We are staying here for 2 weeks in a one bedroom apartment with ocean views that belongs to Evelyn a friend of Dani's mother. We collected the key from Evelyn's friend, sorted out the jobs in the unit, like turning on the fridge & the hot water then we headed out to find a supermarket. As luck would have it we stumbled onto a Lidl, managed to get a few essentials & went home to relax a bit.
When I say essentials of course I am including the 2 litres of 7% alcohol Sangria that we bought for $1.19. We only got one bottle in case it was awful, you never know at that price what it will taste like but it is just lovely & next time we are out we will probably get a six pack. Drinks like Coke are much dearer than the wine so I know what we will be buying while we are here. We plan to see quite a bit of this corner of Spain & Portugal but also want to rest so will have plenty of quiet days at home too.
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| Dawn on our first morning, no we weren't up the sparrows, the sun didn't come up until after 7.30 am, after all it is nearly winter |
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| The mid-morning view at high tide, from our balcony, such a beautiful place to just sit & contemplate life |
Our first full day was just like that, a quiet day at home. It was Sunday so after a slow start we went for a stroll along the ocean promenade, heard some music & noise so detoured into the back streets only to stumble onto a large street market selling mostly clothes & shoes but also olives, shellfish, sweets & a few sundry items. We battled our way through the crowds then wandered into the main shopping mall area, saw a sign for the Tourist Information & followed it. Much to our surprise it was open! Even some much larger places have been closed on weekends, why I don't know, that is the most common time for tourists to need help I would have thought!
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| Just love the way the Spanish tile the outside of their homes, never paint again good idea I think |
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| The sheltered port area, fishing is the main livelihood here |
The lady spoke quite good english, was full of great local information & had brochures for all the places she suggested, in English so we came home loaded up with maps, opening times, brochures & details on things worth seeing in Andalucia. A bite of lunch, a siesta (gee it will be easy to slip into that routine, when in Rome, do as the romans do, they say so we will do the Spanish thing whenever we can) & after 5 pm we followed the tourist lady's advice & went to the lighthouse bar, to watch the sunset & use the free wifi, fortunately it is only a short walk from the unit.
The next journey was into Portugal so you will need to read that blog page to hear about our adventures there.
Another day of rest!!
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| A shady plaza, must be siesta time as there is virtually no-one on the street |
We needed that because our next destination was Seville which is about 120 kilometres away. We found an underground parking station & walked to the fire station. Then we decided on a hop on-hop off bus trip, in many places these trips have stopped for the winter but Seville has such lovely weather it runs all year round. Really good trip as always, we have never been disappointed with these tours. We also joined the walking tour included in the ticket price, into the old ceramic making section of town, Triani. Most of these streets are too narrow for vehicles so foot is the only viable option.
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| The old & the new sit comfortably side by side in Seville |
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| Not really even sure what this is but it looked great |
We had a lovely guide, she was Swedish & had come to Spain to do a five month spanish course five years ago & simply hadn't left because she loved it so much. Anyway we visited the church & the remains of the building used for most of the Spanish Inquisition trials & executions, there was still the 'chute' a sort of narrow laneway where they threw the bodies & rolled them down into the river - really horrific thought - because they refused to give them a proper burial. The things that have been done in the name of religion defy description.
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| The 'body disposal' chute from the Inquisition it is now a small road, but still leads straight to the river |
On a brighter note we visited the only two remaining ceramic workshops where tiles are individually hand crafted, painted, fired etc to create works of art. These are used in churches, on homes, in courtyards etc they are just fantastic & so beautiful I really wished we could have brought something home but that is just not viable neither is postage unfortunately. We also visited a number of the famous courtyards, it is legal in Andalucia to walk inside someones home, if the front door is open & there is a second door which is usually a wrought iron/bar type, so that you can see their courtyard which are normally highly decorative with ceramics, pot plants, wrought iron furniture etc.
