03-04-2016, 02:36 PM
(This post was last modified: 03-11-2016, 03:07 PM by Drunk Monk.)
I was saddened to leave Cadaques. It was so magical. The sunset light was glowing, ever changing and inspiring. The Mediterranean sea glistened like milk from mother earth. The air was sweet as a lover's breath. I could feel Dali everywhere. It would be wonderful to return someday, but it is very unlikely I ever will.
The push to Sevilla was long - Bus>Commuter Train>Major Train. Sevilla is the other side of Spain, the southwestern region. It took us a whole day and the miles were catching up to us. All of our AirBnB's boasted laundry machines but in Spain this only means washers. No dryers. And in winter, it's damp so nothing dries. In Madrid, there was this odd heated rack that dried a few items at a time very slowly. In Barcelona, we dried clothes over the space heater and with the hair dryer, regularly tripping the fuse box and cutting out all our power. In Cadaques, we just gave up. So we were delighted to get to Sevilla where we had a real hotel. Well, sort of. Actually, it was no better than any of the AirBnB. And no laundry. The first day, Stacy and I made a futile effort to find a laundromat. We found it, hidden down an odd alley, but it only had two washers and never opened. It was frustrating.
It was also raining, not much, but it was the first weather we encountered. I bought a cheap umbrella, like a kid's toy, just in case, but it never got used as it never got quite that wet. Like Barcelona, there was a lot of shops, like a giant Euro mall, and we were a short stroll from the main Cathedral and the Alcazar, both of which were stunning examples of architecture. We saw the Alcazar first, and spent a lot of time looking up at the complex geometry of the Alcazar's Islamic ceilings. And I got totally lost in there - it was so maze-like. But stunning, OCD geometry from that you had to crane your neck to see. The gardens were probably lovely but in the rain, we didn't venture out into them much. We just gazed at them from the balconies.
Sevilla is covered with ornamental orange trees and the orange juice is the best in the world (Valencia is very near - this is orange country). I later learned that the ornamental trees are considered too sour for human consumption and all of that is exported. Nevertheless, the fragrance was heavenly. We found a nice French bakery again, but eating was tricky because of the New Year holiday schedule and the odd timing of Spanish eating. Tara and I did some shopping, eventually finding her a Pimkie jacket that was all the fashion. She had underpacked, and needed some sort of heavier jacket for the whole trip. We finally got it and the damn snap cover broke right away. But I managed to find the cover and fix it after we got home.
For New Year's Eve, Tara and Stacy decided to stay at the Hotel and rest. I went out on my own to the Plaza Nueva, which several locals and web resources said was the place to be for NYE in Sevilla. The NYE custom is to have a big family meal that evening. We were not hip to this, so it was really hard for us to find food because everything was reserved or closed. We wound up grabbing odd snacks at a convenience store. Then you are supposed to have 12 grapes, and eat one for every chime of the midnight from the Plaza Nueva clock tower. So I bought 12 grapes for a euro, which was the most I've ever paid for grapes ever, and waited. The Plaza was pretty empty until about 11:45. Then it got packed. Then the damn clock tower didn't chime, so no one really knew when to eat their grapes (I just ate mine when everyone else did). Then everyone went back home by 12:15. That was rather anticlimactic as I expect more from my NYEs.
The next day was Flamenco day - the main reason we came to Sevilla. It's renowned for Flamenco and bull fighting. Given my family, that meant Flamenco. We went to the Flamenco museum, which was a school and theater, with a museum. There was one Dali there too - a poorly lit piece on Flamenco that I couldn't shoot but was delighted nonetheless. Then we went to a tourist Flamenco show, where we mis-ordered extra Sangria for everyone, which meant I had to drink a lot of sangria, but that was fine. The Flamenco show was awesome - such a macho fusion of Ballet and Tap. The best guy looked like Wil Ferrell, and that was really messing with me.
Next: L'Alhambra.
The push to Sevilla was long - Bus>Commuter Train>Major Train. Sevilla is the other side of Spain, the southwestern region. It took us a whole day and the miles were catching up to us. All of our AirBnB's boasted laundry machines but in Spain this only means washers. No dryers. And in winter, it's damp so nothing dries. In Madrid, there was this odd heated rack that dried a few items at a time very slowly. In Barcelona, we dried clothes over the space heater and with the hair dryer, regularly tripping the fuse box and cutting out all our power. In Cadaques, we just gave up. So we were delighted to get to Sevilla where we had a real hotel. Well, sort of. Actually, it was no better than any of the AirBnB. And no laundry. The first day, Stacy and I made a futile effort to find a laundromat. We found it, hidden down an odd alley, but it only had two washers and never opened. It was frustrating.
It was also raining, not much, but it was the first weather we encountered. I bought a cheap umbrella, like a kid's toy, just in case, but it never got used as it never got quite that wet. Like Barcelona, there was a lot of shops, like a giant Euro mall, and we were a short stroll from the main Cathedral and the Alcazar, both of which were stunning examples of architecture. We saw the Alcazar first, and spent a lot of time looking up at the complex geometry of the Alcazar's Islamic ceilings. And I got totally lost in there - it was so maze-like. But stunning, OCD geometry from that you had to crane your neck to see. The gardens were probably lovely but in the rain, we didn't venture out into them much. We just gazed at them from the balconies.
Sevilla is covered with ornamental orange trees and the orange juice is the best in the world (Valencia is very near - this is orange country). I later learned that the ornamental trees are considered too sour for human consumption and all of that is exported. Nevertheless, the fragrance was heavenly. We found a nice French bakery again, but eating was tricky because of the New Year holiday schedule and the odd timing of Spanish eating. Tara and I did some shopping, eventually finding her a Pimkie jacket that was all the fashion. She had underpacked, and needed some sort of heavier jacket for the whole trip. We finally got it and the damn snap cover broke right away. But I managed to find the cover and fix it after we got home.
For New Year's Eve, Tara and Stacy decided to stay at the Hotel and rest. I went out on my own to the Plaza Nueva, which several locals and web resources said was the place to be for NYE in Sevilla. The NYE custom is to have a big family meal that evening. We were not hip to this, so it was really hard for us to find food because everything was reserved or closed. We wound up grabbing odd snacks at a convenience store. Then you are supposed to have 12 grapes, and eat one for every chime of the midnight from the Plaza Nueva clock tower. So I bought 12 grapes for a euro, which was the most I've ever paid for grapes ever, and waited. The Plaza was pretty empty until about 11:45. Then it got packed. Then the damn clock tower didn't chime, so no one really knew when to eat their grapes (I just ate mine when everyone else did). Then everyone went back home by 12:15. That was rather anticlimactic as I expect more from my NYEs.
The next day was Flamenco day - the main reason we came to Sevilla. It's renowned for Flamenco and bull fighting. Given my family, that meant Flamenco. We went to the Flamenco museum, which was a school and theater, with a museum. There was one Dali there too - a poorly lit piece on Flamenco that I couldn't shoot but was delighted nonetheless. Then we went to a tourist Flamenco show, where we mis-ordered extra Sangria for everyone, which meant I had to drink a lot of sangria, but that was fine. The Flamenco show was awesome - such a macho fusion of Ballet and Tap. The best guy looked like Wil Ferrell, and that was really messing with me.
Next: L'Alhambra.
Shadow boxing the apocalypse