Matchmaking bus tours hope to spark love in rural Spain
A screenshot of an advertisement for a matchmaking tour on the Caravan of Women website.
Single women of the world: Spain is looking for you.
The men of Candeleda, a tiny riverside town about halfway between Madrid and the Portuguese border, are looking to the Caravan of Women to bring love to them — literally.
The matchmaking tour company specializes in taking busloads of single women to lonely Spanish villages.
Candeleda is among the Spanish villages with dwindling populations that Manuel Gozalo is trying to save with his tours.
His Caravan of Women this weekend took 68 single ladies from Madrid to Candeleda to hopefully make a few love connections, the Associated Press said.
It's excellent timing for Jose Miguel, a 67-year-old man who told the AP he's already "checked out" all the single women and widows in town.
Gozalo started Caravan of Women in 1985 and has since taken single women from around the world to tiny Spanish villages where they in search of true love.
For about $30 women get a round-trip bus ride, a drink, a snack and dinner. Men pay $50.
Gozalo says he's trying to repopulate rural Spain and ease the loneliness of its single male residents.
A Hollywood movie sparked the idea, he says on his website.
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