Tag Archives: church

20th September 2025: The Mercury Mine in Almadén {Road Trip & Almadén, September 2025}

Posted on by
Reply

My lodging in Almadén included breakfast, so I had a coffee and a toast – better than dinner the previous night, but this time there was the hotel lady working the bar. Afterwards, I just grabbed my things and redid half of my tour from the previous night, and re-visit all the spots inscribed as World Heritage Heritage of Mercury. Almadén and Idrija.

The former mining school, the first one created in Spain, Antigua Escuela de Ingeniería de Minas was still closed – it is not open to visitors due to its poor conservation state. It is a Baroque building erected in the 1780s, with a sober façade and wooden interior with basements and semi-basements to deal with the steep street outside, the whole building designed around a master staircase.

I climbed up towards the castle Castillo de Retamar. Historically, the Romans were the first to intensively exploit the mines, as they used cinnabar for pigments. Later, the Moors started distilling mercury, which they used for decoration. There are testimonies of fountains of mercury running in Al-Andalus – let’s face it, quicksilver is a fascinating thing. As the Moors wanted to protect their dominion over the mine – and the whole territory, including the water sources – they erected the castle in the 12th century. The building was later reinforced by the Order of Calatrava, but today there are only a few remains: the brick foundations of what could have been the keep, topped with a 14th-century bell tower.

I finally headed out towards the mining complex Parque Minero de Almadén. When the mine closed down in 2003, it had been the largest producer of mercury in the world throughout the current era – it is calculated that one third of the mercury used in the world comes from Almadén. The catch? Several of them, actually. First of all, mercury is toxic. Second, the exploitation of the mine was less than stellar – at a point in history, digging in the mine was a punishment for capital crimes, considered worse than being sent to row in the navy, with workers being little more than slaves. Third, the mine is surrounded by underground water reservoirs that percolated slowly into the tunnels, which reach 700 metres deep, threatening to inundate them. If breaking down rock was hard, so was carrying the mineral, along with bags of never-ending water, up and out. Since the mines closed, the water has flooded most of the 19 under-levels of the mine, rising up until the third one.

With the mine closed, life in Almadén dwindled down. The area opened to visitors in 2008. When the Unesco Heritage Declaration came in 2012, it breathed a bit of a new air into the town, turning it into a tourist destination, but lack of management makes it, in the end, barely worth a day’s visit. Visits to the mine are only guaranteed at the weekends, when the museum located in the university is closed down. Reservation of activities is confusing, and unless you’re a whole group there is no way to book a complete visit. I had booked the guided visit to the mine at 10:30 in the morning and a visit to the museums in the afternoon. I was not sure that I could do both before Spanish lunch time, but figured out I would be able to talk my way into the museums early if both things could be combined in one go. It was actually the cashier’s idea to have me do so, even better. One of the museums was closed and there was no warning about it anywhere but Google Maps, which feels a bit like cheating.

The main entrance to the mining complex Parque Minero de Almadén is locked down. There is a side building with an open door and a sign reading “we don’t have any information about tourist visits”, which leads to the Visitors’ Centre. That was confusing. As I came in, there was a large group who had not booked in advance because they were afraid they’d feel claustrophobic, and now they had no tickets. The cashier managed to fit them into the afternoon visit. I talked to him about my bookings and he told me to go to the museums after my mine visit, and to wander around while the rest of the group came together.

The lift that reaches inside the mine (modern lift in old encasing)

Of course, there was a family with young children absolutely in the wrong mind frame to get into a poorly-lit underground tunnel for a couple of hours. Fortunately, there were two groups organised and I made sure to insert myself into the child-free one. I didn’t want a repeat of the Cueva del Viento, where a bunch of information was lost due to kids being kids. And I understand that kids are kids but… for me it’s hard enough to focus on the information from a guide without the added distractions.

The visit into the mine only goes down to the first floor and an upper sub-gallery, after which you ride out in the “mining train”. Before starting, you need to get your helmet, and some lanterns are dealt out to each group to improve visibility in the tunnels. The rules are simple: distribute the lanterns throughout the group, keep light pointed at the floor. Apparently, those pointers are too hard to follow – my group had three lights together in the middle of the group, pointed upwards all the time. Good thing phones have torches now.

The descent to the mine is done through a modern-times lift installed in a former shaft Pozo de San Teodoro, down 50 metres to the gallery. It did not feel claustrophobic to me, and surprisingly, I was more impressed about knowing about the water creeping up than the rock above my head. The visit took about two hours and a half. Along the walk we saw areas that were worked on from the 17th to the 19th centuries, along some of the machinery that came into play in the 20th.

Inside the Almadén mine - corridors and mining galleries and a well to extract the water.

Inside the Almadén mine - corridors sustained by brick. In one of the pictures there is a bat flying but you can't see it.

Don’t get me wrong, back in the day mining those tunnels must have been beyond horrible. It is impossible to describe the history of mine without considering the harsh conditions the workers had to endure, especially the prisoners that were all but enslaved there for decades. The most intense exploitation of the mine happened during the age of the Spanish Empire and its expansion to America. Mercury became a key ingredient in the production of gold and silver in the New World.

Inside the Almadén mine - corridors sustained either by brick (newer) or wood (older).

Inside the Almadén mine - corridors and an image of the Virgin Mary.

Throughout the works in the mine, various exploitation strategies were used, digging both horizontally and in angles. We saw different methods and tools, from plain old pickaxes to modern hydraulic hammers, and the room where the mules would work to help extract the cinnabar. We were shown corridors held up by wooden beams – which were discontinued after in the mid 1750s there was a fire that lasted two years – and later brick ones. We saw shafts that had water at the bottom, and in the end we rode a little mining train to come up to street level. The visit ended with a brief lookout and explanation of the furnaces used to purify the mercury.

A piece of cinnabar embedded in the rock within the Almadén mine.

The mining train that used to transport cinnabar and now transports tourists out of the mine.

Rusted distilling equipement, metres high, where mercury was produced from cinnabar when the mine was in operation.

Afterwards, I had my visit to the museums. One of them has an explanation of the mining procedures, the same thing we had heard within the mine itself. The second held the former workshops, which displayed machinery to keep up with the maintenance of all the apparatuses used within the mine. I was the only person who had booked those tickets, so it was a quiet visit. I was also allowed to amble around the outer part of the mining park, seeing all the heavy-duty machines.

I left the mining park and tried to find the historical gates. The entrance to the mines has always been walled off – historically to protect the valuable resources it held. I could see the restored Puerta de Carlos IV. This gate would have taken me to the Mercury Museum, currently closed. There was another gate, but the overgrown vegetation made it impossible to do more than glimpse it.

Mining equipment and buildings on the outer part of the mine in Almadén, including an excavator, the mechanical shop and the classic door, in red brick.

My next step was heading back downtown until I reached the bullfighting ring Plaza de Toros de Almadén. During thirty-month fire of the mine, which started in 1755, the miners had to work on anything, anywhere, to raise some money. One of their ways to get income was converting the communal garden into a bullfighting ring – at least that is one theory. Today, it is considered the second-oldest ring in the world, with the characteristic that the coso (the actual bullring) is not a circle but a hexagon. It is an important national monument and part of the Heritage Site.

Bullfighting ring in Almadén. The sand pit is hexagonal, which is its main characteristic.

In front of the entrance to the bullring stands the Monument to the Miner Monumento al Minero, which takes a new meaning after having visited the mine itself and heard about all the hardships and dangers within its galleries.

And then came the hard job to find a place to grab a bite. I wanted to try a typical dish from a restaurant with a typical name, but they had run out… For real. At least they let me have lunch at the bar… It made me decide to buy something from the local supermarket to have dinner later on. After lunch, I went back to the hotel to wait for 17:00, when the last monument would open.

This was the former hospital Real Hospital de Mineros de San Rafael. It was built between 1755 and 1775 – started during the fire – in order to treat miners who became ill or had an accident in the mine. The most common malady was hydrargyria – mercury poisoning – though of course there were physical accidents, especially loss of fingers after dynamite was introduced.

The visit has three parts of sorts. On the right there is a bit on the history of mining medicine and mercury poisoning. On the left, a very humble display of what is called “the archive” – documentation related to the mine and mining operations. Upstairs, a ward with some archaeological items and an exhibition about how the layman lived outside the mine, with a chilling panel explaining that the work in the mine was considered so dangerous that children would not be allowed to play when there was a relative in the galleries.

Mining hospital - a baroque building with some exhibits inside, amongst them cinnabar, mercury (sealed away) and a wagon

Afterwards, I moved towards the current university, which has been built around and over the former prison Real Cárcel de Forzados, but there was nothing to see from the outside, and the campus was closed as it was a weekend. However, I was on a small hill, so I decided to continue upwards and see if I could get a general view of the mining park. I ended up at a small forest-park, but did not get a great view.

A general view of the town of Almadén. It shows that it is located on a hilltop. The main structures seen are the mining complex on the left (a grey mass on top of a black gorge) and the castle at the very top.

I headed downtown again and I headed towards a tobacco shop I had seen in a small side street. They had souvenirs in the window, so I hoped that they would sell some mercury. Technically, you cannot buy mercury in Europe – both the Mining Park and the Hospital staff had told me so – but this little shop had a little for sale. So yay me, now I officially own some Almadén mercury.

I found the side entrance to the church Iglesia de Santa María de la Estrella, but no other shops open – I wanted to buy some local cheese. Not even the supermarket had anything that I would not find in my local one. I did buy some dinner and snacks though, and a thermally insulated bag because mine is old and is not working that well any more. It helped keep dinner fresh until I reached the hotel and could use the small fridge there. Pity about the cheese though.

Baroque church in Almadén, showing the exterior in and the main altar.

I turned in afterwards to decide what I would do on my way back, and study the routes.

19th September 2025: A knot of roads {Road Trip & Almadén, September 2025}

Posted on by

I woke up early – way before the alarm clock went off, so I decided to hit the road. I first topped up the fuel tank at the cheap petrol station near my place. Afterwards, I drove off to the motorway and the morning rush hour. As I was caught in the traffic jam, there was a pretty rainbow in front of me – no pictures, though, for obvious reasons. Traffic dwindled a lot when I left the A2 behind and merged onto M50. From there, I took a couple of hours to reach my first stop, the village of Consuegra. On the mountaintop of the so-called Cerro Calderico, in the outskirts of this ten-thousand inhabitant, stand some the best examples of restored traditional windmills.

During the Middle Ages, the area in central Spain known as La Mancha proved a challenging place for watermills, the dominant technology at the time. The rain regimes cause irregular river flow, with a lot of the currents drying up in summer. As demand for flour grew, windmills were built near but outside towns, on high ground. They provided clean flour, cheap enough to be affordable, without being subjected to draught or flood seasons changing. The windmills lived its golden age from the second half of the 16th century until almost the 20th. Towards the end of the 1800s, most of the cereal crops were exchanged for vines in order to supply wine to France, leading to the decay and progressive abandonment of wind-milling. The Industrial Revolution and the appearance of fossil fuels and electricity finished off whatever little remained in the early 20th century.

However, besides their practical function, there was something else about the La Mancha windmills. They had gone viral centuries before the Internet was a thing. In the year 1605, Miguel de Cervantes – considered the greatest writer in the Spanish language – wrote his masterpiece El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha, worldwide known as “Don Quixote”. The novel is amongst the most translated literary works in the world, and tells the tragic story of a minor nobleman, the title character, who goes crazy from reading too many chivalric romances. He decides to leave his home and become an errant knight, having great adventures in his mind, which are more misadventures in real life. He is accompanied by a farmer-turned-squire, Sancho Panza.

During one of his delusions, Don Quixote fights giants with long arms – which the reader knows, from Sancho’s warnings, that are in reality windmills. Of course, the madman is “defeated” by the blades, which shatter his spear on impact. It is one of the most famous passages of the book, even if it is barely a page or two in the eighth chapter. Throughout the novel, which starts “in a village of La Mancha, the name of which I have no desire to call to mind”, several locations are explicitly mentioned, others are implied, and some have completely imaginary names. Experts have placed this fictional encounter with windmills either in Consuegra or Campo de Criptana – which was not on my route.

