Los Dos

La Costa del Steel – Manholes, Mysteries & Musings

21 manholes curated in 24 hours on the seaside streets of Spain’s Costa del Sol. With my wife back in the U.S. for a bit I drove from our expat home in Córdoba, to the Costa del Steel, in search of some industrial art you can walk on. And photograph.

I’ve determined to share two shots per cover: 1) the MHC, highlighted at center, and 2) the street view where the MHC lives. I’ve added some commentary, but I’m doing my best not to suggest too much about the findings since I’m not terribly knowledgable in the art and science of manhole covers just yet.

If manhole covers are not your cup of sTeel, I will be sharing another Los Dos post that focuses on the the more above-ground aspects of the trip. Plus Ella, my ever-present canine compadre when prowling the streets with a phone camera. So stay tuned for that.

Motril

This cover caught my eye as it has no markings for place or function, but features a pattern I haven’t seen before. Funloisa is presumably an acronym-ish rendering of the name of the Spanish foundry who likely made this, Fundición Lopez Iniesta SL. I imagine the foundry’s name explains the LI.
When you go photographing with your dog on a leash it’s not always possible to keep the pooch out of the shot. Say hello to Ella.

Salobreña

Salobreña is about 8 km west of Motril and a good deal smaller than its neighboring town. Yet, richer in steel enticements, I found. And mystery.

Beautiful classic cover. Lovely city seal. Except this isn’t the coat of arms of Salobreña. Google Lens couldn’t find the image at the center of this manhole cover. Nor is it the seal of the Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Urbanismo (MOPU) — Ministry of Public Works — if Google is to be believed. We’ll see more of this mysterious coat of arms later.
Also not the coat of arms of Salobreña. But there’s a motto here, at center, that reads: CIVITAS SEXIS FOR MENSIS, SPQ, which, as Latin goes, “is erroneous and of dubious origin. It refers to the identification of Motril with Sex, a Phoenician town, or Sexi Firmum Iulium, a Roman town.” It would appear that correct Latin might formulate civic strength as “CIVITAS SEXIFIRMENSIS”. Besides, we’re in Salobreña, not Motril. Mayhaps a practical joke between two small Mediterranean towns along the Costa del Sol?
Can’t argue wth this loevely run of the mill cover.

Velilla-Taramy

I made one more stop along the coastal road on my way to Estepona, my destination for the night. Velilla-Taramy is a village of about 3,000 people. I was here, paused in my passage west, because I felt like I should go and check on the Mediterranean sea, the actual beach, which I’d so far neglected in favor of the siren song of the streets of steel. But the village kindly offered up a manhole cover on the way to the playa.

Same coat of arms found in Salobreña. No city identified on this one. The plot thickens.
Oh, there’s the beach!

Estepona

The section of the Coata del Sol I sampled was honestly a little dispiriting in that it was mainly highrise after highrise by the endless beach. I wasn’t expecting anything, to be honest, but miles upon miles of decidedly not small Spanish towns was what I found. And more than one traffic jam heading to Estepona.

I hadn’t really put much thought in the logisitics of this quick trip south, to be sure. Motril and Estepona are equidistant from Malaga, which is a more or less 2-hour cruise north up the A-45 Autovia to Córdoba. My goal was to cover some coastal towns in this range.

It turns out my hotel was quite a ways from the old part of Estepona, in a part of town that was newer but which had already seen better days. I took Ella to the beach, where I found some decaying shuttered cabanas. And an old manhole cover being eclipsed by an old planter.

I was feeling like we were not off to a good start in Estepona. But in the morning we got in the car and drove the 10km to town center, which was a completely different picture.

There were two of these in a litlle plaza in downtown Estepona. Most likely for collection of rain runoff. Only a tad smaller than a regular manhole cover, they didn’t strike me as all that heavy duty. Probably there to direct rain water. Pretty cute, nonetheless.
Next I found two of these Saneamiento lids, about 200 feet from one another.
Nearly identical, these two. Except for… do you see it?
There’s something about these weathered and timeworn covers whose stories I’d like to know.
Looks like the same foundry and design. Love the stars. I hadn’t seen one behore that references Pluviales, or rain water.

Marbella

Like the other towns on the Costa del Sol, Marbella had its condos in the sky along the beach. But more than that. A real Spanish city full of history, a km inland, that predated the invention of sun block in a bottle. My disappointing drive along the coast highway became a little love affair when I walked the old town center in search of ground-bound metal plates.

I dunno about you, but this simply looks old. And we’re back to the mystery in the coat of arms which is not the coat of arms of any of the small citiies I visited.
Here’s an actual Marbella coat of arms.
Another one that just feels old. I love the ambiguous simplicty of AGUAS.
Hmm, so we have an iron foundry at play. Looks like the ubiquitous Sevilla. But what the heck is the Cooperativa Obrera Metalurgica de R.L.? Interesting…

Malaga

On to Malaga. Final stop before heading norte to Córdoba. I would not have guessed I’d spot more interesting covers in Marbella than in any other town I’d breezed through. But Malaga also had its share of both the mundane and the intriguing.

But first… your standard Rexess/PAM offering configured for Malaga.
Malaga coat of arms. I’d guess there’s a good bit of worn off micro fragments of this one wandering around town on the bottoms of pedestrians’ shoes.
Two new things for me on this one: 1) I haven’t see a Telefónica cover with a logo in italics, and 2) this lid was really big. 30% bigger, I’d guess than your standard MHC.

And so our blazing tour of the Costa del Steel comes to a close. Hope you enjoyed one or two finds from the vieja. Please do add a comment if you can help shed light on some of the mysteries introduced here.

Saludos!

Discover more from Los Dos

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Gary Rees

, ,

6 responses to “La Costa del Steel – Manholes, Mysteries & Musings”

  1. Very cool Gary. I’ll have to pay more attention to manhole covers, but I doubt I will find any as interesting as the ones you have found. Toodles and keep on carrying on with interesting and insightful blog 🥳

    Reply

    • The manhole cover begot the sidewalk. Lest one would have to jump from cover to cover. If we rotate 45 degrees you’ll crane your neck trying to read the circle of steel. So I saved you that trouble. So nice to see you, my friend!! I hope you’re doing well. We’re venturing on as ever. 🙂

      Reply

  3. Hi Gary, just got back from Seattle watching my Detroit Tigers beat the Mariners. Manhole covers, dear to my heart. Believe it or not when I was growing up in Detroit I would collect the street coins. The D has been around since 1701 and also had the first Xpress way in the US. Us kids would go to the scrap yards and find classic covers from Victorian, Deco, on and on. The big problem was they are tough to hang on the walls. The plaster was blasted from the weight. So we would make patios out of them, covers all the weeds and I didn’t have to mow so much lawn. Worked great. Created 3rd degree burns on bare feet in the summer but looked really cool. Beautiful foundry art and great weight for scrap metal prices. So yeah, love those photos. Like the hinged ones, rare items. Need more hints on the two covers you compared. Carry on amigo. Have a Pilsner on me. Jim

    Reply

Leave a Reply