Espana 7- Seville

So, here we are in Seville, the land of kings, conquest , oranges, culture, flamenco, and commerce. The locals think of themselves as “Andalucian” almost before being Spanish. There are two football (soccer) teams, one is Seville and the other is Betas, which is the team of the people who are Andalucian first. The river that runs through is called Quadalquiver by the entire rest of the world except the Andalutheans, which call it Betas. (my new personal waiter at a tapas bar that specializes in eggplant explained that to me during a televised game of one of the national cup games).
Nora also artfully told a very young shy bartender that since he was sick and had a fever, he should go home and be in bed. What she really said in Spanish is… well ask me when we get home as it is hysterical and everyone at the counter was laughing for at least 15 minutes. He was beet red... jah

I toyed briefly with the idea of doing a little hotel review, but decided that would be boring. I will say a few words about our first two hotels, however. Las Meninas in Madrid was a nice, modern little hotel in a great location (thanks to Jennifer’s diligent research) that only lacked two things - a hook to hang your hat on and a clock. I hate waking up at 4:30 a.m. and not knowing what time it is. So we arrive in Seville and our hotel was once the house of “Nino Ricardo”, one of the great innovators of flamenco guitar music. The rooms are charming and happily have a few hooks but, alas, still no clock. Then we go to bed and BONG! what the hell was that? Thirty minutes later we get ten bongs, and these bongs sound like Big Ben was right outside our window. I look at Jennifer and laugh, but she is seriously not happy. It took two Tylenol P.M. and a set of earplugs for her to sleep through the night. So for the last six nights we have had to hear (one) of the neighborhood cathedrals ring the hour and every half-hour as well. Truth be told, I’m going to miss my big “clock”...nll

OK, so how would you like a big gong-ing clock right next to you head reminding you all night how much time it is that you are not sleeping? Do you know how long it takes for 10-12 bongs to go off????…jah

We did the tour of the Alcazar (castle) today. So Pretend you have a big family estate or Duchy that has been though Carthaginians, the Romans and the Visagoths, the Moors, the Iberian re-conquest, the Golden Age, the Casa de Contratacion (which is the equivalent of Spains rise to commerce as all the goods from the new world had to be funneled through Seville), then the Decline and the 20th century.
You take this house or REALLY BIG PALACE and everyone to whom it is handed down or takes it by force, remodels it during every era and TA DA!!!! you get the palace that spans from Carthaginians to now, in all its styles. It is the oldest still in use palace by a monarchy: The Alcazar. It also has these Moorish walls and Baroque ceilings, wierd reniasanuce touches, etc...jah

JenN's tip del dia

Life is too short to be grumpy, so the next time you get a stick up your rear end, don't forget to push the red button.

Espana 6 - Jerez

We went to, and are staying in, Seville, but took a side trip the 2nd day to Jerez. More on Seville later.

This morning we got up at the ungodly hour of 7:30 and took the train to Jerez. We didn’t really have a plan, and just our little green guidebook (thanks Sylvia) for reference, so we just picked a point and started walking. Happily, our meandering led us into one of the smaller but more upscale (boutique?) bodegas just as a tour was beginning. Jenn asked if we could get a tour in English and - voila - there appeared before us a charming young woman from Germany who had come to Spain to perfect her Spanish but who coincidentally spoke very good English. She gave us a private tour of the bodega. We learned more than we’ll probably ever need to know about the making of sherry. It must be a pretty lucrative business, because the owner, who is also an art collector, installed one of the acclimatized rooms to display “some” of his paintings. Holy crap! (no, literally), if you’re into medieval religious works - especially ones of the Annunciation (you know, where a dove whispers in Mary’s ear & the poor girl gets pregnant), you’d be impressed with this man’s private collection.
The tour ended with a sherry tasting, of course. Did I mention that we had gotten up early and dashed to the train station? Yeah, well, nothing makes the morning brighter than a breakfast of fortified wine. (See Nora's breakfast photo above)
The rest of the day was Christian cathedrals & Moorish fortresses, Jerez being one of the important cities of the Al-Andalus portion of Spain’s history. The weather down here has been gorgeous. We pass street vendors roasting chestnuts on open fires occasionally, and Jennifer slugs me every time I break into that song. I suppose it is a little incongruous when its 70 degrees and you’re getting a sunburn. Anyway, on that note, ladies and germs, I wish you all a good night as its time for Jennifer’s 8:00 feeding. Blogging off . . . nll