Thirteen windmills were built in the 19th century on the Cerro Calderico, and twelve have been restored and turned into tourist attractions – one even works. They stand in a row alongside the ridge and next to the local castle Castillo de la Muela (or Castillo de Consuegra). After all, both castles and windmills need the higher ground to be effective, in a way. The castle already existed in the 13th century, with roots in a 10th century previous fortress.

I parked at the foot of the hill and walked up to see the castle and the windmills. The castle was closed as it was a local holiday, and the fortress is managed by the town hall. I stayed around for an hour or so, walking from one end of the hill to the other. I had a snack as I snooped around, then I moved on.

Consuegra - a line of windmills with a castle in the background

My next stop was the National Park Parque Nacional de las Tablas de Daimiel, a weird place. I call it weird because despite its status as a protected area, it has been on the brink of collapse for the last century or so. The wetlands have been drying out for decades.

The area is the literal last of its kind in Spain, a kind of wetland generated when rivers break their banks in their middle course on flat terrain. In the middle of the de facto Spanish Inner Plateau desert, it is formed by the rivers Guadiana (fresh water) and its tributary, the Cigüela (brackish water), and fed by a number of underwater aquifers. These have been exploited for farming, which seems to be the cause for the dessication. So out of what it should be, there is only one medium-sized pond, Laguna de Navaseca (usually referred to the “permanent pond” Laguna Permanente), where a number of birds, fish and amphibians live either seasonally or all year round. The area was designated a national park in 1973. Later, it received other protections, especially regarding the bird population.

I parked in the allocated space and had a sandwich before I went in. The visitors’ centre was manned by a very disgruntled employee who explained the dessication to me as if I were personally responsible for it. I really felt like apologising. The truth is that the first place I visited was the pier, which has not seen water for at least a decade. I could do two of the three walking routes, but in the end I only did one and a half, as the second I tried was way hot and dry and I gave it up three-quarters in, as there was no water any more.

In the end, I stayed around the main pond Laguna de Navaseca, where wooden walkways have been built. I felt horribly guilty whenever the wood cracked under my feet and I scared the ducks away, but the local guides could be heard from across the whole pond. On the banks, there are bushes of common reed (Phragmites) and rushes (Juncus). The only tree in the area is the tamarix (Tamarix gallica), small and brime-resistant.

In the pond – and flying over it – I found a flock of greater flamingoes (Phoenicopterus roseus) – which are for some reason not listed anywhere that explains the park. I also saw herons, ducks, geese and I swear ibises – the latter are not mentioned either, but my bird identification book suggest a glossy ibis (Plegadis falcinellus). I was hoping that autumn had modulated the temperatures a bit, but it was extremely hot. It was also… stupidly dry for wetlands… That is why I gave up on the second route halfway.

Doñana National Park - view of the main pond, surrounded by low bushes

Doñana National Park - view of the main pond with flying flamingoes

An ibis waddling for food

A flock of flamingoes flying

I went back to the car and drove to a small parking lot at the entrance of the park which allows you to see the watermill. It was closed, and again dry, but it was an interesting structure.

I continued on the road towards the archaeological site Yacimiento Visitable de Calatrava la Vieja in Carrión de Calatrava, which has a very nice and shaded parking area, where I had my second sandwich as I was there 30 minutes before schedule – read: they had not opened yet.

The archaeological site is considered one of the most important of Moorish origin in Spain – a city and a castle from that period, erected on older remains, probably Iberian. Back during the Arab vs Christian wars in Spain, the fortress was right in the middle on the way between Toledo and Córdoba, along with other important commercial routes, so it became a key defence point. It is known that the castle already existed before the 8th century, on the Guadiana riverbank. When it fell to the Christians around 1150, it became the first line of defence, and it was entrusted first to the Knights Templar and then to the Cistercians. It became the birthplace of the first Spanish military order, the Order of Calatrava Órden de Calatrava.

Calatrava castle from the outside - a ruined fortress with a roundish shape, built in clay-coloured rock, with no vegetation whatsoever around it

The castle was built on a plateau, defended by the river itself and the walling structure, which included at least 44 flanking towers. There were four fortified corridors (corachas) that protected access to the water. The entrances to the inner fortress had several turns to make them easier to protect. Between the inner core and the walls stood the medina, the Islamic city, and the alcázar rose as a sort of triangular keep, accessed through a triumphal arch. The inner castle itself is the best-preserved area, having even rebuilt furnaces to make clay. During the Templar times, part of the alcázar was repurposed into a budding church which was never finished. On one of the inside walls there are carved drawings of vessels.

Calatrava castle, collage: The inside of a room with a Templar cape as sole decoration, the inside of a pottery oven, a view of the mdina arched entrance and two inner archways.

As I climbed the walls, clouds had started gathering and the wind had picked up. I decided to get going, trying to outdrive the storm. At first I thought I had been lucky, but about 20 minutes away from Almadén, the skies opened and there was a torrential downpour. I was lucky enough to find a parking spot where I hoped, down the corner from the hotel, and I have an umbrella in the car. A few minutes after parking, the storm stopped though, albeit the rain did nothing to cool down the evening. I checked in, and the hotel lady gave me a map with all the spots that have been inscribed as World Heritage Heritage of Mercury. Almadén and Idrija.

Mercury (chemical symbol Hg) is a native metallic element, the only one which is liquid under normal temperature and pressure conditions. In nature, it is usually found as cinnabar (mercury sulphide, HgS), a bright scarlet mineral. Its formation is linked to volcanic activity and alkaline hot springs (the area of Ciudad Real comprises the extinct volcanic field called Campo de Calatrava, which I drove through, but found no way to stop anywhere to explore). Liquid mercury, also called quicksilver, is extracted from cinnabar by heating it, as sulphur evaporates with heat.

Mercury is toxic to the nervous system, dissolves gold and silver, and has long been associated with “mystical” powers and sites – the first emperor of China was buried in a tomb with rivers of mercury, there is mercury under one of the Teotihuacan pyramids in Mexico, and in the end it carries the name of the Roman God of Messengers and Travellers. It has fascinated humans throughout history.

The name of the five-thousand-inhabitant town, Almadén, comes from the Arabic Al-maʻdin [المعدن], which means “The Mine”. The site was already exploited in times of the Romans – the extracted bright-red cinnabar was used to create vermilion paint for the walls of Pompeii and Complutum. When I was a child, my history book had some information on Almadén, and the accompanying photograph showed someone who had thrown a cannonball into a mercury pool, but the cannonball was floating on it. I have wanted to see the mine since then, even knowing that there was no way I would ever see that one pool any more, due to the legislations that have deemed mercury as “too toxic for anything”.

I went to have a look around town. It was dusk and everything was closed – not that many things would open the next day anyway. I did a small circular walking tour which included the main church Iglesia de Santa María de la Estrella, and down the main street the central square with the town hall Ayuntamiento de Almadén and the church Iglesia de San Juan. I continued on and found the the old mining school Antigua Escuela de Ingeniería de Minas. To the side of the street stands the former castle point Castillo de Retamar, where only a turret remains. Up a little, I reached the third church, Iglesia de San Sebastian and the ruins of the manor house Casa de la Superintendencia.

Almadén Castle - a derelict tower in brick, with a stork nest on top

I undid my path and headed to the other side of town. In a secondary square there is a monument to miners Monumento al Minero, and across the street the bullfighting ring Plaza de Toros de Almadén. My final stop was the former hospital Real Hospital de Mineros de San Rafael. I had dinner at the hotel restaurant, which honestly was a little disappointing.

Almadén: monument to the miner at night; a huge sculpture in metal that represents miners. Two of them have picks and are breaking a rock, two others are pushing a wagon. The miners have helmets with actual lights.

I headed back to the room to have a shower and some rest, and get ready for the following day – and try to digest dinner.

18th July 2025: In the University of Saragossa {Dinosaur Eggs Loarre & Zaragoza, July 2025}

Posted on by

I woke up and for the first time in days I put on “person clothes” (for the city) instead of “scarecrow clothes” (for hiking & working in the field). Before setting off on the trip, I went to the sales to buy some jeans that would work for sitting on rock or walking through thistles and dry grass, and while they are not particularly nice, they are comfortable and resistant. Saragossa / Zaragoza was still waking up as I headed for breakfast to a bakery close to the hotel, Pannitelli Original Bakery, which I had chosen for two reasons. One, they opened at 7:30, which gave me plenty of time to walk to the university afterwards and two, they had waffles, I had seen them online. I wanted waffles, and a big coffee. I had both (and some orange juice, just because I could).

It turned out that not driving to the university Universidad de Zaragoza had been a great idea. Though it had been my first thought (dump the car there, then walk to my accommodation), I was lucky that in the end I was able to reserve my parking spot with the hotel. It happens that access to campus is restricted to working staff. Students can drive into the parking lot ten times in the school year. And on top of that, there was a farmers’ market for some reason.

Having 20 minutes to walk, I was the first one there, and I sat down in the rock garden of the Earth Sciences building to wait for everyone else for the last day of the course Técnicas de restauración en paleontología a través de la preparación de los huevos de dinosaurio de Loarre: Palaeontological Restoration Techniques through the preparation of Loarre dinosaur eggs. By 9:00, when class was to start, I was the only one besides the teachers who had managed to arrive. Everyone else had either got lost, left Loarre late, or was taking forever trying to park. So yay me being lucky for once (and for the 20 € which the hotel parking cost for the whole stay).

The first chunk of the morning was a tour through the Rock and Hard Material Preparations, 3D Printing and Scanning Service (Servicio de preparación de rocas y materiales duros, impresión y escaneado en 3D) in the university. They have two main lines of work. One is to make thin translucent sections out of specimens so they can be studied under the microscope, and the other is digitalising and making 3D models and copies of items so they can be lent or studied through a computer. The inner works of the department were explained by Raquel Moya Costa, who not only described in detail all her complex machinery, she also gave each of us a 3D printed T-Rex charm from the Dino Run Game!

We then moved onto the Petrology lab to look at thin sections on the transmitted-light microscopes – preparations of a sauropod eggshell, a crocodilian eggshell and an iguanodon eggshell. There were other preparations we could snoop around if we promised not to take pictures and publish them. We also got to play with the 3D copy of one of the first eggs recovered from Loarre. Much less heavy than the real thing, for sure.

Microscope used in geological studies

Microscope preparations and how they look under the microscope. There are three egg specimens: one from Loarre (sauropod), a crocodile and an iguanodon, The crocodile is the thinnest, and the sauropod is the brightest and more complex

Then a bit of chaos ensued as we got distracted by the shiny exhibits of the Palaeontology department, and a couple of post-docs offered to show us their lab and what they were working on. Having finished all the activities of the course, the coordinators had organised an extra visit to the Natural Science Museum Museo de Ciencias Naturales de la Universidad de Zaragoza (which might have actually been my fault as I asked how come that would not happen, considering that most of the region’s fossils are officially deposited there). A few people left first, but some of us got delayed looking at the lab specimens, and then we had to hurry to the museum…

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: Exhibits in the Geological science building. Replicas of dinosaurs and invertebrate fossils

Once we were at the site of the Museo de Ciencias Naturales, we were taken on an express visit of the palaeontology ward by Ester Díaz Berenguer, curator of the collections. The museum is located in one of the historical buildings of the Zaragoza campus. Designed by Ricardo Magdalena in 1886, it was erected with academicist criteria, in brick, with large windows and striking symmetry. It opened in 1893, and during the 20th century, it served as Faculty of Medicine. When the university moved to the newer campus, the building was refurbished as cultural spot and seat of the government body. The basement was turned into the exhibition site of the Science Museum, which has three main areas – palaeontology, natural science, and mineralogy.

The palaeontology ward of the museum comprises nine rooms. The first one is an introduction to the science and the concept of fossilisation, and the following ones run through the Earth’s history, from the Precambrian to the Quaternary. The Precambrian is the earliest “calculated” period in geological time, and spanned from 4567 to 539 million years ago (give or take). Though we cannot pinpoint when life actually originated, it was already there when this “supereon” gave way to the Cambrian. During the Ediacara Period, at the end of the last Eon of the Precambrian, the Proterozoic, the earliest complex multicellular organisms that we know about thrived in a state that has been called “The Garden of Ediacara”. The word “garden” tries to evoke the idea of the “Garden of Eden” as there was no active predation and life just… existed.

