October 25-26 Aqueduct Pics

Here are some pictures of the aqueduct in Segovia.  I walked along it from where it is just coming out of the ground up to where it crosses the valley into the city walls.

Where it is first above ground

 

The actual channel at the top

A settling house & cistern

 

First arches

 

Arches at 2 metres

The turn to crosss the valley

 At the corner and the first double arch

 View of the cathedral from the corner
 across to the walls

October 28th - Sunday. Deb’s disjointed thoughts on Spanish food

 

 

 

 

So many things to eat – so little time! Segovia was a wonderful place to try new things. We tried to get something we hadn’t tried before at each meal, sometimes more than one at the same meal. So, forthwith, some impressions:

·         Warren got a tortilla (kind of a potato omelet that is ubiquitous in Spain) at breakfast in a nifty little bar he found (complete with friendly barman/waiter in black tie, dazzling white shirt, black apron). It was so much tastier than what we had made as an experiment in Denver. Where did we go wrong?

·         I tried the local breakfast specialty of fresh tomato rubbed across a warm grilled baguette half. It was yummy, but amazingly cost markedly more than a hot ham-and-cheese. Go figure.

·         I tried a couple of unknowns at lunch. One was a revuelta, which ties into Warren telling the docent at the Foundation Juan March that we were going to have lunch, then revolt. Turns out he might have said we were going to have lunch and then scramble. A revuelta also means scrambled as in eggs, so I had a dish of green beans done in an egg sauce that was very nice. Revuelta  

 

       Then some empanadillas with some sort of fish filling in a pimenton sauce, also very nice. Warren had tiny lamb ribs which he enjoyed – so thanks to Jose for recommending it and a tip

      of the hat to Sunny who would have loved it.

    Empanadillas

·         Warren just got a mixed bag of holiday sweets that he picked out of big bins at the market. We had no idea what they were, but loved trying each one in their fancy little different wrappers. Some names like “angel’s hair”… I thought they’d last a week, but Warren made short work of them.

·         Have now tried three different Sherries (Jerez) for which Spain is famous. Each one better than the last. Sadly they get better with price. Sigh. Had the best one so far at the Jose Maria bar that Norm, our language instructor recommended.

·         We’ve been finding out that several things we had heard before we came to Spain just aren’t true. We’d heard that good tea was hard to find, and, heck, there are little tea stores all over. We’d heard that good bread wasn’t common, and we’ve been getting dandy, inexpensive, fresh, crusty baguettes every day. Can’t believe everything you read on the web…

·         Trying to get better at cooking whole fish. Don’t often get whole fish at home. This is being a bit of a challenge for me.

·         We’re just sliding into the Spanish schedule. Seldom eat lunch before 2:30, but we’re just ridiculously early dinner-eaters, dining around 8:30. The Spanish are just starting on tapas then.

·         Tried three local soups in Segovia, all good. The roast suckling pig is legendary, and with good reason. Felt sorry for the piglet, but forged on. No regrets.

 

        Sopa Castillana (aka Garlic soup)

·         Warren has probably said it repeatedly but we’re drinking some really pleasant wines VERY inexpensively. Found a little wine store nearby, and the lady had been giving us some pleasant suggestions. She struggles along, trying to get us to understand. Sort of like explaining wine to the cat, except that we’re interested and the cat isn’t. Drinking lots of Navarras to replace the lovely Navarros my brother buys us.

·         The local dessert specialty is a cakey-thing called poncho segovia. Get this: an angel food-like cake with a custardy filling wrapped in solid marzipan for icing. Warren ordered a second one! (He said it was just to photograph, but he ate every crumb and the waiter was so amused he refused to charge us for it.) Interestingly, the cake tasted definitely but not unpleasantly of having been cooking in a wood burning oven. So far I think that Spanish sweets are much like the French: much lighter, much less sweet, and much more reasonably sized than American. But Spanish desserts favor eggs and almond over the French favorites, fruit and pastry. Gail, the natillas are the best I’ve ever tasted. And with a tiny cookie crust on top.