Nora tried to sneak HoneyCrisp into the satchel to our trip to Jerez de la Fronterra. At the last minute, she decided to have a quick pre trip bathroom break. I pulled stinky apple out of the satchel and hid her behind the art/bookcase area in out room. Nora did not notice until we were in Jerez. I am now a kidnapper.
Jerez, the city of sherry and horses. It is a cliché, but true. The other thing is you have to watch where you step or it dog poop for you. Seville is actually worse in the dog poo department, but Nora hit the big time in Jerez…
Jerez has a big tower on the Alcazar (Moorish fortress) with a “camera obscura”, a device perfected by Leonardo de Vinci, which has a mirror that rotates 360 degrees and projects the reflection onto a lens that focuses on a surface in the room. So if you were in a tower, you could look into the distance, real time, and see what was going on as far away as beyond the city walls. Totally great for military applications, but was mostly used for artists to "copy" landscapes. We toured the tower and watched cars, birds, and the comings and goings of the residents. At the alcazar they also have horse parade grounds that they use for festivals and parades. All these palaces/churches/fortresses here in Andalusia have a fascinating mix of Moorish/Christian architectural styles.
PS: there are some horses in the main square of Seville that take touristas around. They look sort of hungry, wouldn’t that be a fitting end to HoneyCrisp???…jah

Jenn's Tip of the Day

Ok, so I just wanted to remind you to read by the numbers, # 1 being the first post, and subsequenst posts may not make sense as they refer to previous posts so quit complaining and read bottom up. This is not my tip of the day though. Kodi, the time diff. is 9 hours, and we are ahead of you. Please comment, we are far far away and like hearing from you...jah

Tip of the Day: When the security people at a museum tell you no photos allowed, you should listen.

In My Head: "this looks like an interesting piece of art, I think I will take a photo". RESULT= "hey!! so this is what the inside of the cells look like at that cool jail!"

Espana 5 - Seville

Saturday morning found us arising early (well, early for this trip) to catch the train to Sevilla. Let me just tell you that the train is a sweet ride. We arrived in Seville relaxed and ready to go, despite the fact that we had some trouble finding our hotel. Seems street names are “just a suggestion” round here. Nevertheless, we got checked to our charming old world hotel and set off to find the center of town.
We were told it was really easy to walk to the main plaza, and were handed a map with the route highlighted. Trouble is, all the streets are narrow, winding cobblestone medieval alleyways and, oh yeah, there is that street-names-are-just-a-suggestion thing. It took us several tries and more than one bout of asking directions to find our way there and, she was right, it is easy to get there once you know the way! So we had to stop and refresh ourselves with tuna belly and duck liver. Nope, no fat here (and did I mention that everything is swimming in olive oil?)!!! Anyway, I think we’ll spend the evening mapping out our itinerary for the next few days. Blogging off . . . nll

I think Nora would like to dedicate this lunch to Sylvia: Seriously, ½ lb of seared foie gras in a reduction of Jimenez Perez and another ½ lb of tuna belly in green olive oil over roasted pimentos, That was just what she ordered. I had a green salad. This photo is JUST the foi gras and that is a full size plate, not some little saucer.

The symbol of Sevilla is the Girlda (from the word "to turn") which has a huge weather vane on top which very cleverly turns. The Catherdral is the third largest in the world and has lots of ornate windows, but Nora wouldn't go in because we only had half an hour before it closed and she needed more time to be able to go to confessional. We will do that tomorrow. Nora hauled her bad apple HoneyCrisp along on the high speed (120 mph) train and when we got to the hotel in Sevilla, the little fruit promply took over the room and would not get off the bed. I am sleeping on the couch…jah

Espana 4

On our last day in Madrid, Jennifer put on her tour guide hat and took us on a walking tour of the city. Little did we know, however, that it was a holy day and none of the cathedrals were open. We did take a very enjoyable and informative tour of the Royal Palace. And for our farewell pub crawl, we ate tapas dedicated entirely to Kodi - squid, octopus and fried peppers. Yum!…nll

I was trying to do the tour of the Medieval Madrid, and then, go up to the time of the the reign of the Hapsburgs, both eras include numerous cathedrals and lots of artwork, culminating with the Cathedral de Nuestra Senora de la Almudenas which is where the royal weddings take place and is adjacent to the palace. After wandering around the oldest quarter of the city and having lunch, we had no luck with being able to check out the acoustics in the vaulted church ceilings with my elk bugle. Nor did we get to see the sarcophagus of Columbus. What is up closing the churches on holy days?? At least I got a good look at this huge bias relief bronze door, (see photo). We were so hungry we ate a whole Octopus swimming around in olive oil, Patron peppers, which are rare and only available one time a year (now), and calamari…jah

Espana 3

So Nora is now taking her apple every where. She decided to photograph her new best friend HoneyCrisp sitting on a statue of Velasquez, and asked me to hold it, or as she said, "her". I plopped "her" down and walked away. "She" decided to escape and landed on the sidewalk, rolling ten feet away. Of course this was my fault, and I now was responsible for making Nora's HoneyCrisp just some "applesauce in a skin". Boy am I in trouble. To make up for this, I agreed to let HC see the real Royal Palace, as seen here.