The next rooms focus on the “Cambrian Explosion”, a term used to refer to the point in geological time when living things took over the planet. At first, this brand-new life was comprised of ocean-dwelling invertebrates. In the room there are impressive trilobites from the Murero Palaeontological Site, which I had actually planned to drive through on my way back. But not only animals appeared, so did plants – organisms which produced a new toxic gas that would change the planet forever: oxygen. To the side of this area there is a curtained room, the “aquarium”.

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: Two trilobites from the same species showing slightly different shapes, thought to be a male and a female

Here you can see the cranium of Carolowilhelmina geognostica, a fish which lived around 392 million years ago, during the Devonian period. It was a placoderm, a group whose main characteristics were being covered in armoured plates, and having developed an actual jaw and true teeth. The specimen is not just the holotype, it is the only known fossil of the animal. The cranium alone measures almost 45 cm, and by its shape, palaeontologist speculate that the animal was probably a predator of invertebrates. A first fragment of the fossil was found in Southern Aragón in 1971 by palaeontologist Peter Carls. Carls kept returning to the site to search for the rest of it every summer, until in 1986 he unearthed the rest of the skull, which was finally extracted in 1993.

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: skull of an ancient armoured fish

The following room is devoted to the Mesozoic, and it hosts another of the museum treasures, the skull of the holotype and only specimen of Maledictosuchus riclaensis, the “Cursed Crocodile from Ricla”. This crocodilian lived in saltwater around 163 million years ago, during the Middle Jurassic. It had flippers instead of legs, and probably ate fish. The fossil was found during the construction of the high-speed railway between Madrid and Barcelona in 1994. It earned the name of “cursed crocodile” because despite the fact that it was the oldest crocodilian found in Spain, exceptionally preserved on top of that, it took 20 years until someone could tackle its study and description. The “curse-breaking” researcher was Jara Parrilla Bel, one of the post-docs who shown us her lab work at the university.

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: Skull of an ancient crocodile

Of course, the “stars” of any palaeontological exhibit are dinosaurs. The museum hosts several iconic pieces, amongst them replica of the feet of the first dinosaur ever described by researchers belonging to the local university Universidad de Zaragoza, Tastavinsaurus sanzi (a titanosaur), a whole specimen of the Mongolian Psittacosaurus (a small ceratopsian), and a good part of an Arenysaurus ardevoli, a hadrosaur which lived in the Pyrenees area around 66 million years ago, during the early Maastrichtian; the rest of the specimen is located in Arén, where it was located, and which is one of the museum’s satellite centres, just like Loarre’s museum-lab. In the same room there were trunks of fossilised wood that could be touched, and a skull of the extinct crocodile Allodaposuchus subjuniperus.

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: Skeleton of a small Mongolian dinosaur

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: some bones from a hadrosaur, including the tale, hind hip and some ribs

After a small room with an audiovisual representing the impact of the meteorite and the K-Pg mass extinction (which we skipped due to time constraints), there was an exhibit of the spread of mammals. The specimen of honour in this exhibit is the ancient sirenian Sobrarbesiren cardieli (holotype, and the topic of our guide’s thesis). This species lived during the Eocene, around 45 million years ago. Sirenians (manatees and dugongs) are a type of marine mammals whose closest relatives are elephants – and not other ocean-dwelling mammals. After life spread through land, a number of mammals went back to water, and it looks like this species is a snapshot on the readaptation process: it was already completely aquatic, but it still had four functional limbs. Its hind legs had started reducing and its tail was getting flat. It was a strict herbivore, eating sea grass, but less efficiently than current sirenians.

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: Skull of an ancient sirenian.

There was also an impressive aquatic turtle of the genus Chelonia, several remains of Gomphotherium angustidens, an elephantimorph, and smaller pieces including crabs, sea urchins, gastropods and even insects. Several of these specimens are holotypes, too.

The final area was almost contemporary considering when we had started. It hosted remains of cave bears (Ursus spelaeus, 40,000 years ago), the skull of an aurochs (Bos primigenius, a species that actually lived until the 1600s), evidence ancient hyena nests, micro-invertebrate bones, mammoth defences… These animals coexisted with human beings, whose skulls comprise the ending room before moving onto the “nature collections” which we did not visit because a) the course had after all to do with palaeontology and b) it was closing time – quite literally, museum security was turning off lights behind us since the museum shut down at 14:00.

Zaragoza Natural Science Museum: Skull of an ancient bull, curved mammoth defence, a pile of bones from a hyena nest and several human-ancestor skulls

We had a mini closure “ceremony” in the hall of the building – coordinators Miguel Moreno Azanza and Lope Ezquerro Ruiz thanked us for attending, we clapped and thanked them back. Then we all went off to have a drink, a snack and a chat. A bit after 16:00, when most students had already left and the professors had been joined by university staff, I took my leave.

Palaeontological Restoration Techniques through the preparation of Loarre dinosaur eggs

Hopping from shadow to shadow to avoid the sun and the heat as much as I could, I headed downtown. On my way I made an exception regarding the walking in the shade when I found the only remaining gate of the original Medieval Wall, today called Puerta del Carmen. Calling it “original” is a bit of a stretch though. While it is in the same place as the first gate, it actually dates from the early 1790s, and it follows Neoclassical patterns.

I also stopped at Starbucks for a Vanilla Frappuccino – I’m on a bit of a matcha remorse trip due to the alleged shortage, so I’ve reverted to my old drink of choice. With a temperature of around 38 ºC, I reached the most important square in town, Plaza de Nuestra Señora del Pilar, where the namesake basilica is. I kid you not, what was running through my head was “I’ve got a 0.5 zoom on my phone now, I’ll be able to take a nice picture of the whole building with its towers…”. Only to find said towers covered in scaffolding. I was able to take the picture, but it could have been nicer. I entered the Cathedral-Basilica of Our Lady of the Pillar Catedral-Basílica de Nuestra Señora del Pilar, a Baroque / Neomudejar catholic temple which is considered the first-ever church dedicated to the Virgin Mary. I sat at the chapel for a little bit, but when I was ready to have a walk around the church, there was a call for mass, so I did not do it out of respect.

Chapel of Our Lady of the Pillar, a baroque chapel for the workshop of a small figurine of the Virgin Mary carrying a child and standing on a pillar

Instead, I strolled to the former exchange building Lonja de Zaragoza, which has been turned into a free exhibition centre. The building is Renaissance with a touch of Neomudejar, and it is considered the most important civil architecture construction erected in the whole area of Aragón during the 16th century.

I had read that there was an exhibition on Asian culture called Tesoros. Colecciones de arte asiático del Museo de Zaragoza – Treasures: Asian art collections from the Zaragoza Museum. At the moment, the Zaragoza Museum is closed and has loaned a few of its artifacts to be displayed elsewhere. This one exhibition displays items that were originally part of personal collections and were donated to the museum. The Colección Federico Torralba, comprises religious items and art pieces from China and items from Japan. The Colección Víctor Pasamar Gracia and Colección Miguel Ángel Gutierrez Pascual have woodblock prints – landscapes, noh [能], kabuki [歌舞伎], even modern ones. The. Finally, the Colección Kotoge displays lacquered tea bowls (chawan [茶碗]). There are also modern calligraphies, paintings, and the compulsory samurai armour. The regional government has undertaken buying artefacts to engross the Asian collections. Though they looked a bit out of place in the historical building, the items were fantastic – and you could even make your very own “woodblock print” at the end.

Zaragoza exchange ceiling, decorated with architectural flower-like patterns

Though the exhibition was the reason I had wanted to go downtown, after I left the (nicely air-conditioned) Lonja, I still had some time to do stuff. I wandered back into the cathedral for a bit – between the 17:00 mass and the 18:00 mass, and left before the second one started.

I continued towards the Roman Walls Murallas Romanas de Zaragoza, which sadly have had to be fenced off because people have no respect (I vividly remember a mum letting her toddlers to climb all over them one time I visited). At the end of that square stands the marketplace Mercado Central de Zaragoza, a wrought iron architecture building designed in 1895 by Félix Navarro Pérez. Being a Friday evening, in the middle of summer, many of the stands were closed, so it was not crowded.

Zaragoza Roman ruins

Iron and glass architecture market

I continued towards the Fire and Fireforce Museum Museo del Fuego y de los Bomberos, where a nice gentleman wanted to give me a guided visit which I declined. Honestly, I just wanted to look at the old fire trucks (and actually, support any initiative by firefighters if it helps fund firefighting). It is a little quaint museum located in part of a former convent, the other half is an actual fire station. The exhibition covers documentation of historical Zaragoza fires, firefighting equipment, a collection of helmets, miniatures, and quite an impressive collection of vehicles used to fight fire. There were two immersive rooms, one which showed damage to a house and another about forest fires. I really enjoyed it, though I only had a quick visit – they closed in an hour, and I was the only guest along a family.

Firefighting museum: collection of vintage vehicles in a brick cloister

On my way back towards the hotel I walked by CaixaForum Zaragoza, where they were running the Patagonian dinosaurs Dinosaurios de la Patagonia. Seeing the Patagotitan on the balcony made me want to go in, but I had already seen it, and I knew I was just on a palaeontology high.

Patagotitan installation on a balcony

I headed back to the hotel – crossing a couple of quite unsavoury neighbourhoods – and bought some fast food dinner again. It was stupidly early, but after eating I could have a shower and relax on the bed while I studied the route for the following day. Furthermore, it was so hot I really needed that shower, and I knew I would not be going anywhere after taking it. Thus, I showered and plopped down to watch the Natural Science Museum’s YouTube Channel after I had learnt how to get out of the city.

22nd February 2025: Architecture in Madrid, and folklore in Guadalajara (Spain)

Posted on by

By now, reaching Madrid by train without anything remarkable to comment on is actually remarkable all by itself – there were actually no problems for once. I had booked a spot for a visit at noon, but since I don’t trust the rail service, I hopped on a train to be at Atocha Station around 10:00, and for once I was there right on time, maybe even a minute early!

As I walked up the street Paseo del Prado, I passed by the exhibition centre CaixaForum, where the Patagotitan still stands. Since it was still winter, the trees on both sides had little to no leaves, and I could see it from the opposite side. I of course said hi.

Patagotitan skeleton

My first stop was the church Iglesia de San Jerónimo el Real, dedicated to St. Jerome, a late Gothic – early Renaissance building erected between 1502 and 1505. It belonged to a monkhood whose original monastery stood near the river. The stagnant waters caused illnesses among the brethren, who asked the Catholic Monarchs for a new location. The church for the new community was created from brick and masonry, and towers were added in the 17th century. The interior is decorated with two gothic altars to the sides, but no main altarpiece, as the original one has been lost to time. Instead, there is a painting by Rafael Tegeo La última comunión de San Jerónimo – Saint Jerome’s last communion – created in 1829.

Monastery Monasterio de Jerónimos

Afterwards, I headed towards the National Museum of Anthropology Museo Nacional de Antropología, a small museum dedicated to the diversity of cultures in the world, particularly the Americas, Philippines, Africa and the “Far East”, focusing on traditions, culture and religion. It is covered by my national museum card.

At the moment, the museum is running a temporal exhibit on art based on myths, legends, and sacred texts from India, Caminos místicos. Tradiciones vivas del arte de la India – Mystic Paths. Living Traditions of art from India. I was curious about it, but not expecting how much I liked it in the end. The pieces of the exhibit were mostly based on Hinduism (Sanātana Dharma, सनातन धर्म), the oldest religion in the world. According to Hindu tradition, the Supreme Being Brahma exists as themself, but also as the manifestation of the deities Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Sustainer and Shiva the Destroyer, all of who at the same time have different avatars (avatāra, अवतार) or incarnations. One of the core principles of Hinduism is the concept of cosmic cause-and-effect justice, karma [कर्म]. Another is reincarnation (saṃsāra, संसार), an eternal cycle of life and death until the individual is liberated from it through self realisation or illumination. The religion is based on values like righteousness, truth, love, peace, and ethical conduct, and it is quite open to other beliefs and ethics.