Just one last sort of unrelated thought. We enjoyed seeing quite a few cats in Segovia, since we’re missing our own feline (who is under the capable care of her cousin Elizabeth). These little cat-folk are presumably feral, but we were pleased to see that Segovians put out food and water for them wherever they know that they’re likely to come for it. We saw a pair of youngsters come stealthily out of some dense ivy, down to where the food had been put out for them, and another pair come under the gate to a deserted ruin. Just outside the gate of a museum garden was a similar offering for the little black garden-guardian we saw hunched up in a warm corner of the wall, inside the garden and out of the rain. He kept a semi-wary eye on us, but apparently didn’t think we looked like much of a threat. Anyway, just another pleasant memory of Segovia.

October 26th Second day in Segovia

 

 

 

Well today even tops yesterday, as we visited the historical/archeological museum with tracks the history of Segovia and the surrounding area from very prehistory (i.e. -700,000 years) up to the end of the 19^th Century.  They have exhibits beginning with the geology and moving into the earliest Stone Age through the copper, bronze, and iron ages. 
 A prehistoric stone boar used as boundary markersA prehistoric stone bull used as boundary markers

It contains beautiful Roman and Visigoth artifacts with reputedly the finest gathering of Visigothic jewelry and gold in the world.  I can believe it.  It also deals with the agriculture, animal husbandry, clothing, art, glass work, etc. and gives a very good overview of this area.   After this museum we got up into the main town again for another great lunch, with of course lots of local vino.  It started raining so we  headed up for a visit to the modern art museum dedicated to the art of Estaben Vincente who was a locally bred artist.  He is world renowned and studied in Paris at the same time as Picasso.  They were friends but didn’t share the same artistic vision.   Then he went to New York City around the time of Franco’s takeover of Spain, where he lived for the rest of his life.  He was friends with Jackson Pollock, Clyford Still, Mark Rothko, and other abstract expressionist.  It was a total visual delight.  Just too much to describe adequately.  We caught the 8:00pm train back to Madrid and were in the apartment by 10:00.  We had a wonderful adventure. I will post nothing but pictures next week when the internet traffic is less here at the library.
Tapas at Jose Maria's

It ain't all religion here in Spain

The Spanish are pretty worldly in spite of the predominance of the Catholic church.   After Franco died they had a sort of drug and sex orgy for several years.  Now things have toned down considerably but they have a good sense of humor about their religion, too. Tetillas are breasts and these are cookies.

October 25^th Another field trip - Segovia or Bust

Today we really had to break up our routine for our trip to Segovia.   We actually got up at 6:00am to catch the metro over to Chamartin station to catch the 7:30 train for Segovia.  Our trip took just over half an hour and it was completely in the dark.  Our goal was to get to Segovia in time to visit the weekly Thursday produce and flea market.  We were able to take our bag directly to our hotel where they agreed to store it until we checked in.   However when we arrived it turned out there was a room available so we were able to move right in.  We are staying just outside the city walls so of course the price is considerably less.  Across the street from our room is a three story building where only the façade remains so we can see the city walls through the windows.

A 3 minute walk takes us to the base of the famous roman aqueduct and from there right up the stairway next to it and into the town.  We walked through the town looking for a little place to get some breakfast and got a little tour of the backstreets.  The first thing that catches your eye, after the aqueduct of course, is that so many of the buildings are decorated with graffito in the stucco of the walls.  It is spectacular and only just the first of so many interesting and beautiful sights.  We got to the plaza mayor and started looking for the flea market which was nowhere to seen, so we stopped in the tourist information office to find out where it may be.   What we found out was that it was a city festival day and therefore no market.  Oh Well.  We did find out that there was going to be a special musical presentation with orchestra and choir dedicated to the patron saint of the city followed by a high mass.  Once it started the cathedral would be closed so we hustled over to have a look.  When we got in we heard choir music and singing, they were rehearsing for the presentation so we got to look through the church to the sound of singing and it was so enjoyable.  Having sung in choirs throughout my school years I love to hear it, so it was a particular treat.  Then we headed down to the alcazar, a castle/fort.

The alcazar looks like it’s right out of a movie set and I guess it should since it was restored after a fire in the late 19^th century with somewhat more embellishment than it originally had, still it’s quite attractive.  It’s located out on the point of land surrounded on 3 sides by rivers and cliffs, virtually impregnable. The aqueduct was built to furnish it with water as it was originally the site of a roman army camp.  We had lunch at a delightful restaurant located next to a plaza containing a 13^th century church. So we got our chance to eat roast suckling pig and it was delectable. Sorry no pics, I forgot.  Here is a picture of the desert which was a wood-fire baked cake iced with marzipan.

