A correspondent for National Geographic magazine made in the 20s of last century a trip from Malaga to Gibraltar. He avoided the train because it took 12 hours to cover the trip and so he took a bus, which did in five hours. He reported that he suffered some problems during the trip and when they crossed the river Guadiaro there was no way to carry on: the boat that crossed the shore capsized and the vehicle fell into the river.

It was a company bus from Automobiles Portillo, who at that time began to operate.

The ordeal ended with the correspondent walking to the town of Guadiaro, where they got some horses and a mule for the luggage. Two hours later they arrived at San Roque and rented a car that would take them to Gibraltar, the final destination. These were times when the principal and most reliable means of transportation was the train that was gradually losing ground due to the arrival of the car but also by creation of the Bus Company Portillo.

This bus company, which currently has a fleet of 180 vehicles, operates 93 lines and has offices in all the bus stations along the Costa del Sol until La Linea de la Concepcion, travels each year 16 million miles and carries 20 million passengers.

Cars Portillo was founded by a family that came from the town of Huesca, in Granada. The owner, known as Paquita Portillo, had a simple majority of the shares. The story goes that she gave a small portion to a trusted person. And there the case got complicated: that friend sold it to Ricardo Villar and thus the woman lost the majority. Soon after, this well known businessman in tourism in the Costa del Sol bought all the shares in the firm and became the owner of the transport business. Paquita did not collapse and, far from it, invested some of the money she received for the sale to build the Malaga Palacio Hotel, which currently manages AC Hotels. Portillo is currently run by the British venture capital fund Doughty Hanson.