Religious Indian Art pieces

The Museum of Anthropology’s permanent exhibition has a lot of items from the Philippines on the ground floor, probably due to how long(1565–1898) the islands were a Spanish colony. There are clothes, tobacco items, ritual objects, and a small sample of how the local culture was throughout the 1800s. To the back, there is a room dedicated to the religions of Asia and the Middle East – Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam. The first floor is dedicated to Africa, combining a number of traditional exhibits with modern photographs of the traditional people’s way of life – baskets, pottery, leather and wooden objects, ritual masks… The second floor holds items from the Americas, especially from South America. Some of them include a Mexican Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) altar, Andean Carnival masks, Sioux-Lakota clothes, Inuit coats…

Religious icons and traditional masks

I remember visiting the museum when I was a child, and then feeling disappointed in it when I returned as an adult. This time around, I found the permanent and temporal exhibitions quite interesting, so it’s a good thing I headed there. It also helped make time until noon, when my next visit was due, to the only Ministry that can be visited – albeit not freely, by appointment and paying a fee – as it is a historical building.

The current Agriculture Ministry is housed in the historical building known as Palacio de Fomento – Palace of Development. Its plans were originally drawn by architect Mariano  Belmás y Estrada, aiming for an Arts and Craftwork School. Later, Eduardo Saavedra y Moragas took over to turn the design into a university. Finally, the project ended in the hands of architect Ricardo Velázquez Bosco, who erected the building between 1893 and 1897 to house the then Ministry of Development.

The Palace is an impressive construction. The original design had three floors, which have now been turned into five. From the outside, the building looks white and orange-brown, but a more focused look reveals decorative tiles by Daniel Zuloaga, who also collaborated with Velázquez Bosco in the ETSIME. The entrance is flanked by two caryatids and roof above there is a sculpture group – Glory and Pegasi La Gloria y los Pegasos, a bronze copy of an original marble by Agustín Querol.

Palacio de Fomento, outside

Once you enter, you find yourself in a huge majestic hall, where we had to check in, since the building is a working Ministry. The email said to be there at 11:45 to go through security. I got there at 11:40 and went in at 11:44. They took my name (they did not care about the ticket) and they put my stuff in the X-ray machine. I had to go through the metal detector and when I asked whether I had to remove my belt, I was just told to put my hand over the buckle… So much for security, I thought, because I did not beep. Then I realised that I must look quite non-threatening as quite a few people were thoroughly searched as they set off the machine.

Beyond the hall where we were checked in, there is an imperial staircase in marble, and a vaulted frescoed ceiling. From there, we visited some offices and meeting rooms, and the portrait gallery – from which the ministers who held office during the Franco dictatorship had been removed. Finally, we visited one of the side inner courtyards, covered in a skylight with some ironwork.

Palacio de Fomento, inside

After the visit was over, the security guards saw us out and locked the doors. I walked around the building, because I had honestly never realised it was square. As the place was next to the Retiro Park, I had been considering looking for some archaeological spot they had opened. However, there were more ideas – Guadalajara was having the Botarga parade, and it was the fair weekend in Tendilla, though, a phone call informed me that traffic was horrid and that it was not a good idea to head there so late in the afternoon.

Eventually, I decided on the Parade. I bought some sandwiches and headed for the train. Though I got rained upon, it cleared up, and at 18:00 I was in Guadalajara to have a look at the traditional Parade of Carnival characters Desfile de Botargas – “creatures” from the whole area which meet up in the capital the Saturday before carnival, despite each character having its own schedule wherever it is rooted. The parade was a bit late, so I could talk the local botarga group – El Manda (the Order-giver), Los Mandaneros (the Order-receivers), and the Botarguilla (Little Botarga) – into posing for me. I watched and took pictures from two spots, but the parade moved really fast because they only had thirty minutes to do the route – last year they took well over an hour for that. I decided I did not want to run for it that much… I have to remember to find myself a vantage point next year, instead of trying to get the beginning of the parade…

Guadalajara Botargas

Heifferette from Riba de Saelices

Botarga Parade 2025

I got “attacked” a few times, and ended up with soot all over my face, but at least I avoided the guy painting people with mustard… The botargas seemed to zoom in on children and cameras, and so did the devils Diablos (from Luzón) and the heiferettes Vaquillas and Vaquillones (Villares de Jadraque, Robledillo de Mohernando, Luzaga, Riba de Saelices). It was fun. One of these days I might have to try to follow the botargas in their own villages…

30th December 2024: A planned and packed day {Vienna, Silvesterkonzert 2024}

Posted on by

It was a crisp morning in Vienna when we got up. We went down for breakfast and it was not particularly well stocked. The coffee was… weak, so I decided to mix a cappuccino and a black coffee to get me the energy I needed for the day. I tried some local cake, but I did not enjoy it, so I decided to stick to bread and croissants. Thankfully, I did run into the lady from the day before, and her husband, during breakfast, and told her about our plans – that way at least someone in the group would know not to wait for us and we would not delay anyone. Apparently, we were not the only ones who had made their own plans either, as the excursion had been marketed as “optional” and yet it seemed to be “a given”. Even better, we came across the driver from the day before (despite him saying he had nothing to do with the trip), and we could tell him that we were not coming, either. As we stepped out, it was freezing – literally below zero – but sunny during the whole day.

We took the underground at Zieglergasse and headed towards the city centre. I asked my parent to use their phone for GPS and maps in order to keep my battery for as long as I could so I could be taking pictures throughout the day, so they would be guiding. Our first stop was the Hofburg – the former imperial palace – and the Sisi Museum. Empress Elisabeth of Austria (1837 – 1898) was the wife of Emperor Franz Josef I of Austria. She married the Emperor when she was just 16 years old, and was stifled by court life. She spent most of her time travelling and avoiding royal duties. Her perceived eccentricity – today we would call it depression – and assassination in 1898 helped create an image of a romantic heroine in the media that has reached today, especially through actor Romy Shenider’s portrayal in the 1950s.

Hofburg

The museum tells about her life by showing objects, portraits and reproductions of her clothes. Then, you step into the former imperial apartments, which have been refurbished with furniture from the 19th century to make them look real. The audioguide was… corny to say the least, and I kind of skipped most of it because I got bored.

Sisi Museum and Royal Apartments Vienna

I proposed the church of Saint Michael first, and then the National Library. However, my parent had been intrigued by the church that stood at the exit of the underground. Thus, we headed there. The Wiener Minoritenkirche, Friars Minor Conventual Church, is officially the Italian National Church of Mary of the Snows Italienische Nationalkirche Maria Schnee. The church was erected between 1276 and 1350, and it was one of the first gothic churches in Vienna, following a French pattern. There were many subsequent reforms, including rebuilding the bell tower and the spire again and again – today the bell tower is flat and the spire is gone. The interior altar is Neogothic, by Ferdinand Hohenberg. Since it was still around Christmas time there were Nativities and Christmas trees.

Wiener Minoritenkirche

Afterwards, we headed towards St. Michael’s Church Pfarre St. Michael. It started as a late Romanesque or early Gothic building, maybe in 1221. The following two centuries saw Gothic annexes added. The crypt was built in the 16th century. The organ was built in 1714. The Rococo high altar was sculpted by Karl Georg Merville, and it represents the Fall of the Angels after the War in Heaven, when Lucifer was banished; underneath, there is a Byzantine Virgin Mary from the Cretan school. The outer façade was rebuilt in a classicist style in 1791. Construction officially finished in 1792. The crypt is accessible in a guided tour, but considering it has about 4,000 bodies, some of them mummified and on display, I think I’m happy we did not take it.

Michaelkirche Vienna

I proposed going to the Library again, because it was cold and there would be toilets there. My parent took over guiding with their phone, and my sibling and I got distracted as we passed by the Stallburg, where we caught a glimpse of the Lipizzan horses chilling out.

Instead of reaching the Library, my parent decided that we wanted to see the Augustinian church Augustinerkirche, a mix of 14th century Gothic and 18th century Neogothic. The original church was engulfed by the Hofburg as it expanded, and in 1634 it became the official imperial church. May Habsburg weddings were officiated there, and a chapel to the side, called the Herzgruft (Heart Crypt), contains the hearts of the members of the dynasty, from Ferdinand IV in 1654 to Archduke Franz Karl in 1878.

Augustinerkirche

I did not get to go to the Library, but we walked past the Hotel Astoria, which opened in 1912. it was built in the a late Art nouveau style known as fin de siècle (end-of-century). At the time it opened, the hotel was the latest, with electricity, bathrooms and all!

We reached the pedestrian / shopping street Kärntner Straße, the neuralgic centre for Vienna shopping. There we… met the card-not-working lady and her husband again, in what would become a funny number of encounters. We also saw the Swarovski shop. We entered it because we thought it would be warm – and hey, it had a toilet, which was handy, considering we had left the hotel over four hours before. Swarovski is an Austrian glass producer, known for its crystal glass, used in jewellery, decoration, watches, accessories. The company was founded in the late 19th century with the idea of “making a diamond for everyone”. Since then, it has produced thousands of items – from Christmas decorations to sculptures to collectible tiny figurines to whole dresses for the Vienna Opera. The place was halfway between a shop and a museum – and we might have spent a bit more than we had planned there, especially considering we were not planning to spend anything.

Swarovski flagshop Vienna

We reached DO & CO Restaurant Stephansplatz, located on the top floor of the post modernist structure Haas House, constructed in 1990. Most of the building is a hotel now. The restaurant has a fun view of the cathedral Domkirche St. Stephan. My parent and I discovered the restaurant because the opening scene of Austrian TV series Kommissar Rex, which ran between 1994 and 2004. It follows the story of German Shepherd Rex, a police dog which is “transferred” to the homicide department after his original handler dies… at the DO & CO terrace. It is such a naïve series, I just love it. Think The A-Team ingenuity with an adorable GSD saving the day every time and stealing sausage rolls as a self-reward. In a later series, Rex would move to Italy, and there is currently a Canadian reboot too…

There were no doggies in DO & CO, but both service and food were superb. They had butter and bread, and small receptacles with different types of salt, and a note on how they should be used. For lunch, I ordered kalbsbutterschnitzel – delicious minced veal butter patties with cream, accompanied with mashed potatoes, fried onion rings and a small leaf salad. For dessert, I had an ice latte that I should not have had, but I saw it pass by and I was smitten. We snuck a number of pictures from the restaurant, too.

DO & CO Vienna

After lunch, we went into St Stephan’s cathedral Domkirche St. Stephan. The building is a mixture of Romanesque and Gothic, and it was initiated around 1137 and completed 1578, and as many as four construction stages can be seen – the first Romanesque towers, the later Romanesque church, the Gothic Choir, and the outer, newest additions. The roof is tiled with as many as 230,000 pieces, one side shows the mosaic of a double-headed eagle, and the other the coat of arms of the city and the country. The bell tower has twelve bells, and the interior hosts as many as 18 altars (plus the ones in chapels). The cathedral was built in limestone, so it looks darker than other churches its size (107 metres long, 70 metres wide and 137 metres high).

The high altar was built in marble by Tobias Pock in the 1640s in the Baroque style. It depicts the stoning of Saint Stephen, church patron and the first Christian martyr. He was stoned to death by the Israelites after a rather inflammatory speech in front of the Sanhedrin, defending Christ’s teaching versus the traditional Jewish ones. According to the Bible, this would have happened a couple of years after Jesus’ death, and before the Roman persecution.

St Stephan’s cathedral

My parents were tired and they decided to head off towards the hotel, while my sibling and myself stayed behind. We wandered around Stephansplatz, Rotenturmstraße, and Kärntner Straße, checking out the Christmas lights and decoration until we reached the Popp & Kretschmer fashion store. They are a luxury women’s clothes firm, which draw tourist crowds during Christmastime to see their huge bow decoration, which makes the whole building look like a present. They call it the Vienna Bow.

Christmas decoration - Vienna Bow

We also looked at the Vienna State Opera Wiener Staatsoper, which was prepared to celebrate the new year, with a neon display saying (in English) “Hello 2025”. It was stupidly cold though, so we might have stayed in an underpass for a few minutes longer than necessary.