After lunch we walked down to the archeological and historical museum but of course it was closed for the local festival day so we wandered around town before going back to the hotel for the evening.   This town rivals Venice for its charm and interest; it’s small enough to walk across in 20-30 minutes (within the walled old town) and virtually every street offers some interesting walls or doors or arches.  So far I agree with a British traveler who opines that it is the most beautiful city in Spain, and that is going a ways.

October 24th - Learning our history

Both Deb and I love to read history, especially about the areas where we are staying.  So before we left Deb found a history of Spain for her Nook and bought it.   It was written by the Spanish Historical Society of America so she thought it would give an interesting perspective. A few days ago she decided to get started on it and opened it up.  It begins with prehistory and finishes up with what was going on 6000 years ago and it’s only 12 pages long, of which 6 are drawings.   We laughed to tears about this one.

Oct 24th Time for a Teaparty

Deb read a blog which said it’s nearly impossible to get tea in Madrid as a consequence thereof we brought a half-kilo of tea with us.  The truth is that it is available nearly everywhere, mostly in tea-bag form and mostly fruit based tisanes, but black teas are available.  Also in our peregrinations we’ve found several tea stores where perfectly good loose black teas are available. Now all we have to do is use ours up and that will take a while.  The moral of  the story is don’t believe everything that you read; the difficulty of the moral is that you don’t always know what to believe and what to discount.  Ah travel, it broadens your horizons.

October 23rd Taking care of business

 

 

Today was a market day for us and we faced the fact that, due to our interest in food, we are spending a little more than we figured.  That won’t likely surprise any of you who know us.  We are buying fresh bread nearly every day and new bottles of wine several days a week.  Both are inexpensive so it’s like Trompeau and Trader Joe’s every day.  Also our kitchen is very compact so that also limits trying to buy in quantity.  The upside of that is that we get smaller quantities of many different things more frequently. 

Part of our shopping included Chapter 2 – Buying Merluza.  You may remember that I tried and failed to buy a type of fish, called Merluza, when the vendor would not sell it to me and I could not understand why.  Our teacher said that perhaps we needed to ask for thick slices, called rodahas.  So we tried buying two rodahas of Merluza today and THEY REFUSED US AGAIN.  The smallest portion they will sell is half of a fish; either the head end or the tail end, and they are not small fish it looks as if a half would be 3 or 4 pounds for a small one.  We can’t eat that sort portion and we don’t want to keep it in the refrigerator very long.  So I guess Merluza is a restaurant item for us.  We did get a very good pair of steaks, they looked and tasted like rib eye but we know it’s not precisely the same cut.  We decided yesterday that we are going to Segovia on Thursday for 2 days so we made reservations for a hotel and bought train tickets; we leave at 7:30 in the morning and get there around 8:00.  Segovia has a very famous Roman aqueduct and a couple museums worth seeing; it also is noted for its roast suckling pig.  We want spend a couple days enjoying that experience.  These plans were accomplished very easily, with an email to the hotel and a trip to the train station.

Botanic gardens at Atocha Station 

After getting train tickets we went to the Prado and bought our annual membership.  We are now official card carrying Friends of the Prado.  We now have access to the Prado, Reina Sophia, and  a dozen other museums anytime we want.   It will pay for itself in just over 3 visits to the Prado alone so all the others are bonus.   

Front facade of the Prado

We almost wandered into one of the demonstrations, as when we were leaving the Prado we suddenly found ourselves in literally a forest of Policia.  They were everywhere along with their police vans so we made a prompt transit out of the area.  It turned out to be an unannounced demonstration, at least to us, which began shortly after our exit from the area.  It was totally peaceful at least this time.

Tomorrow is our Spanish lesson, so we’re studying our verb conjugations and staying patient with ourselves.  It’s only been 3 weeks and we’re making progress.

October 22nd - We’ve mastered part of the Spanish Dictionary

There are very few words in the Spanish Dictionary for the letter W so we’ve managed to commit them all to memory.   The Spanish is on the left with the English translation on the right. The only one we’re struggling with is Water; do we make it or wear it like perfume?

Oct 23rd -The leaning buildings

Gail asked for an explanation of the leaning buildings; they are up in the financial area of Madrid and were built to showcase Spanish design and architecture.  They are a famous symbol of modern Madrid.The second lower pic is taken from the bottom of the building and the vertical line on the left is vertical while the one on the right is leaning.

