Category: Spain

We keep visiting these historic landmarks and we are beginning to see a pattern in their histories.  Each place’s story has some combination of the following occurrences:  If it was not built by Romans, it was most likely conquered by Romans, the Christans/Catholics take over and add their own flare to it (usually this cheapens the original), throw in some mass murder, maybe the area is abandoned for a century or two, Napoleon probably conquered it, more murder, eventually things get unearthed/restored, and when it’s all said and done you can avoid long lines if you buy your tickets online for a few Euro extra.  Obviously that is a gross over simplification of what are very significant and rich histories, but I don’t think the point of this blog is to tell you what you could read in a guide book.  I hope that we give you a taste of what we have experienced in order to inspire you to visit these places yourselves.

Views from the Fort:

Notable favourites:

We are staying in the heart of Granada in an apartment where we are close to everything.  One of the highlights of this city is all the amazing graffiti that is on display.  Today we did a walking tour of the most impressive works of street art.

Tomorrow we are heading to Madrid.  It will be my last stop before heading back home to Canada.  DawnO still has a couple of weeks to spend in the UK before she comes back home.

I will leave you with a picture of DawnO’s churros that she had today.  They are basically fresh doughnut-like sticks born from a play-dough fun factory.  They are then dipped into the provided cup of steaming hot liquid chocolate…  and are consumed with a shit-eating grin.

Here are 2 of my favourite buildings that we explored in Seville. The first is Alcázar, which is a palace built in the 1300s. It was there that I officially fell in love with patterned tiles. RobO pretty much had to drag me out of the room with the archways at closing time.

 

We also had a daytime and a nighttime visit to the Metropol Parasol, which was built in 2011. This is supposedly the largest wooden building in the world.

Finally, it would be irresponsible to blog about Seville without talking about the food! We ate well every day (albeit with dinner starting at 9:00 or later) and their gluten free options were top notch. I had one of the best meals of my life which included something they called ‘bags of goat cheese’ (goat cheese wrapped in filo pastry, fried, then drizzled with balsamic reduction). The dessert was ‘fried milk’, which tasted like creme brûlée wrapped in filo pastry and topped with mint leaves. RobO didn’t do too bad either with prosciutto wrapped asparagus and Iberian ham topped potatoes.

Our picnic spot for lunch one day:

 

We have found DawnO’s place.  Allow me to explain.  We have a reoccurring conversation every time we arrive somewhere new.  We try to determine if the current place we are in is somewhere that feels like a home away from home to either one of us.  To be fair, I think almost every place we have been to on this particular trip has been noted as her place, but we seem to be getting closer to DawnO perfection as we go. I admit, Seville is certainly a beautiful corner of the world.

We have been here for 4 days and have made use of the bikes that came with our latest place to stay.  We go out exploring in the morning, come back in the afternoon when the temperature reaches 40 degrees C, and we head out again in the evening time once the sun starts to make its decent.  Here are a few pics of our time in Seville.

This is my bike ‘Mustachio’, Dawn’s is ‘El Rocket Rojo’ (the Red Rocket)

Here I set a world land speed record on Mustachio.  No officials were present to confirm this.

DawnO going not-quite-as-fast-as-I-did-but-still-swiftly at Plaza de España.

Seville is the birthplace of Flamenco.  We took in a show the other night and got a front row seat.

Last night we headed across the river to Triana, which is only a 10 minute ride from our place.  Every night this week there is a party along the river where locals drink cervesas, listen to live music, and party like it’s 1999.  We saw the fiesta from the impressive bridge we took pant loads of pictures of.  We preferred the bridge.

La fiesta

So where is my place?  As long as DawnO is there it doesn’t much matter.  Also, there needs to be access to Nachos and guacamole.

Here is a parting shot of us at a spot DawnO will talk about in our next blog:

Yesterday we arrived in the medieval village of Collbató. We’re staying in the top floor of a house with this view:

RobO was disappointed he couldn’t bring his unicorn on the hike:

We have left the big city of Barcelona for Tarragona, which has been a change in pace.  Tarragona is a smaller coastal town that once was the Roman capital on this side of the Balearic Sea.  It has plenty of beaches, outdoor patios, gelatarias, and history in the form of Roman ruins.

Our place is very charming.  We are staying right across from the cathedral, whichs means it’s close to the action.  We have been getting used to the Spanish timetable of resting in the afternoon and eating at 9 at night.  As a rookie, I have gotten into a bit of trouble when I start sipping sweet Sangria on an empty stomach at 9:30pm.  Now I take a few bites of food prior to drinking the sweet nectar.

The cathedral

My rookie campaign.

Tomorrow we head to the Montserrat area for some hiking and Sangria!

As RobO reported in our last blog, our visit to Barcelona has been a Gaudí bonanza! Today we cycled to another Gaudí site, this one a famous gate sculpted like a dragon.

Outside of all of the architectural siteseeing we have had a lot of time to explore other parts of Barcelona. We’ve hit our travel groove: sleeping in, then having full days of exploring and good food! Here are some of the highlights:

– the Arch de Triumph (here it’s made of brick)

– Tibidabo (church and amusement park with amazing city views)

– renting bikes to cycle the length of the beach

– the ‘Dilding’ (Who do you think came up with that name? Hint: it’s the same person who’s been begging me to call it that on the blog!)

Random exploration in old town

As mentioned, the food has been incredible. Spain is ahead of the curve in awareness of gluten free. We enjoyed ‘pinchos’ (2-3 bite snacks chosen buffet-style) one night on a patio. The bar made all of Rob’s selections gluten free. It was extra cool that different street performers came along to entertain us.

I don’t know if this is a blessing or a curse, but even McDonalds has gluten free in Spain! RobO has been waiting almost 10 years for this taste of a Big Mac. Talk about a happy meal! He reports that it was good but he is ok with waiting another 10 years until the next one!

In conclusion Barcelona has lived up to it’s high expectations! We’re looking forward to tomorrow’s trip to another coastal city called Tarragona. It’s a smaller city where many Spanish go to holiday. I’m sure we’ll have lots to blog about!

We have arrived in Barcelona and have spent the last few days exploring this beautiful city, enjoying the cuisine, and touring as many Gaudí structures as we can.  I’ll admit, I had never heard of Antoni Gaudí until a couple of days ago when DawnO said, “Are you freaking kidding me?  You’ve never heard of Gaudí?”  Anyway, for you cotton-headed ninny mugginses like myself who have no idea who this guy is, allow me to explain what I’ve learned so far.  He was an architect genius in the 19th century who was a student of nature and incorporated what he learned into his architecture. He proved that his structures could be functional, efficient, and works of art, all at once.  He had the support of a few well-off friends who allowed him to have free reign over his creations.  His eye for detail and his brilliant mind helped create some of the most elegant structures in the world. We have been going absolutely crazy with touring all of his buildings, and here is what we have seen so far:

Gaudì was a master at controlling the amount of natural light he let enter each building.  In the Sagrada Familia he perfected it by using stained glass to create a beautiful atmosphere of colour.

We got to go up one of the towers and this was our view of Barcelona