Afterwards, we headed towards the Sacher Hotel. The five-star hotel was founded in 1876 by the son of a famous confectioner. When the founder died, his wife, Anna Sacher, became manager. She turned the hotel into one of the most refined in the world, catering exclusively to the aristocracy. This management lead the hotel to bankruptcy, and she had to sell the business to new owners, who restored it to its former glory. The hotel serves “the original Sacher-torte”, a chocolate cake coated with dark chocolate icing, and a thin layer of apricot jam in the middle, served with unsweetened whipped cream. It was reportedly invented by the father of the founder, and the recipe is kept a secret. There are other versions of Sacher-torte, but the hotel is the only one with legal standing to call theirs original.

We had a 17:30 reservation at Café Sacher, in the hotel. Sacher Hotel actually has two cafés. The more modern one faces Kärntner Straße and is called Café Bel Étage. It had a long queue – Christmas is peak season in Vienna, as we were quickly learning – but I had been informed that reservations accessed through a particular door. However, that was not where our reservation was – I swear, I did not see the different name anywhere. The historic Café Sacher had an even longer line, and no special door. I dared ask the doorman at the hotel how to get there, and he gave me a huge grin and said “skip the line, go through the exit”. Boy, that was… awkward. Very, very awkward. I though the people just outside would lynch us!

Staff came to check on us, and since our reservation at the Café Sacher was valid – I made the reservation in July, literally as soon as the spots open – we were shown into one of the small salons. The café has a perfect offer – Sacher Sweet Treat: a perfect slice of original Sacher-torte with whipped cream, a non-alcoholic hot beverage and a bottle of Römerquelle mineral water for 22.5 € (31.5 € with a glass of the in-house champagne, Original Sacher Cuvée). I ordered mine with sencha senpai, Japanese green tea. I enjoyed the cake more than I had thought I would, and the tea was great. The staff was incredibly nice, too. They must have been used to silly tourists.

Sacher & Sachertorte

We left the Café Sacher and headed towards the Spanish Riding School Spanische Hofreitschule. For my sibling, this was a core-memory event, so they insisted we got really, really good seats for the Gala Performance Galavorführung at 19:00, on the parterreloge – the box at ground level. The Gala performance is the longest exhibition the Riding School has, and it lasts 90 minutes, with a break. The horses were gorgeous, and the riders looked very cold, but everything felt strangely… cold. I think I liked the exhibit in Jerez Riding School better.

The Spanish Riding School, considered the oldest horsemanship school in the world, was established during the Habsburg Monarchy in 1565. It is dedicated to the breed and training of Lipizzan horses. Lipizzaners are a breed of riding horses developed during the Habsburg empire. It derives from Arab, Bavarian, Spanish and Neapolitan breeds. They were selectively bred so most of them are grey with white coats – albeit there is always a bay stallion in the Spanish Riding School. The breed itself might be traced to eight stallions in the late 1700s, and it was developed in Slovenia. The horses are considered so precious that they were evacuated during WWI, and “rescued” by the US army during WWII. “Lipizzan horse breeding traditions” has been considered Unesco Intangible Cultural Heritage since 2022.

Once bred, foaled and fledged, the Lippizaners are trained. This is done at the Spanish Riding school. The traditional horse training methods used by the school can be traced back to Ancient Greece, and like many other things, they re-flourished during the Renaissance period in the 16th century. The goal of Classical training was to prepare horses for warfare as part of the calvary. Horses train for six year after they turn four.

In Vienna, the Lippizaners are housed at the Stallburg, which is technically part of the Hofburg Palace. It is a Renaissance building from around 1560, originally conceived as a residence but that was later converted into the Imperial Stables. The Winter Arena was built in 1735, and has remained unchanged since then – including the chandeliers. The arena is presided by a painted portrait of Emperor Charles VI.

Vienna Riding School - winter Arena

There was something weird in the atmosphere that made it not feel all that… fun. Before every performance, a lady walked to the centre of the arena to introduce the exercises movements in German and English. The performance was pretty though. I tried to sneak a picture or two, but I was unsuccessful – and a bit worried they would kick me out if the venue. There were a total of six different numbers, and the show, including the introductions, was organised as follows:

  1. Alle Gänge und Touren der Hohen Schule – “All Steps and Movements of the High School”: four riders and stallions in individual choreographers, including the one dark stallion in the stable, with classical movements.
  2. Am Langen Zügel “Schools on the Ground: On the Long Rein” – the riders guide the horse from the ground, they are not on top of the horse, with movements such as piaffe and pirouette.
  3. Pas de Deux “Step by Two” – two riders-horses pairs work in tandem, mirroring each other.
  4. Arbeit an der Hand und Schule über der Erde “Working Hand and Airs Above the Ground” – with three main movements: levade, capriole and courbette. Four horses work with their riders on the ground, and two of them with the riders on the saddle, but without stirrups. When horses perform well, they get a sugar treat from the rider.
  5. Am Zügel “Schools on the Ground: Curb Reins” – only one horse and his rider, who only holds two out the four reins in their left hand, and they hold the riding crop upright in their right hand, a commemoration of the military heritage of the horse riding tradition.
  6. Schulquadrille “School Quadrille” (or Das Ballett der weißen Hengste “Ballet of the Eight White Stallions”) – eight horse-rider pairs have to coordinate with each other for a choreography, ending in the Radetzky-Marsch.

When the exhibition came to an end, we tried to go to the toilets. You had to scan your tickets and pay 50 cents. Really. Two hundred quid for the tickets and they charged fifty cents for the toilets, which were filthy on top? A total rip-off.

I got my sibling to the hotel, and then I left again to meet up with my friend D****e and her father Fr***, who were also in Vienna for a few days. They were even staying in a hotel close to ours, so it seemed that we had planned it in advance. We spent a couple of hours in a small eatery – Gschamster Diener – where they introduced me to kaiserschmarrn, fluffy shredded pancakes with raisins, powdered sugar and cinnamon.

Kaiserschmarrn

I eventually had to go back to the hotel and my room. There, I spent an hour trying to find a place to book lunch for the following day. After deciding not to plan anything on the 31st, my parents had a change of mind and suddenly I found myself tasked with planning and finding a place for lunch. Most restaurants were either closed or booked off. I was not a happy camper, but in the end I managed to find something… somewhat decent. My sibling suggested the Natural History Museum, the Butterfly House and the Library before lunch. I was absolutely sure that was impossible to cram three things in the morning. We would not even do the entire Natural History Museum, but at least we would be somewhere warm. I resigned myself not to see the Library, had a shower and went to bed.

29th December 2024: Arrival, Karlskirche & Prater {Vienna, Silvesterkonzert 2024}

Posted on by

With our plane boarding at 8:10, we aimed to be at the airport around 6:30, which was a successful endeavour. We had our boarding passes but we needed to drop off some luggage. As we needed formal wear, neither of us could just make do with a simple backpack or trolley. We had decided to bring a carry on each, and two large suitcases – one per room – for coats, jackets, dresses and so on. The travel agency had checked us in the day before, and we had separate seats, but that was not important since it is just a short trip early in the morning.

Once in the terminal, it turned out that Iberia did not have a drop-off counter as my parent was expecting, so we had to queue with the people who needed to check in, including non-Schengen and intercontinental travellers. We decided that two of us would line while the other two could sit down and wait for us. We stepped into the cordoned area, and suddenly… one of the attendants directed half of the queue out and into another area of check-in counters. All in all, it took us around 35 minutes to drop the luggage off. Not efficient, Iberia. Not efficient.

Luggage successfully checked in, we went past security, found our gate, and sat down for breakfast. We went to the gate early, and queued to be the first in our group because… I’m not even sure why, but it was too early in the morning to fight. I napped about half of the journey, and also took pictures of the landscape from above. Once we left Spain behind, the mountaintops were covered in snow, and the valleys in fog. This was a clue of how cold it would be when we landed in Vienna. We had a maximum temperature of around +3ºC throughout the trip.

From the plane window Flight Madrid - Vienna

We disembarked and made our way to baggage claim, where our suitcases were among the first few to come up, which is always a great feeling. Afterwards, we went out and found the people responsible for picking us up – the representatives from Blaguss DMC, the local agency which manages Viajes El Corte Inglés and Tourmundial in Austria and Hungary. First, they handed us our our hotel voucher, schedule, and tickets!! Upon opening the envelope to check that everything was correct, we found out schedule with a Vienna tour the following day that my parents swear they had never heard about – the truth is that it appears in the documentation as optional. The driver in charge of taking us to the hotel was… a character. My biggest regret though is that I did not run for a Costa Coffee while we were waiting for the other travellers to come out, but I only saw the sign when he had started moving.

We arrived at the hotel Elaya Hotel Vienna City West around 13:00. It was a four-star hotel that felt like it had dropped at least one and a half, and it was not any of the ones listed in the original documentation. There was neither a bar nor a restaurant, and the staff was not exactly friendly. I know it’s not nice to work during the holidays, but come on. I don’t think requesting two keys for a two-people room was that outrageous. At first, neither card worked to open my door, but after trying three times each card, both sides, I managed to get it open. And more importantly, though the warm option of the air-conditioning did not work, I figured out how to turn on the radiators.

The hotel room was… sad. It had a little terrace overlooking the interior yard, and two windows – the blinds were unmoveable on one and broken on the other. We unpacked, got freshened up, and went back down to find a place to grab a bite to eat. I approached reception to ask for a recommendation, and there was a Spanish lady trying to get the check-in attendant to help her with her card – she seemed to have the same problem I had had. She had no English at all, so I tried to help her out. The attendant just huffed and left to check the room herself, and I guess she managed to get the card working. When she came back, I asked for any restaurants around, and she pointed us up the street. We found a Greek place seemed okay, and that is where we ended up – at restaurant Mythos, which had very friendly staff, and decent food.

Afterwards, I would have gone towards the city centre. However, my parents needed a break and wanted to move as a group. Thus, I stayed in the room – we did not leave the hotel until 16:30, and by that time it was already getting dark. We walked to the underground stop Pilgramgasse. It was supposed to be just ten minutes away, but was a bit longer, I think we took a wrong turn.

The Pilgramgasse station dates back to the original 1899 Valley line, before electricity and all. The entrance was cast in iron, and it looked very cool. There, we bought seventy-two-hour tickets, which are awesome because you only have to validate them once, and then you can use all the transportation options in the city for 72 hours. The price of the pass was 17.10 €, so not that expensive – one trip is 2.20 €, so aside from the convenience, it is value for money if you plan more than seven trips. Though we did take more than that, the best thing is just being able to waltz down to the platforms without having to validate each time. It was also great that the frequency of the underground service was 8 minutes at the longest, and that was on Sunday evening!

We used the underground to find our stop next to Musikverein Wien (Vienna Music Society), where the concert would take place on the 31st. This was to gauge the time to get to the station and the underground system. Once we familiarised ourselves with the transport though, we realised that there was a better route. It included a change, but the station was much closer to the hotel, and the total time was around the same if you accounted for walking times. The Musikverein stands next to Karlsplatz, so once there we just had to cross the street to find ourselves in front of the church Rektoratskirche St. Karl Borromäus or Karlskirche, dedicated to Saint Charles Borromeo.

The cathedral was originally designed in 1713 by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. When he died, his son took over directing construction and altered some of the plans. Though the building is Baroque, it displays a mixture of elements – the dome, a Greek temple portico façade, monumental columns based on Rome’s Trajan Columns… The altarpiece was erected by Ferdinand Maximilian Brokoff after the elder Fischer’s design. It portrays the Assumption of Saint Charles Borromeo, the nominal saint, into Heaven. There were Christmas trees on both sides of the altar, which I found strange – I had always thought that the Christian church was not a fan of them.

Karlskirche Vienna

The dome is frescoed with a scene featuring Charles Borromeo, the Virgin Mary, and the Cardinal Virtues, by Johann Michael Rottmayr. Hanging from it, there was a modern art installation by artist Cerith Wyn Evans called Forms through folds (ascending)…. This sculpture is part of the Karlskirche Contemporary Arts Program, started in 2018. That was… weird, and really out of place amongst the Baroque frescoes.

We climbed to the upper levels. The first floor hosts a choir model and the organ, built between 1739 and 1847. Technically you can also access the treasury, but it was locked away. We continued up and stepped into the terrace, which yields to a bit… underwhelming… panoramic view of Karlsplatz and the city. Vienna is a great city, but the Karlskirche is not really looking at the scenery from above.