October 22, 2012, Monday. Deb’s thoughts

We’re in our fourth week now and plugging along. At least part of the time, we’re making complete idiots of ourselves with our appalling Spanish, but we keep up the attempt. The very kind-hearted Spanish usually try to meet us part way with any English that they know.

Together, we usually get through.

For example, today I got my second Madrid library card. We’ve been wanting to use the libraries not only for internet, but also for access to English magazines and reference books. Warren has been zealous in finding the libraries, given the sketchy and often misunderstood directions we’ve gotten. He found the first library (a commune of Madrid kind) and we got our cards in record time. Warren found the second (a municipal of Madrid kind) and got his card there with just his Colorado driver’s license. Amusingly, a few hours later, a different librarian was adamant that he needed my passport number (I look markedly less trustworthy than Warren) but still I had a card within five minutes. Considering the hoops we’ve been jumping through to buy a year’s membership at the Prado (including copies of our passports and two passport photos each!) I am yet again convinced that libraries are the last bastions of civilization and civility worldwide. Librarians of the world – I salute you!

Our Spanish lessons with Norm continued tonight. He is endlessly patient with our bungling sentences and ridiculous pronunciation. (our dear friend Mel Preusser had tried to teach us the correct pronunciation of “plaza” – platha – years ago, but we were too dumb to pick it up.) Our v/b’s and c/th’s are keeping us endlessly amused. Norm has a hard time understanding how we can’t pronounce something simple like the z’s all being th’s, but have no trouble with the tilde n’s - ñ- being the ny sound (think Cañon City.) Or how we know obscure words like orphan, chimney and greenhorn, but don’t know any useful words. Hard to explain what we’re used to in Colorado. Norm actually teaches English to Spaniards, so our classes are sorta “reversed” for him. We really appreciate his being willing to deal with us.

Norm is great with answering all our endless “living here” questions, like how the partial bus/metro strikes work and what some of the newspaper headlines mean. Our attempts at translating newspaper jargon are hilarious. Spain is under huge political pressure at the moment with all the economic issues with the EU, and with separatist agitation in some of the regions of Spain, particularly in the always contentious Basque region. We spend an hour every morning watching TV trying to understand what’s going on in the local news; Spanish immersion training. Surprising how hard it is to figure out even short phrases that use abbreviations that everyone here knows.

I cooked us up some pork and potatoes with the Hatch red chili powder I brought. Our blood levels of capsicum were getting dangerously low, but we’re back in balance now. The food here has been wonderful. The quality of the fruit and veg are just wonderful. I always forget in the US why you would have fruit for dessert – just plain fruit. And then I get here and have watermelon for dessert, and it’s so sweet and fresh that no pastry could compete. And the fresh fish! Spain is second only to Japan in fish consumption, and the variety and freshness are just amazing. After being refused a purchase of merluza (hake), we asked Norm and found out that we needed to ask for slices of the fish, that the whole fish are sold in different units. Anyway, we just keep learning. We now know three different words for “slice” that apply to three different things.

Speaking of markets, we went to the Supermercado at the big Corte Ingles store on Sunday. Almost nothing is open on Sunday, but amazingly this big supermarket is. Corte Ingles is the biggest department store in Madrid with various buildings in several locations. Its supermarket is wonderful and we spent three hours just wandering around looking at food. We bought some stuff, but won’t desert our local market, los Ventos, with the sellers who’ve been so good and patient with us. Not to mention that their produce is of such high quality. We’ll be shopping tomorrow, because Monday seems to be a restocking day after the weekend, so we’re trying to shop on Tuesday when everything is fresh.

Know we’re thinking of all our dear friends/family in the States and missing you and wishing you were here helping us with our Spanish.

