullring extends on the right hand the homonymous district with its beaches and lighthouse promenade which closes the harbour.
From Gibralfaro fortress walls a rough idea of all this may be made and about the new neighbourhoods that have grown up around the old core where before flourished Phoenicians, Romans, Byzantines and Muslims.
© J.L.Nicolas