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| Beautifully tiles homes in Triani area which has always been famous for its ceramics |
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| A great example of an internal courtyard, ideal for life in a hot climate |
During the afternoon we detoured to the bull fighting arena, there was a museum Grant thought he might have a bit of a look at. We found however that there was also a guided tour, in English, of the entire stadium & the museum with commentary on all the interesting items. He said it was great, he learnt loads of interesting facts like:
- the last bull fighter to be killed was in 1992,
- they no longer put those small spears into the bull's shoulder they now use a stick-on patch with dangly bits (it's the bells & dangles that annoy the bull not the spear),
- the bull meat is sold after the fight for a premium price as it is very highly prized,
- on fight day they have six bulls (all specially bred for their nasty temperament) & usually three fighters who face two bulls each but sometimes if they cannot get fighters for one reason or another the one matador faces all six bulls
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| Panorama of the bull ring at Seville |
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| Upper level decorations etc, there are two different ticket prices - SUN or SHADE |
It was a very late night home about midnight but that was OK as we had a rest day coming up. We did rest but also went for a bit of an afternoon drive to a couple of neighbouring oceanside townships, very touristy, lots of multi-storey apartment blocks but it is outside the season so it is quiet & the shops are mostly shut or empty.
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| A marine near Islantilla, a neighbouring town, plenty of wealthy people holiday or own apartments here |
Next trip was to Huelva (or Hoover as we call it, these names are a bit tricky) to visit the site of the departure of Christopher Columbus on his trip to discover the Americas in August 1492. Very interesting but a bit of a shame there wasn't more information in English, they only really had spanish notice boards etc. Although there was a good documentary film on the building of the replica vessels launch in 1992 on the 500 anniversary of the Discovery of the Americas & another one with re-creations, photos, animations etc on the journey & how it all got started. Amazingly the three replica boats sailed the trip to America in 1992 before finding a permanent home in La Rabida near Huelva the departure port for the original voyage. They were surprisingly small, no wonder it was such a daunting trip, for a start most people thought the world was flat & they had only the most basic navigation aids (sextons hadn't been invented yet). What was achieved was quite astounding really when we think of the times, well over 200 men left in three ships but only 18 half-starved men & one ship returned.
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| Replica build in 1992 & sailed to America to celebrate 500 years since Columbus undertook the journey |
We also went to the neighbouring town Palos de la Frontera, to the well that was used to fill the ships' water barrels & the church door from where the proclamation was read announcing the journey & asking for money & men to join the adventure. The captains of the other two ships, the Nina & the Pinta were local men & their statues stand in the town centre. The man who shouted 'tierra' or 'land' as we'd say from the crows nest was also from this town, there was a street named after him too. All in all a great day out, well worth the drive.
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| The Fontinella where water barrels were filled for the journey & in the background you can see the church where the royal proclamation was read out to the people |
Another day of rest was planned although we needed to find an optometrist to fix Grant's reading glasses & a Farmicia (chemist) for some voltaren cream for Grant's shoulder so we popped over to Ayamount just 10 kilometres or so away but on the Spanish side of the river that is the border with Portugal, nice town, lovely marina, adequate parking (which is a bit of a rarity here) & all the shops we needed. So once home it was feet up, novel open for us!
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| Ayamonte, there were literally kilometres of blocks of units like this one. Very touristy in the summer apparently, Scandinavians, Brits & Irish seem to like this area. |
Sunday, cloudy, windy & not looking too flash on the coast so we decided to travel inland a bit for a look-see. First stop was the original Rio Tinto (Red River) mine, there has been a mine on this site for thousands of years (long before things became mechanised) & there is not much of the original hill left now.
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| Rio Tinto, supposedly there has been a mine of some sort on this spot since 4th millenium BC, neolothic times. Bet those people didn't do as much damage in 4000 years as Rio does in a year! |
Next stop was at the Gruta de las Maravillas (a cave) under the township of Aracena. It had been mentioned by the tourist information lady as worth visiting & she was right! It was great, we have visited plenty of caves over the years & this was as good as any we had seen with numerous lakes up to 10 metres deep plus it was an easy walk on good walkways just a bit of ducking here & there & a few stairs. The only drawback was that the guide didn't provide any information in english but we had been given a printed sheet when we bought our tickets, the problem was of course that it was way too dark to read it underground but we had a look at it while we ate our lunch. Next stop was the old church & castle on the top of the hill for wonderful views over the sierras (mountains) & township.
