Montejaque is a Holiday Village in the Costa del Sol

Historically HOLIDAY RENTALS IN COSTA DEL SOL is made up of many small fishing villages along the coast and a few white villages inland among the mountain ranges. There was a trend of British gangsters escaping English justice during the 1970s and 1980s by moving to the Costa del Sol, giving it the nickname “Costa del Crime”. Marbella though in the 1950s became known as a playground for the mega rich actors, film stars, presidents and their families, who would indulge themselves with parties and sun and since then has become a popular destination for tourists.

Nowadays Costa del Sol tourism is moving away from both reputations, offering tourists alternative destinations from the sun, sea and sangria. With more and more villages opening their doors to holidaymakers, like those further inland, other activities have become popular. Horse riding, climbing, caving, mountain biking, gorge descents and abseiling have all added to the list along with swimming and surfing.

The biggest problem for a lot of the small villages is the gradual loss of the inhabitants looking for golden roads elsewhere: they are no longer a place where the local grows up and eventually becomes the farm boy who meets the farm girl and lives out his life in the family home. The young want to explore, leaving the towns and villages to go to waste while they search their fortunes elsewhere. Many homes have become silent and empty. Property developers have taken the opportunity and have bought many of these properties turning them into small holiday villas with pools.

Mountejaque is a prime example: nestled in the rolling hills just 20 minutes by car to Ronda and 140 kilometres from Malaga. Parking is not easy and the best thing often is leave the car outside of the village and walk in. The narrow ancient cobbled streets make it difficult for cars to enter, and if they do just as hard to turn around. There is a small plaque commemorating the loss of inhabitants to such far off places, all starting back in the 17th century when so many left for the Americas.

These small villages offer all the amenities of the large cities only on smaller scale. While in the city nearly everyone met is likely to be a tourist, in the villages the local people are often the elderly that spend their days sitting on stools in their porches while the chickens, dogs and goats roam freely. The village sits in part of the Grazalema Natural Park, a Karstic region surrounded by complex mountain ranges known as the Sierra de Grazalema, home of colonies of vultures and other wildlife the region is also filled with limestone caverns. So there are plenty of HOLIDAY RENTALS IN COSTA DEL SOL places to walk through and see.