Three decades sharing online the magic of Andalusian life

The independent online guide, andalucia.com, is celebrating its 30th birthday this year. Since launching on 17 April 1996, the platform has established itself as a reliable cornerstone of southern Spain's travel and cultural scene, consistently reaching over 300,000 monthly visitors through decades of change.

The idea for the initiative began in 1984, when a young civil engineer born in Manchester in 1959 took a sabbatical from his engineering position to embark on a backpacking journey across South America. Six years later, and with the basics of Spanish, Chris Chaplow and his partner Michelle, a highly respected hotel and travel photographer, chose to start a new life in Spain.

However, they soon faced a challenge: Chris's engineering qualifications were not easily recognised due to differences between British and Spanish university accreditation systems. But, a chance postcard from a friend in Gibraltar offered a solution - Chris could work on the Rock.

The couple settled in Estepona in January 1991 and married the following year in Sotogrande. They spent their weekends exploring the surrounding region, with Michelle capturing its spectacular landscapes, pretty white villages and vibrant local fiestas through her camera lens. The couple were attracted to the region by the depth of the culture and the popularity of old traditions, which, Chris says, "sat comfortably alongside modern-world items".

"I have had the privilege of visiting over 70 countries, and Andalucía is my home of choice: it is one of the most beautiful places in the world. We were impressed by the culture, the old traditions and the sheer quantity of monuments and historic and archaeological sites, many of which were free to visit and seemingly forgotten," Chris tells SUR in English.

In the early 1990s, Lookout Magazine commissioned an article about foreign residents who were using the internet. They could only find four English- speaking foreign residents in all of Andalucía with an internet connection, and Chris was one of them.

By 1995, Chris and his university friend Chris Mason were building Tizz.com, a compendium of Spanish links. The transition to andalucia.com, which Chris describes as a "leap of faith", cost 100 dollars to register (on a complicated email plain text template) and 250 pounds sterling for annual hosting - "serious money when funds were tight".

Chris announced his proposed project in a restaurant in April 1996, to which a friend replied, "I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about, but let's drink to that!"

"At that time, even Yahoo only had around 50 references to Spain and zero for Andalucía. It's hard to imagine now, but when we first flickered into existence, the information superhighway was more of a dirt track. Back then, the internet was a world of high-pitched modem squeaks and internet for dummies guidebooks," he says, laughing.

Michelle began freelancing for the state press agency Efe and won a government tender from the Spanish tourist board to photograph 700 km of the Spanish coastline, stretching from Alicante to Huelva. These images became part of the national tourism archive.

While Michelle (one of the first photographers in Spain to adopt digitalising analogue prints) captured the region's beauty and built an extensive slide library, Chris was busy experimenting with a 1200 baud modem and an Amstrad PC2286 desktop.

"This was a light bulb moment. I was the first person out of seven million living in Andalucia to have the happy idea of creating a website about it. By March 1996, we had three elements in place: the internet publishing know-how, thousands of images of Andalucía and an engineering desire to organise the information," Chris explains.

Three decades later, that "kernel of an idea" has grown from a "hobbyist's passion" into the definitive resource for the place that Chris and Michelle have grown to love. In 1996, Chris and Michelle essentially managed the business on their own. Today, however, in addition to their office staff in Estepona, they are supported by a team of freelance writers who specialise in all aspects of Andalusian life.

The English edition now comprises over 11,000 pages, while the Spanish edition offers 3,500. Chris is now looking forward to the future and the platform will soon be launching a new modern-looking theme.

"Longevity in the digital world is earned through trust. We focus on providing accurate, up-to-date overviews and evergreen content rather than news. There is no substitute for a journalist who is an expert on his or her subject. A lot of my time is spent on research, before pages are written. I love delving into history," Chris concludes.

As it enters its fourth decade, Chris is hoping the website will continue to serve as a key resource for anyone travelling to or discovering Andalucía.