Ronda - The Most Beautiful Town

Ronda - The Most Beautiful Town

With an Arab spirit, medieval streets and a mountain range sculpted by the passage of time, Ronda, in the Spanish province of Malaga, is proclaimed as one of the most spectacular towns in Andalusia - and in the whole world.

Looking at Ronda is an exercise of humility. One feels small before so much beauty (natural and monumental). A land of bandits and legends, of footprints fossilized by history and of streets where you can get lost forever.

It is not a coincidence that its old town has been declared an Asset of Cultural Interest, because after its first Neolithic inhabitants, Celts, Phoenicians, Romans and Arabs passed through here until the Catholic Kings conquered it in 1485.

A city divided by a natural canyon, the Tajo that forms the Guadalevín River, and joined by a spectacular 18th century bridge that attracts travellers and tourists from all corners of the world. A balcony overlooking the Serranía de Ronda, with a medieval layout and Arab reminiscences, a romantic atmosphere and stories of bandits.

A place to spend a weekend full of culture, history, architecture and, of course, gastronomy.

The Tajo de Ronda is the most visited place in the whole province of Malaga, the visual peak of a city that seems to hang from the sky. It is a gorge almost 100 meters deep excavated by the Guadalevín river on which stands, among others, the Puente Nuevo, the true emblem of this mountain city, an object of worship of countless artists and poets.

Designed between 1751 and 1793 by the Cuenca architect José Martín de Aldehuela, more than 40 years were needed to build this bridge of 70 meters long and 98 meters high, due to the dangerousness of the land (previously another one of different structure had been built, which collapsed, and according to the story, killed several dozens of people).

Such is its beauty that legend has it that Aldehuela died when he threw himself into the Tajo de Ronda from the bridge, in order to avoid building a bridge that would surpass him in beauty, or perhaps because he thought he could never build something so sublime again.

Returning to the Tajo de Ronda, it is said that there are days when the wind blows so hard that even some drops of water from the river reach the bridge. That's why in Ronda it is said that "sometimes it rains up". But that's not all. Leaving the bridge, but not the river, Ronda offers us an impressive walk along the edge of the ravine, until we arrive at the famous "Balcón del Coño", so called because many people, when looking out over the abyss from the viewpoint, let out this suddenness before turning back.

If, in spite of the vertigo, we dare to look, perhaps we will feel a little less earthly when we see that the birds fly under the feet of those who lean out of the Tajo.

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