We should have tried the Vienna Museum next to the church then, but instead took the underground to the classical amusement park Prater, where we had dinner reservations a couple of hours later. Originally a hunting ground, Prater was the area where the 1873 World Exhibition was held. Some of the current buildings were erected at that time. In 1897, the first rides, attractions and puppet theatres were established – including the Ferris wheel Wiener Riesenrad, which is the current symbol of the park. Prater was severely damaged throughout World War II, due to bombings, trenches and fire, but it was eventually reconstructed using records from local artists who had drawn or photographed the area in all its glory. Nowadays, it is considered an actual park, which just happens to have rides on it, and part of it is protected as “green land”. The actual amusement park is called Wurstelprater. There are tons of attractions, rides, snack stalls, and there were even some musical activities going on.

Viena: Prater

But of course, it was Vienna, in a late December evening. It was late and cold. And dinner reservation was hours away. We almost decided to give it up and go back to the hotel, but we found somewhere to have a drink and warm up instead. Finally, we made our way to the Rollercoaster Restaurant, the place where we had – thankfully – reserved in November. It was packed. There were around 50 people waiting to come in, and most of them did not have a booking, and were turned away – there was even a group of people checking every 15 minutes if there was an opening. We took ten minutes to get to the front of the mob to finally get our table, but we were sat around 20:15. I was so happy I had pushed for the reservation! It made me further convinced that anything in the city centre or near a tourist spot might need a reservation, which in turn made me worried about the 31st “winging it” decision.

The Rollercoaster Restaurant works with a system of rails that hang from the ceiling and connect the kitchen to the different tables. The food is prepared by human chefs and distributed by two huge robotic arms. Once placed on the rails, it rolls and slides and gets to the right table – much like suitcases inside an airport distribution system. We were also on time for one of the robot shows, where they turn off all the lights and play music while the robot arms “dance”, and it was surreally fun. One of my parents was horrified, because they are more on the traditional side of things, but the rest of us had a lot of fun! The food was all right, too. I ordered baked schnitzel fingers served with potato salad, Gebackene Schnitzel mit Erdäpfelsalat, and we shared some baked Emmental with cranberry sauce Gebackener Emmentaler mit Preiselbeeren. I kind of wanted some apple strudel, but my portion was good enough, so I decided not to get any.

Vienna Rollercoaster Restaurant

We left around 21:30, and headed back to the hotel using the underground system. This time, we came out at a stop much closer to the hotel, Zieglergasse, which was neither pretty nor classical, but nearby and functional. Afterwards, there was just a shower and bed. I could not sleep right away though, because my mind was latching onto the group trip the following day. My parent had decided that we would just not show up – we had tried to warn the representative, but the driver said it was not his responsibility. I kept thinking that if we were not there, everyone else would wait for us and that was not a nice thing to do. It did not feel right. Maybe I’d meet the lady with the key problem, I thought, and warn her that we would not be tagging along. Hopefully.

Yes, I know. I worry too much.

6th December 2024: Knowing people gets you places – Church of the Virgin Mary, Guadalajara (Spain)

Posted on by

Knowing people who know people is cool. It opens doors, too. I was in Guadalajara for personal reasons and an acquaintance of an acquaintance offered to show us around the co-cathedral of the Virgin Mary Santa María de la Fuente la Mayor. The church, built in the 14th century in the Mudejar style, shares rank with the co-cathedral of Sigüenza. The whole structure is made or covered in brick, with some traces of coloured ceramic tiles around the horseshoe arch entrance.

Santa María Guadalajara

The interior is covered in plaster, hiding away the original stonework. Golden decoration was added afterwards. The main altarpiece was built by Francisco Mir in the late Renaissance style, with scenes of the life of the Virgin Mary. It was designed in 1622 and decorated in more gold.

Altarpiece at Santa María in Guadalajara

The church has a Mudejar artesonado or Spanish ceiling (a ceiling structure halfway between support and decoration, made out of wood, usually decorated). The artesonado was covered up during the Baroque renovations of the church and recently restored. Furthermore, if you know people, they show it to you. Up the high choir we went, and past a narrow staircase, through a small walkway that has been built for the few privileged visitors who are admitted (a bunch of people apparently tried to emulate us but were declined). We “floated” above the ceiling and underneath the wood for a while, and it was really interesting. Though of course the wood has been restored, most it is the original one. You can also see the Baroque vaults from above, along the original brick ceilings and walls, hidden away in the nave.

Spanish celiling at Santa María in Guadalajara

Spanish celiling at Santa María in Guadalajara

We were invited to climb the bell tower, too. The structure has also been restored, following the original brickwork. The tower is narrower at the top than at the bottom, and the ascending path has vaulted ceilings in brick. On top, there are eight bells. One of them dates from the 18th century, two of them from the 19th century and the rest are newer. There was also a view of the city, but Guadalajara does not really have dramatic backdrops, I fear…

Bell at Santa María Guadalajara

Guadalajara skyline of sorts

It was not a big trip or anything, but apparently you have to know someone to get there. Thus, I guess it is worthy of its own mention, right?

18 & 19th November 2024: Apocalyptica Played Metallica in Madrid (Spain), so there I went

Posted on by

Planning for this short getaway started on the 23rd of February, when I bought my ticket for the Apocalyptica Plays Metallica Vol. 2 Tour 2024 stop in La Riviera in Madrid (50.50 €). Almost immediately, I headed off to Apocalyptica’s website to buy the VIP Tour 2024 Upgrade (58,90 €). The upgrade consisted on early access, photograph / meet & greet / autograph session (the important part), VIP lanyard, fabric patch, pin and tote bag. Honestly, all that for barely 100 € was a sweet deal. Back in Antwerp for Starset, someone I was queueing with complained that VIP tickets were too expensive for “a broke uni student”, but for me, meeting with the artist, albeit briefly is usually worth it – early entry is a plus, too, because for some concerts I either find a barrier spot or I just have to go to the back. The bundle was dispatched on the 9th of June (according to the email. Do Finnish post offices open on Sunday?) and it arrived on the 18th.

I originally booked a cheap hotel about half an hour’s walk from the venue. Later, I decided that I preferred the more expensive one less than 10 minutes away, so I changed my booking a week before the concert. I did not book there originally because it required prepayment, and my card was playing up..

On Friday the 4th of November I received an email with instructions for the Meet & Greet, which was to start at 18:30, and I should be there at 18:15. All right, I could do that. It was only a matter of waiting.

On Monday, 17th of November, I took a morning train to head out to Madrid with some leeway for time because I needed to do some small item shopping. I had to dodge some guys trying to get people to sign up for an NGO, but at 11:40 I made it to my first stop of the day – the light museum Museo de la Luz. I had been putting this visit off to go with someone who had expressed interest. However, I also waited for another exhibit and I missed my chance as it turned out to be only temporal. Thus, I decided to head to the Light Museum on my own – it was also one of the few exhibitions open on a Monday morning.

The Light Museum is a modest exhibition with interactive artworks that are mainly made out of lamps, lasers and lights. When you come in, you are given covers for your shoes and a key for a locker – all for free. Then you wait until an attendant takes you in and shows you how to interact with the first artwork “The birdcage” (La Pajarera), a box made out of light and metal that you make change colours with the movement of your arms. Once you know how to “play” with the art, you are left on your own to wander for an hour. At first I thought it would be tight, but the place was small – a bit too small for the price, I thought. I was there for around 40 minutes in total.

There were few people and I was able to check out most of the artwork uninterrupted. The next exhibit is made out of a number of old music festival lights – those that gave a lot of heat from the 90s, which are supposed to be a reference to climate change. Then there is a giant kaleidoscope you can walk in – this one became my favourite. Other rooms or works include a wall of lights that follow you as you move or dance, something with lasers (that I think was broken), some light illusions, a room full of hanging lights, a cube of mirrors and light… At the end there is a wall reading “light museum” in differently coloured lights. When I left, the lady at reception gave me a badge for booking with the official website.

Light Museum Madrid

Light Museum Madrid

I walked out and headed towards the restaurant where I wanted to cheat the system. I crossed the square Puerta del Sol, where they were setting up the Christmas tree – it was about 45% Christmas. On my way, I walked by the underground stop Metro Banco de España which has a tiny door for Little Mouse Pérez – Ratoncito Pérez, the Spanish equivalent to the tooth fairy. I never remember to check it out when I am around, but I made the connection this time.

I finally made it to the James Joyce Pub – which is technically a sports bar. I was not there for the TVs though. I had a while back found the place looking up places which served English breakfasts in Madrid. The James Joyce prides itself in being an Irish pub and offers Irish All-Day Breakfast (12.00 €) – two pork sausages, two rashers of bacon, baked beans, fried egg, sautéed mushrooms, grilled tomato, blood pudding, chips, two half-toasts and butter. No, I would not survive that for breakfast, so I ordered it for lunch (and dinner), thus tricking the system indeed. Unfortunately, it was really good and authentic, so now I’ve got to come back for the sausages and the shepherd’s pie, so at least twice.

James Joyce Irish breakfast

After lunch, I headed out towards the park known as Madrid Río. The park runs along the banks of the river Manzanares. It covers 121 hectares, and it was designed after to cover the space emptied when the belt road M-30 was rebuilt as an underground tunnel. The original project was created by a team of architectural studios and landscapers, with strong ecological consideration – aiming to help the area recover from the degradation and pollution caused by years of road traffic. The project was carried out between 2006 and 2012. In 2015, a second project was carried out to “renaturalise” the river, opening the dams to allow the water to flow freely, which in turn caused the recovery of many plant and animal species (to the detriment of… the local rowing team).

There are also bridges that connect both banks of the river. One of them is the one I crossed – just because I could. It is the pedestrian bridge Puente Monumental de Arganzuela, designed by Dominique Perrault. It is a bridge in two parts – one crosses the river, the other overlooks the park and connects to the urban area, and a total length of 278 metres. It is a tube made out of steel and wood that I’ve been wanting to check out for a while.

Arganzuela bridge

Another important bridge is the completely different Puente de Toledo, a baroque bridge built by Pedro de Ribera. It was erected in granite between 1717 and 1732 as the previous ones had been taken down by torrential floods. This one was made to stay, with nine solid arches opened to allow for the river floods. It was… ready for Christmas.

Madrid Río and bridges

It was weirdly warm for a November afternoon, so when I went to my hotel I opened the window while I had a shower. Around 17:00 I headed out to the venue, where there was a small group of people waiting already. La Riviera is a 1,500 people venue, with really good acoustics – and very dedicated staff. The place was originally a cinema, which was turned into a disco, and then into a music venue and nightclub. It is the same place I saw Epica and Apocalyptica in 2023, and I was surprised how many people came for the M&G considering that last year we were… six. We were around 30 this time around.

At first we were chatting in front of the main door, but soon a queue started forming. A little later, the nice security guy (who last year told me “I looked the part of an Apocalyptica fan”) took us to a secondary door, and the queue was properly organised. Surprisingly, bags were not checked – while last year they even took markers from people.

Apocalyptica is a Finnish symphonic metal band. It was formed in 1993 as a tribute to Metallica with a classical touch – playing with cellos. Their debut album Apocalyptica plays Metallica by Four Cellos was released in 1993. They slowly moved from covering other bands in a neoclassical style to their very own repertoire. Today, the members are Eicca Toppinen, Paavo Lötjönen and Perttu Kivilaakso, three classically-trained musicians with a deep love for metal. In 2024, they have gone full circle with the album and tour Apocalyptica Plays Metallica Vol. 2, performing with drummer Mikko Kaakkuriniemi.

Apocalyptica Tour 24/25

We were ushered into a queue for signatures, and afterwards we would go at the end of the line to wait for photographs. I had brought a print-out of the picture from the previous year, and I told them that whenever they came to Madrid, I would come see them. I got a smile for that. It was an awesome photograph, after all. After everyone had their stuff signed we had the photographs. I asked for “a big metal hug” and got trolled instead. Fun times though!

After the photograph, I found a spot at the barrier. Last time I got on the right, this time I went left. Just a little. I did not want to go dead centre in case anyone decided to moshpit, but I might next time as there was no issue – everyone was too entranced for anything like that, I’d say.