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| Mall leading to the cave entrance inside the last white building at the top of the hill |
Looks like you can paint your home any colour you like here in Spain, as long as it is white & of course they only manufacture terracotta roof tiles.
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| The bell tower/gate portal into the castle |
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| Aracina from the castle./fortress, white & terracotta as far as the eye can see |
Random things that happen to make the day so unexpectedly wonderful! Just out of town we picked up a hitchhiker, not something we would normally do but it was a mature women with her cardigan & handbag in her hands, so we thought that looked safe enough. Maria-Teresa, Terri, for short, turned out to be a wonderful guide. She lived in the area & took us to some fabulous vantage points for views over the Picos de Aroche Natural Park, then we went to her home township where her father is the local policeman to see the church & for a coffee. As we walked down one of the small lanes a couple came out of a restaurant & heard us speaking English, they were English but have been living in Spain for many years, one thing turned to another & we all sat having coffee & chatting for an hour or more.
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| Inside the very modest church on top of the hill at the lookout over the national park |
We needed to head for home as it was getting late & we had a two hour drive ahead of us, so we dropped Terri off near her place & headed home, toasted cheese & tomato sandwiches for dinner & an early night as we were off to Lisbon, Portugal the next day. That is a 350 km drive so up with the sparrows and an overnight stay in Lisbon was planned. The low down on Lisbon is in the Portugal blog page.
After our big day in Lisbon we needed another rest day round town so we slept in, the shutters that Evelyn has on the windows of the apartment make it dark all day so it is quite easy to sleep in when you are tired, think I will get some of these for our front bedrooms at home, they are really good. Had a couple of small jobs to do round town, post office, library to use the wifi, supermarket for more sangria, you know all the usual stuff.
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| Cadiz (pronounced Cardith) Town Hall, lots of work going on in the plaza too |
One last 'big day out' before we pack up to leave this area so Cadiz was our destination, quite a drive but we didn't want to miss the opportunity to see it & there won't be another day available so it's now or never - we chose NOW!
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| Part of the original city wall, but they had to rebuild the tower when it was accidentally blown up by fireworks...haha |
Boy was it worth the effort, we loved Cadiz, such a beautiful city with a golden sandy beach along one side of the peninsular & a harbour on the other, no matter where you lived or worked you could easily walk to the water's edge. It was very clean & surprisingly graffiti free with lovely palm lined streets & lots of pedestrian walkways in the old city centre. There was plenty of historical sites too, as the city has been around since long before Julius Caesar opened the Roman Theatre here in 45 BC (think that was the date anyway). The population is only 125,000 which meant the traffic & parking was bearable but there were still plenty of shops, cafes, restaurants etc.
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| A section of the Atlantic Ocean side of the peninsular, flanked by apartments |
It was very busy while we were there, unfortunately even though it was out of season & all the beach crowd had long since left there were still five cruise ships loaded up with tourists docked in the harbour. I have a feeling it is like this all year round 'only worse' in the July/August holiday period! Still I guess the money & employment that tourism brings is what makes it so vibrant.
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| Plaza outside the cathedral, free council provided wifi all over the area |
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| More of the Atlantic seafront, too lovely to be in the middle of the city |
Next year, 2012 is a big celebration year, it is the bicentenary of the signing of the Proclamation of Independence for Spain, right there in Cadiz so the city is gearing up for the celebrations. Road works going on everywhere, paving being repaired, trees planted or pruned & gardens revamped, the council staff were working like beavers! Now that is a rare sight!
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| One of many roundabouts with fountains/statues/artworks/gardens instead of concrete, nice change |
There are plenty of places we have been to that 'once was enough' but not Cadiz, we both agree that we could easily be convinced to come back for an extended seaside holiday.
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| A gorgeous sunset as we travelled westward on our way home |
A day of rest...ha ha...it was clean up the unit, do the washing & get it dry, pack our gear, eat up everything left in the fridge, day!! We managed though, fortunately we have a car so the bits & pieces don't have to be fitted into our backpacks.