October 19th – Our first art exhibition

 

We’ve been saving ourselves for a visit to a museum/exhibition until a cold or stormy day and today we finally made our first visit to an exhibition.  It was not stormy nor was it particularly cold, but it was cloudy and cool and it seems as if that’s as close as we’re going to get for now.   Anyway we went to the Juan March Foundation for and exhibit of English art from Holbein to Hockney and what a treat it turned out to be.  I’ve been a BIG admirer of Holbein ever since I saw the queen’s collection at Windsor Palace and one of his portraits was the first painting in the exhibit.  It didn’t disappoint!   Deb was surprised at the quality of the 16^th century art and enjoyed the breadth of the 20^th century offerings.  Of course for us the art from 1900 to about 1945 was really fun to see and compare to what was going on in Colorado and the U.S.   There were interesting prints in addition to paintings and sculpture.  Best of all it turned out to be free so we went through the first 3 rooms then took a break.   They have a cafeteria in the basement but it’s really a small restaurant.   For 9.50 Euros we got 3 courses with bread and wine and it was really good.   After lunch we went back up and finished the last 4 rooms.  The modern paintings included David Hockney, Lucien Freud,  Barbara Hepworth, and Henry Moore among others.

After  the exhibition we walked down to the outdoor museum of abstract sculpture which is under a viaduct of all things, but it is really good too, with pieces by Edward Chillida, and Joan Miro among others.   We finished the day with a paseo through the Barrio Salamanca which must be the most expensive quarter of Madrid. 

Lots of opportunity to spend more money than you could launder with the Chinese Mafia here.   It’s alleged that they have laundered over 1.2 billion euros in the last 4 years; big money.

A DOH Postscript - I wanted to tell the lady docent that we were going to lunch and would return finish viewing the exhibition, but the next day we found that I had told her I was going to eat and then REVOLT.   Ah well, lost in translation again

October 18th Now we’re really moving in

Last night the father of our instructor was able to tell us the basic location of a public library close to where we’re staying.  We’ve been on the hunt since we found one that had wifi for public use.  It was clear across town, but we felt there must be one closer.  So today I got out earlier and walked over to where he said this one should be and darned if it wasn’t.  It’s about a 20 minute walk so not very far away.  On the way back I found a small shop that would provide us with passport type photos.  You may remember from an earlier post that we can’t get our museum passes without passport type photos and copies of our passports.   Anyway I went back to the apartment and got Deb to come with me for photos and to see the library.  We got photos for 4 euros each then went up to the library.  At the library they told us that we would need library cards in order to be able to use the wifi.  Then wonder of wonders they issued us library cards within about 5 minutes, for free.  Totally reinforces our contention that libraries are still the place where one can go almost anywhere in the world and be treated as a valued client regardless of where you come from.  A gentleman from the U.K who has been living here for the last 15 years was incredibly kind in helping us and explaining how the libraries work in Madrid, as Stella said in ‘A Streetcar named  Desire’, we depend upon the kindness of strangers.  So now we are enrolled in a class and we have public library cards, we’re practically embedded in the place.   A peaceful evening at home for us.  Tomorrow is supposed to be rainy and cold, we’ll see.

October 17th Chueca

Today we got out for a walk through an area called Chueca, it is north of Plaza Mayor and is an area that was pretty run down not so long ago.  It has a bit of a reputation as a place where you could get mugged at night if you aren’t paying attention, but like all neighborhoods for us it seems pretty sedate. However like all neighborhoods anywhere you could get in trouble if you’re careless.  That being said we started our walk at the ‘Sociedad General da Autores de Espagna’ which is the organization that ensures that Spanish authors and composers receive all the royalties to which they are entitled.  What makes this interesting is that it is housed in one of the most over the top Art Nouveau building we’ve ever seen.  It is recognized as one of the top architectural gems of Madrid and that still almost understates it.  From there we walked through the quarter past the church where one of Spain’s kings is buried along with his wife, from which it gets its name, Santa Barbara.  Then past the supreme tribunal building where all of the high profile trials take place, for people like terrorists and such.  We then walked through an area that is primarily the gay neighborhood of Madrid, lots of fashion and shoe stores to tempt a person. After our walk we got back to the apartment for a quick rest before going for our second Spanish language session.  A busy day all in all.

Sculpture in public places

Everywhere you look it seems that there is interesting and beautiful sculpture in Madrid here are some of the ones I´ve captured so far.   I could take pics every day and still miss many but here is a beginning.  I missed a sculpture garden very close to the last of these pics but I will go back to it and get more pictures.

First Introduction to A Conchina

Here are some pics from A Conchina as a first introduction, I´ll try to get more as we go but this is the exterior and some of the tapa´s we´ve had.

You need to know that on Fridays & Saturdays this place is as crazy as the bus was the night we came back from Toledo.  More to follow.