The opening act was the Finnish band Arctis, a baby band who has just debuted with their first CD. They were pretty fun, maybe… a bit… too happy bouncy for metal? I’ve read their act described as metal-pop. It might be. I liked them okay, and they were nice.

Setlist:
 1. I’ll Give You Hell
 2. Remedy
 3. Tell Me Why
 4. WWM
 5. Bimbo (Lambretta Cover)
 6. Fire
 7. Frozen Swan
 8. When The Lights Go Out
 9. Theater of Tragedy

Arctis at La Riviera 2024

Arctis at La Riviera 2024

Apocalyptica came on stage at 21:00 sharp, and the live was glorious. All the songs were Metallica covers, from the new album, the first one, or the remastered version of Plays Metallica released in 2016. Despite that, one would not even have to be a Metallica fan to enjoy the concert, because the three men that compose Apocalyptica have an amazing magnetism. Perttu reminds me of the Duracell Bunny, he just did not stop for a second throughout the whole concert, which lasted a good two hours. Paavo seemed to be in his own little world, as he usually does. Eicca is the one doing most of the talking, and he is hilarious when he delivers his puns with a total deadpan voice and face.

Setlist:
 1. Ride the Lightning
 2. Enter Sandman
 3. Creeping Death
 4. For Whom the Bell Tolls
 5. Battery
 6. The Call of Ktulu
 7. St. Anger
 8. The Four Horsemen
 9. Blackened
 10. Master of Puppets
 11. Nothing Else Matters
 12. Seek & Destroy
 13. One

The audience was mostly moved by Nothing Else Matters, I’d say, judging by how they chorused it. Perttu was all in for that. Personally, I found Seek & Destroy and One, particularly, to be extremely powerful. Also, knowing that they dug up the original bass track from deceased Metallica member Cliff Burton for The Call of Ktulu was half-amazing and half-chilling. All in all, it was a fantastic concert, no matter how one looked at it.

Apocalyptica La Riviera 2024

Eicca Toppinen . Apocalyptica La Riviera 2024

Paavo Lötjönen. Apocalyptica La Riviera 2024

Perttu Kivilaakso. Apocalyptica La Riviera 2024

Apocalyptica La Riviera 2024

Afterwards, Arctis was hanging out by the merch. I got their CD, they signed it, we took a photo. It was fun!

I left the venue and I brought an ice-cream and a sports drink for “dinner” of sorts, because I was thirsty. I had both in the hotel room before my shower – the second of the day – and collapsing onto the king-sized bed. I had to wait for the phone to finish charging before I slept though, so I watched a movie before I zonked out.

I woke up on Tuesday, 18th of November and drank my coffee before I set out. It was freezing out there, with frost on the grass, in spite of the warm afternoon the day before. On my way, I found the ancient walls of the city, remains from the old Moorish fortress alcázar, which stand to the side of the Royal Palace and the Almudena cathedral. I walked towards the centre of Madrid – The Sol Christmas tree was about 60% ready – to meet up with my relative for breakfast at a new place called Kawaii Cafe. Inspired by the Japanese kawaii [可愛い]. Kawaii means pretty, childlike, cute, and the Kawaii Cafe has taken the idea to heart, maybe not not in a complete accurate manner though. Everything is pink, full of fluffy and glitter. The food is not only tasty, also pretty. However, the wait staff is dressed as “maids” [マイド], which I tend to associate more to the… hm… more risqué side of hospitality. When food is brought out, you are offered to chant a spell for it to be even tastier.

I found the place existed by chance, and I was instantly smitten by the rainbow waffles, because they were adorable, and very, very rainbow-like. Thus, I ordered them, along a matcha latte. My relative tried the pancakes with a cocoa. She was ecstatic at the quirkiness of the place.

Kawaii Cafe Madrid order

We stayed for well over an hour, and then headed out to one of the local museums Museo de San Isidro – Museum of Saint Isidore the Labourer. Isidore is the patron saint of Madrid. He is credited with several miracles – multiplying wheat and food, having his oxen plough on their own, and rescuing a child from a well making the waters inside rise. According to tradition, the museum is housed where he used to work, and legend has it that the old well is the one he pulled the child from.

Today the museum hosts some palaeontological and archaeological exhibits, from a mastodon and ancient rhinos to Medieval artefacts, running through the Roman occupation and the Muslim period. The place is a complement to the Museo de Historia de Madrid, or maybe its competition, though I think both belong to the same institution – and both are free. As the building is a historical place, it offers the chance to enjoy its small but beautiful Renaissance courtyard, with sculptures of mythological heroes, and of course St. Isidore and his wife. There is also a tiny Baroque chapel.

San Isidro Museum

San Isidro Museum: chapel, well, and courtyard

Right next to the museum stands the Baroque church of Saint Andrew the Apostle Iglesia de San Andrés Apóstol , which was getting ready for Christmas. The church is one of the oldest in town, though it was rebuilt after its destruction during the Civil War, and it has been recently restored. It hosts a number of religious sculptures and a painted vault above the altar.

Saint Andrew church Madrid

We took the underground at the station Tirso de Molina, which can still be accessed through the historical entrance hall, which is similar to the one that was closed off in Pacífico. It was beautiful, though of course busier than the museum one. Over the entrance to the platform there is a tile mosaic with the old shield of Madrid, dating back from the original station. It was installed in 1921, and it is the oldest artistic item in the underground network.

Access Hall at undeground station Tirso de Molina

From there we commuted to Nuevos Ministerios, where they had just kick-started the Christmas market. It seemed to be the “brands” market, with Lego, Disney, and so on. There was also a food truck by a famous chef selling basically chicken sandwiches at outrageous prices. I had been vaguely curious but not going to break the bank for a chicken sandwich, especially after such a breakfast!

I took a train from there back home, with no incidents whatsoever (because by now I’m desensitised to trains being late…)

3rd October 2024: Istanbul, day 1 – Classical Istanbul (plus) {Türkiye, October 2024}

Posted on by

I spent the day in Istanbul | İstanbul, probably the most important city in Türkiye, and certainly the largest, but not the capital. It was founded as Byzantium in the 7th century BCE, straddling the Bosphorus Strait, which is considered the boundary between Europe and Asia. In 330 CE, Roman Emperor Constantine renamed the city into Constantinople after himself, and made it the capital of his domains. The so-called Fall of Constantinople in 1453 started the Ottoman Caliphate – sometimes called the Ottoman Empire. The empire survived until it joined World War I and was subsequently defeated – Istanbul was the capital during most of that time, until the Turkish Independence War, when Mustafa Kemal Atatürk made Ankara the capital.

Istanbul is probably the only city in the world which stands between two continents, separated by the Bosphorus strait and the Golden Horn – an estuary flowing into the strait. To the west of the Bosphorus is Europe, and to the east Asia. The European area south of the Golden Horn is called the historic peninsula.

Istanbul has claimed its rightful place in history as a key step of the Silk Road and the spread of Christianity during Roman times. The historic peninsula is a Unesco Heritage Site, the Historic Areas of Istanbul, which the day trip I had hired, called “Classical Istanbul” Estambul Clásica (50 €) was supposed to cover.

I woke up around 7:00 and went down for breakfast. Coffee was… unexpectedly dull, considering the fame of Turkish coffee – and I had two cups to kickstart my brain. The scrambled eggs were particularly good, but the bread so-so. At 8:20, ten minutes before pick-up time, I was ready and waiting at reception. At 9:10 I wrote to the person who had picked me up from the airport, who had told me to text her with any question, and at 9:15 they showed up – there was apparently “a lot of traffic”, and we were stuck in it for a while. I spent the time checking out the ruins of Constantinople’s ancient walls Bizans Surları, which are also part of the Unesco Heritage Site.

The group comprised around 30 people, and the bus headed towards an area called Pierre Loti Tepesi, Pierre Loti Hill, and reached there around 10:00. This is a viewpoint above the Golden Horn Altın Boynuz, with a viewing terrace, a café and the Eyüp Cemetery Eyüp Mezarlığı. We were told we’d visit the cemetery later, and were given twenty minutes to take in the views. Afterwards, we hiked (considering the speed, “marched”) down the hill through the cemetery, and saw several tombstones from the Ottoman period, but there was no visit whatsoever.

Istambul from Pierre Loti hill

We hopped back onto the bus to drive towards the quarter called Fener, which we were told was “movie neighbourhood”. We were going to visit the Venerable Patriarchal Church of Saint George, the Orthodox cathedral of Istanbul Aziz George Katedrali, which closed down as we arrived for “an unknown length of time” because the Patriarch was coming out. Instead of letting us amble through the neighbourhood before the church, the guide insisted on us waiting for about 20 minutes before we all came into the church, and he gave a couple of explanations, and gave us free time to check out the church and the neighbourhood.

The church of St George was one of the few places with “real” security. We got through a lot of places with metal detectors and such with guards who would not even care, but the ones that did were ridiculously strict in contrast. The truth is that with the rise of Turkish nationalism, a lot of the church’s flock were deported, so the church and Patriarch are mostly symbolic and a pilgrimage point, and it has even been attacked by terrorists at times. The church itself used to be the centre of the quarter, which was historically the Greek quarter, even after the Ottoman Turks had taken over former Constantinople. Though the church existed previously, it became the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople since the early 1600s. It has been damaged and rebuilt several times, the latest as recently as 1991. It has three naves and aisles, with a rich iconostasis (decorated screen that separates the altar from the nave) in golden wood.

Church of St George Istanbul

After the cathedral, I wandered the quarter of Fener on my own for as long as was given us as free time. I found a colourful set of stairs Renkli Merdivenler, which led to nowhere but area pretty. The whole area was a hill, and I climbed up to try to catch a view of a very interesting building – the private school Phanar Roman Orthodox Lyceum Özel Fener Rum Lisesi. The building was designed in an eclectic style by Greek architect Konstantinos Dimadis, and built around 1882, though the school itself dates back from 1597. I also saw a film crew on a break in one of the streets.

Roman Orthodox Lyceum

Once we were called back to the bus, we headed out for lunch. The entrées looked good, actually Turkish, including hummus, rolled paçanga böreği, dolma (stuffed vine leaves), cacik (Turkish tzatziki). The main was rather unremarkable, and something that I could have easily had in either Jordan or Egypt – a sad-looking plate with eight fries, two slices of cucumber, one slice of tomato, a mouthful of rice, and some chicken and lamb. Dessert were the ubiquitous Turkish delights, which are extremely sweet and I’m not a big fan of. Looking back, however, this was one of the most Turkish meals I ended up having, besides kebaps. During lunch, I made acquaintances with some nice ladies who promised to make sure I was not left behind – which has been a bit of a worry of mine when I’m in a guided tour since my last day in Egypt.

Turkish meal

Around 14:00 we walked towards the area known as Sultanahmet Square Sultanahmet Meydanı, the neuralgic centre of historic Istanbul. There, the first stop of the afternoon was Sultanahmet Camii, the Sultan Ahmed Mosque colloquially known as the Blue Mosque. It was built between 1609 and 1617, during the Ottoman era. Designed by architect Sedefkar Mehmed Agha, it was the last great mosque built in the Classical Ottoman style, and combines Byzantine details and Islamic architecture. It has a central dome (43 metres high) with four semi domes and six minarets. The interior is decorated with tiles and mostly blue decoration, hence the name – though honestly I mostly felt it was… golden. The mosque has windows which originally had coloured glass, and are now modern, and it has chandeliers hung from the ceiling, with some of the lamps being ostrich eggs, a typical feature in Turkish mosques. One of the minarets was being restored.

Blue mosque

The mosque stands next to the square, which is long and narrow – it is actually built on the former Hippodrome of Constantinople Hipodrom, the centre of the city during the Byzantine period. Upon the founding of Constantinople, both Constantine and his successor Theodosius the Great brought works of art into the area. Today, there stands the Serpent Column Yılanlı Sütun, an ancient bronze column representing a hydra, whose heads are now missing (part of one is now in the nearby Archaeology Museum). Another monument of the square is the Egyptian Obelisk of Theodosius Dikilitaş, originally erected for Pharaoh Thutmose III (1479 – 1425 BCE, 18th century) in Karnak. It stands on a Roman pedestal from the time it was transported to Constantinople around the year 390 CE. The final construction in the square is the German Fountain Alman Çeşmesi (The Kaiser Wilhelm Fountain), a neo-Byzantine fountain that was constructed to commemorate the visit of German Emperor Wilhem II to Istanbul. It has eight sides, with marble columns and an inside covered with golden mosaics.