Now that we know where King Carlos and Queen Sofie live, what, we wondered, do they do all day? Turns out they are pretty busy, and we went to see one of the great cultural works the city of Madrid enjoys courtesy of the good works of Queen Sofia. I know that usually someone of this type would do something like open a hospital for the poor. But no, our Reina Sofia took a hospital for the poor and turned it into arguably one of the worlds finest museums of modern art. If you like Picasso, Miro, Salvador Dali, Magritte, and a multitude of like minded artists, this place is for you. The space is great, now that they have cleaned out all of those messy hospital beds and operating rooms.

The museum houses Guernica, the massive painting by Picasso which was commisioned for the 1937 Paris World Fair, during the Spanish civil war, and some consider the prelude to WW2. It depicts his view of the straffing and bombing of Guernica by the Fascists, who were supported by the Nazi party. They used the small basque village as target practice, just to target in their skills. Nora started worrying that the maids would throw out HoneyCrisp, so we came back to check on the bad apple...jah

So Jennifer was in hog-heaven today as MNCARS (Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia) had a large collection of two of Jenn's three favorite artists. We spent a very pleasant morning in the large, light-filled galleries. Then we lunched at a little place nearby that was recommended on Mirabel's website.

Jennifer keeps telling me that I need to do a better job of restaurant review, so here goes. . .yesterday we lunched at a "chic" (that was, in fact, the name) cafe near our hotel. Many restaurants have a "menu del dia" or set lunch menu with primero (1st), secundo (2nd) and postre (dessert) for a set price. We tried this yesterday, much to our disappointment. In fact, I can say the food was nasty. Last night we walked around the corner to a little taberna and were greeted warmly by a woman who was delighted at the chance to use her English, talk politics and show off her native cuisine. We weren't even given the chance to order, really. She recommended a lovely wine from the Duero, insisted that we try several versions of Iberico Pork (for those of you who don't know, this is a local free-range pig that eats only acorns), brought us lovely acetunas (olives), and generally kept us relaxed and entertained - a lovely experience. It was called Taberna la Jerezana and,oh yes, for dessert she brought us a housemade anise-infused sherry. Yum!

My only complaint is that we're eating at 9 or 10 at night. That means bed after midnight, rising late (the hotel offers a breakfast buffet, but J doesn't like the coffee, so she dragged me out to elbow my way to a crowded counter where people were shouting at me for my oder over the heads of dozens of other coffee-drinkers - very unsettling), a late start, a late lunch and so on and so forth. I guess we're in step with the Madrilenos, but my biorhythms are way off. Oh well. When in Rome. . .

So, having said all that - its 8:30 and I have to get dressed so we can go out and try yet another recommended tapas bar. Buen Provecho! . . .nll

Espana 2

Mom, just note that those violent video games have nothing on Rembrandt, seen here with HoneyCrisp, our new traveling companion, checking out Samson getting his eyes poked out...jah

Weather has been just excellent, around 12-14 C, and the Euro is has been selling for 1.20 usd, but got much better today as the us dollar surged on "internationally exuberant" political news. We are staying right in the city center, within walking distance of everything, so we can just head out to the Plaza Mayor for lunch or a stroll, pop over to the Prado or Reina Sofia Museo, or if they would allow, the Palacio Real is a couple of blocks away and Queen Sofia could invite us for tea or tapas. Here is Nora and HoneyCrisp angling for an invite at the Palace, or I should say in front of the buildings in front of the palace. They wouldn't live in such a urbane looking building...jah

Espana 1

Oh Mein Gato! It was almost 24 hrs. pillow-to-pillow, but the trip over was relatively painless thanks to International 1st class. Of course, the first thing we had to do (after settling into our hotel), was to tromp all over looking for a bocadillo de calamari for lunch. Dinner consisted of some very excellent tapas at the Cava Blanca (the white cave), and then bed. By-the-way, Sylvia, if you see Becky, tell her we ate some killer liver-butter in her honor... nll Nora packed us leftovers incase we got hungry on the plane, noodles from Monsoon, honeycrisp apple, cougar cheddar cheese, nuts and chocolate. But, they started stuffing food in us from wheels up to wheels down, so we are still packing them around... jah


Jennifer and I woke up at 6 a.m. to Obama's acceptance speech (hooray!!), and then jet lag hit one of us - hard. So while I slept it off, Missy J went for cafe con leche and another reconoiter. We spent the afternoon soaking up some culture at the Prado Museum, where i was asked to coat check a honeycrisp apple I was carrying around in my purse - more on that later. All-in-all we're having a great time and falling back into the local customs without too much difficulty. If only we had spent more time practising our Spanish! ...nll

Its a little bit more of an international world today than it was yesterday, so from this little piece of the globe to the one where you're standing, HAPPY TRAILS! nll & jah

Happy Halloween

Hope the little goblins didn't scare anyone too much!!