Easter week in Cáceres

José, the kids and I spent a great week visiting with José’s family during Holy Week. First we spent a couple of days at his father’s in the foothills of northern Cáceres province and later we headed to the south. We stayed in the medieval town of Trujillo but spent most of the time at his sister’s in a nearby village. She was hosting the Trocolada, the 3rd annual gathering of all the cousin. A lot of Family!
But then again, last July I subjected José to my family’s annual reunion which dwarfed his.
Photos: Torremenga, Trocolada, Trujillo, Guadalupe

K

zipper boy

K is healing fine from his recent accident and surgery. He says he is walking around with a big zipper on on his shoulder what with the row of staples they put into him. I just wish they could do an operation on his attitude. Teenagers!

Fuerteventura

I finally got the pictures posted from José’s and My trip in March to the island of Fuerteventura in the Canaries. With all the craziness surrounded K’s accident, hospitalization and followup treatment, posting had fallen way down the priorities list.

still celebrating

As promised the birthday celebrating has continued all month. I followed up my party from a couple of weekends ago with a little getaway this past weekend. José and I met up in Palma on the island of Majorca in the Balearics. It wasn’t exactly tropical what with the horrid wind storms that hit all of Spain, but at least it was much warmer than Madrid.
Palma itself is quite nice and retain many things from its glory days as the capital of an independent kingdom. And though all of Majorca generally gets overshadowed by its little sister Ibiza, I would recommend it very highly.
Photos

my birthday celebration

Thanks to all of you who helped me celebrate my birthday (or rather birthmonth as I plan to celebrate all month). The gifts, emails, cards, calls and text messages were all appreciated. And especially to those who came out to the party at my house. We had 30 people eating drinking and dances, and I think an excellent time was had by all. Definitely by me. See the photographic proof.

snow day!

 

opera snow man

Check out my photos from our latest snowfall in Madrid, something that doesn’t happen too often. This was only the third time in my 5 winters in Madrid. And like a kid I took advantage of my classes being canceled and went out to frolic in it.

holiday trip

D, José and I spent the Christmas/New Year’s period traveling and had a wonderful trip. We rented a car and drove first to José’s hometown of Badajoz in western Spain’s Extremadura region on the Portuguese border. We arrived in time for Christmas Eve lunch and then had a chance to meet up with some of his friends for drinks before the big family dinner at his mother’s house with his parents and sisters. We finished the day off with drinks at his friend Zaira’s house.

Christmas day was pretty much devoted to eating and more eating. The next couple of days we made day trips: first to Elvas, Portugal with his mother and sister, Mariló, and later to Mérida in Spain. Elvas is basically just across the border and is a fantastic old medieval town crowned by three fortresses, one of which we toured. We saw the town and did a bit of shopping before winding up with sweets in one of the ubiquitous pastry shops. Mérida, on the other hand, is dedicated to ancient Rome. With José’s cousins Trini and Bea as guides we visited many of the Roman ruins including the theater, amphitheater, bridge (the longest in existence) and temples. After tapas in a couple of great bars we browsed through the National Roman Antiquities Museum.

After bidding our goodbyes to all the family we headed farther south seeing some villages in Badajoz province, in particular Zafra which was pleasant. Especially the charming restaurant which dished up wild hare stew for lunch.

We then ventured into the Andalusia region, specifically Huelva province. We had intended more or less (no very defined plans for the entire trip to be honest) to see the Sierra de Aracena National Park, but the weather was terrible with extremely limited visibility. So we spent the time in two of the park’s villages: Jabugo, famous for producing Spain’s renowned cured hams, and Aracena, not famous but should be for the amazing caves and grottos below the mountain on which the village sleeps. We spent a morning on a guided tour of the caverns with their numerous stalactites and stalagmites and stunningly clear lakes. Unfortunately photos were not allowed so y’all will just have to go see them for yourselves. You won’t be disappointed!  From there we went to Huelva city. Big and not beautiful. Just your basic port city. We looked around a bit, had lunch and moved on. To the resorts along the Atlantic coast: La Antilla, Isla Cristina and Ayamonte. 

The first was very deserted being just a small seasonal spot but we found a great hotel open and with plenty of beachfront rooms available. It was a bit chilly but not too cold to enjoy an evening and then a morning stroll along the sands. Isla Cristina being a bigger place with year-round residents had more to offer. But we passed on most of it and just went to the beach for a while during the afternoon. Ayamonte however was great and one of the highlights of the trip. A nice sized little city on the coast where the Guadiana River, which divides Spain and Portugal, hits the ocean. The city was very pretty and very lively. And the weather was ideal. Finally. It made it great to explore the pedestrianized old town and have lunch at a terrace cafe on the main square.

After Ayamonte we continued along the coast into Portugal’s Algarve region. We really only spent time in two cities there: Tavira and Faro. Tavira was my favorite of all. We hadn’t actually planed to stop there but as we drove by we spotted a beautiful old town capping a hill encircled by a river and couldn’t resisted seeing it up close. A great decision. It also had some Roman ruins in addition to the mostly Arabic old town. And the people were friendly (and cute). Faro at first sight seemed unappealing being a large working city. But after finally finding a hotel (much harder than anticipated) we discovered the old walled inner city and the pedestrian shopping area just outside it. All the food we eat there was really good as well.

From Faro we headed inland to the Alentejo region to the north seeing mainly the towns and cities of Almodôvar, Beja, Estremoz and Évora having already seen Elvas which is in the Alentejo as well. Other than the day we drove over the mountains through fog so thick we could barely see the road, we saw some beautiful sights in the Alentejo. Évora which is a World Heritage site is of course the crown jewel of the region but the other locations were just as nice for my money. Besides, you can only spend so many consecutive days seeing castles, cathedrals and forts before you just want to go to the mall. And Évora was the next-to-the-last place we saw, so some of its magic is perhaps lost on me. But then again Estremoz was the last and I loved it. There is a lot to be said, I suppose, for unexpected surprises. Much like Tavira and Ayamonte before it, stopping in Estremoz was a completely last second and not at all regrettable decision.

All in all, a fantastic road trip executed just the way I like them, drifting along spontaneously. But I think I’m good on ruins and historic sites for a while. At least a week.

Photos: Badajoz Province, Huelva Province, Algarve & Alentejo

baking out a storm

It has really been a long time since I wrote about cooking. So here goes. 
I’ve actually done a little baking lately. First, for Thanksgiving I decided to make a sweet-potato pie. That’s something I hadn’t done in years. Mostly, because you can’t buy ready made crust in Spain and I had never made a crust from scratch. Well now I have. And it was damn good if I do say so myself. And without rolling pin no less. I used a large glass to roll out the dough. Interesting let me tell ya.

And the past weekend, I spent the whole cold, stormy Saturday in my pajamas and decided to bake a cake to 1) help past the time, 2) help heat up my cold flat and 3) satisfy the sweet tooth I’ve developed after the aforementioned sweet-potato pie. And as I do with everything I cook, I invented as I went. It was basically just your plain cake except I had some wild berry flavored yogurt that was quickly approaching it’s drop dead date. So I through that in the batter. (It smelled like blueberry muffins cooking). And to top it off I made a simple little glaze using apricot jam, orange juice, honey, cinnamon and a little plain yogurt to take the edge off the sweetness. It actually turned out quite delicious. (Or else, you’d have never heard about it, right)?

gone to see my baby

I made my first trip to Frankfurt to visit José this past weekend. I was there from early Friday evening to Sunday evening and it was a very nice experience.

Because José is staying in a small apartment-hotel provided by his employer we had to stay in a hotel. And it was a nice one in the financial district. As the main train station, to which I arrived from the airport, is also in that area, that’s all I saw the first day. And I had the distinct impression of being in Dallas, or Charlotte, or Nashville or any other generic American downtown. What with all the skyscrapers and cars. But the next two days we toured the historic center (both blocks), the Main River area and the central shopping district and it felt much more European. More like Brussels or Rotterdam, for example.

In general Frankfurt is nothing special, but I had very low expectation and so was pleasantly surprised. And besides, I just wanted to spend some time with José regardless of the location. So quite frankly, Hell itself would have probably sufficed.

We ate well, but not very German. José loves Japanese but had never been to one of the places where they cook in front of you, so we did that on Friday and on Saturday we had Indian for dinner. However we did have some bratwurst, potatoes and sauerkraut from vendors in a plaza on Saturday afternoon. (I like meat cooked very well so I’m always a bit hesitant with food in northern Europe). And other than the overuse of raisins, the pastries were quite good.

All in all, a great experience. See the photos

literate times two

I’m so excited! I just finished reading my first novel in Spanish. Sure I’ve been reading newspapers, magazines and the Internet in Spanish for a long time. (And I’ve started and stopped several book). But this is different. 400 plus pages different. If fact, I started and stopped this one a couple of times as well.

The book, by the way, was El muchacho persa/The Persian Boy which is an historical novel about the life of Alexander the Great told from the perspective of his Persian eunuch-servant-lover. Quite interesting. And thanks to Jesus for recommending it and lending me his cherished copy.