Monuments at Istanbul hyppodrome

The official day trip ended there – though they were supposed to take us to the Grand Bazaar. However, the extended tour (25 € extra) included visiting the Orthodox church-turned-mosque-turned-museum-turned-mosque Ayasofya-i Kebir Cami-i Şerifi Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque. The current structure was commissioned by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I to be the Christian cathedral of Constantinople as the Church of God’s Holy Wisdom, designed by Greek geometers Isidore of Miletus and Anthemius of Tralles. At the time it was built, it was the largest interior open space in the world.

It has a central dome with rises 55.6 metres from the ground and a diameter of around 31 metres. After the fall of Constantinople in 1453 it was converted into a mosque. In 1935, the new Turkish Republic turned it into a museum, but in 2020 the controversial decision to turn it back into mosque was made. With the first transformation into a mosque, minarets were erected and the Byzantine mosaics on the ceilings were covered or destroyed. They were recovered for the museum period, and now they are hidden away. While originally the mosque was going to be “open for all”, now the ground floor, covered with a carpet, is only for praying Muslims, and tourists have to pay to access the second floor and see the Christian mosaics. From the second floor, you can see the mosaics, and are close to the domes, which allows you to see the questionable state of conservation. The dome is fantastic, and there are mosaics of the archangels there. On the way out, there is another mosaic depicting the Virgin Mary with the child, and Constantine and Justinian giving them presents – Istanbul itself and Hagia Sophia. The walls however, are in dire need of restorations.

Hagia Sophia Istanbul

The day trip ended after an introduction to the building, and I wandered around for a while, seeing everything I was allowed to before I stepped out. At that point it was 16:50. I had the option of walking, as recommended, to the Grand Bazaar, but I decided that I had better things to do. I rushed towards the palace-turned-museum Topkapı Palace Topkapı Sarayı. Construction of the complex was ordered just after the fall of Constantinople by Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror overlooking the Golden Horn. Closed-off by walls, it has several buildings and palaces, some of which hold exhibitions. The palace closes at 18:30, and the ticket booths at 17:00. I was able to buy a ticket at 16:57 because I am very motivated, and I even saw most of the key areas of the palace in those 90 minutes. Though the recommended visit time is four to five hours, at least I felt accomplished – I wished I had prepared better for it, but I thought that I was standing next to the palace, and even if it was expensive I could return the next day if I felt I wanted to see more.

The first courtyard is free for everyone to see, and that is where the ticket booths are. I hurried towards the second courtyard, where I was able to see the Ottoman Empire Imperial Council, the Treasury, the Arms collection, the Gate of Felicity, the Chamber of the Sacred Relics, the Harem, the Baghdad kiosk, the Grand Kiosk, and even the panoramic view of Marmara Sea, among other smaller buildings – and of course, the feral cats. I did miss the porcelain and miniature collection, but I felt rather accomplished for the 90 minutes I had.

Topkapi palace Istanbul

Topkapi palace

I left the palace among the last visitors, as they closed the gates behind us. I had two options now – head back to the hotel and try to see the Grand Bazaar, or explore around for a while. To be fair, the area looked rather full and with a bunch of tourists looking more like a target than myself. That happened a lot during this trip, fortunately. I was not considered “targetable”.

Most visitable monuments had closed or were about to at this point. However, I knew that the Basilica Cistern would reopen an hour later, so I decided to wander around and try to get to the promenade along Kennedy street Kennedy Caddesi, which allowed me for nice views of Bosphorus Strait İstanbul Boğazı, the Golden Horn Altın Boynuz and Galata Bridge Galata Köprüsü.

Golden Horn at night

I went back towards the city centre through Gülhane Park Gülhane Parkı. At this point it was dark, so the fountains were on, and they looked very fun, all lit up.

I reached the queue to enter the Basilica Cistern Yerebatan Sarnıcı (Subterranean Palace). The ancient cistern has a normal opening schedule, and an evening schedule, which is a bit more expensive, with live music. But it worked for me. The cistern was built in the 6th century with the goal of providing water to the Great Palace of Constantinople, which stood where the Blue Mosque is now. It is an underground chamber with 336 columns that are up to 9 metres high, and it can hold up to 80,000 cubic metres of water. The columns seem to be recycled from ruined buildings, and at least one of them is carved with an upside-down Medusa face on the base. Today there is very little water, and there are modern art installations, and there are cool changing lights that give it a very interesting look and feel.

Basilica Cistern Istanbul

By the time I left, I kind of regretted having signed up for the second day trip, because I had been rather more efficient on my own, but again, I had not done much planning for the city. I went back to the hotel and I ordered food using the online room service. This time I decided on a kebap chicken wrap and a Turkish yoghurt, which was delicious. I had a shower and went off to bed.

Kebap and yoghurt

13th September 2024: Cádiz, Jerez, Puerto Real & back to Cádiz {Escapade to Cádiz, September 2024}

Posted on by

After making sure there were no ants in my breakfast – I had stored it in the mini-fridge, and they were all in the trash can with the decoy – I left for an early walk around Cádiz as the sun rose. I went to Puerta de Tierra (the Land Gate), the remains of the walls that closed off the city in the past, which today separates the old and new areas. The original redoubt was erected in the 16th century, embellished in 1756 with a portal, and a tower was added in 1850. In the early 20th century, arches were opened into the wall to allow traffic to come through. There was a temporary installation to commemorate the “Phoenician Week” activities, but it was so garish that I was not even sure whether it was real or a parody of sorts.

Puerta de Tierra Cádiz

Afterwards, I walked to the train station to take the train to the nearby city of Jerez de la Frontera, where my first stop was the fortress-palace Conjunto Monumental del Alcázar. The first remains known of the alcázar date back from the 11th century, though most of what still stands was erected in the Almohad period (12th – 13th centuries). The fortress was repeatedly taken and lost in the war between Moors and Christians until the Catholic Monarchs finally conquered all of Spain. The building was owned by the crown, but it fell into disarray, and in the 18th century a Baroque palace was built.

Alcazar de Jerez de la Frontera - exterior

Today, this palace is the only intact construction, and the one I left for last. I moved towards the garden first, which lead to the Arab baths, the octagonal tower, the cistern, the Royal Pavilion, and the walls, with some of the machinery from the Medieval times. The gardens were patrolled by peafowl. On the other side of the complex stand the mosque, an area with a reproduction of ancient oil presses, and the original gates in the walls.

Alcazar de Jerez de la Frontera - cistern and mosque, and peacock

The Baroque palace Palacio de Villavicencio holds a wooden staircase, several rooms with rich decoration including hanging lamps and wall paintings, and a salvaged pharmacy from the 19th century.

Alcazar de Jerez: Palacio de Villavicencio

After the alcázar, which took longer than I thought to explore, I headed out to the Royal Andalusian School of Equestrian Art Real Escuela Andaluza del Arte Ecuestre to watch the show Cómo bailan los caballos andaluces (The way Andalusian horses dance), an eight-part show which has been performed since 1973. The exhibition showcases the different types of exercises that the horses are trained for – whether it is with a rider, or a handler on their feet, alone, or coordinating with other horses on the arena. It was a really impressive performance, and the horses were gorgeous.

Setlist of the show:
  1. Cómo se anda en el campo
  2. Al son de la garrocha
  3. Paso a dos
  4. Trabajos en la mano
  5. Fantasía
  6. Saltos de escuela
  7. Riendas largas
  8. Carrusel

Royal Equestrian Art School, Jerez

After the show, I hung around for as long as I was allowed to, snooping the horse riding museum and the small palace in the grounds until they closed down and I had to leave. I bought a sandwich and a bottle of water from a supermarket in the way, and went on to the cathedral Catedral de Nuestro Señor San Salvador. The current building was not originally conceived as a cathedral. It was founded in 1778, built between the 17th and 18th centuries, and consecrated as cathedral as recently as 1978. It has a gothic structure, with a Baroque façade and a Neoclassic altarpiece. Behind the altar there is small treasury / museum and a spiral staircase to a secret chapel which is barely the painting of a saint – but the staircase was pretty, it reminded me of the one in the church in Tendilla. I also walked up the tower so I could see the city from above.

Cathedral Jerez de la Frontera

By the time I was on my way back, it was too late to snoop into the farmers’ market Mercado Central Abastos, so I headed directly towards the train station to fight the ticket machine, then headed to Puerto Real. This is a town between Jerez and Cádiz where I used to live. After checking out some places out of nostalgia, I went towards the seaside. It was an eerie feeling, because it had changed very little from what I remembered from almost two decades ago, when I left, and still it was slightly different. I visited the beach Playa de la Cachucha and walked along the promenade Paseo Marítimo until I saw my old university building.

The Andalusian Centre for Marine Studies Centro Superior de Estudios Marinos, CASEM, is a helix-shaped building, originally conceived by Manuel López Vázquez. The building has three “arms” in 120-degree angles, and a glass dome at the centre. It is located in the middle of the natural reserve. However, going there would have made me extremely sad. Thus, I decided to walk back towards the station and take a train back to Cádiz.

Puerto Real: Playa de la Cacucha

Since I had visited the land gates, I also wanted to see the Sea Gate Puerta del Mar, the remains of the entrance to the harbour. Today it is more of a monument than an actual gate, but it is still there.

Cádiz Puerta del Mar

I was able to get there with enough time to head out to the archaeological site Yacimiento Arqueológico Gadir, one of the most important of its kind, since Phoenician settlement remains are far and few. The site, underneath a theatre, has two layers – the original one might date back from the 9th century BCE, with the remains of eight houses, complete with kitchen and oven, and streets. The settlement was destroyed in a fire, which also left two victims, a man and a cat, both of whose remains are exhibited there. The second layer is more recent – a fish processing factory with pools to preserve the product in brine from the Roman domination.

Yacimiento arqueológico de Gadir

Finally, I decided to end the day with a nice dinner. I went to the nearby market Mercado Central de Abastos de Cádiz, which has some eateries that work with local product. However, I did not locate the place I wanted to hit, and ended up distracted by El Viajero del Merkao, a place which advertised bluefin tuna, and offered it in tartar. I combined the tuna tartar with a typical tortillita de camarones, a fried batter made with water, chickpea flour, wheat flour and tiny shrimp, and a not so typical Taco de Cadi, Cadi, a tortillita with guacamole and salsa.

Tortillita de camarones & tuna tartar

I went back to the hotel to have a shower, then I turned in for the night (in a non-ant-infested room now).

12th September 2024: Cádiz {Escapade to Cádiz, September 2024}

Posted on by

My paperwork-related appointment was at 9:30 in Cádiz itself, and I got up around 7:30. I left the hotel, but unfortunately the café where I had expected to have breakfast was closed. Thus, I instead headed out towards the promenade Paseo del Vendaval to see the ocean again. I turned to my right, in the opposite direction from the previous night, and I walked towards the central beach in town – Playa de la Caleta, a mostly-rocky area with tidal ponds and a long bridge called Puente del Hierro which leads to an old castle Castillo de San Esteban. I chased a few birds on the way for photographs. They were not at all cooperative.

I reached the former bathhouse Balneario de Nuestra Señora de la Palma y del Real, built in 1926 from an original design by Enrique García Cañas with one main access and two corridors that form a semicircle towards the ocean, and end in domes. It was build directly onto the beach, in reinforced concrete, with a style gravitating among Art noveau, eastern historicism and local decoration with azulejo tiles. It was abandoned in the 1970s, but restored for administrative use in the 1990s.

I ventured away from the ocean into the narrow streets of Cádiz downtown until I got to the town’s theatre Gran Teatro Falla, in the Neomudejar style. It was built between 1884 and 1905, on and off due to lack of funds, after a design by Adolfo Morales de los Ríos and Adolfo del Castillo Escribano. The theatre is one of the key spots during Carnival festivities. The Cádiz Carnival is one of oldest and most famous in Spain, known for its groups of people who parade the town in costume to sing simple songs that make fun of every- and anything, normally current affairs – coros, cuartetos, comparsas and chirigotas. The great Carnival contest is celebrated in the theatre, and prizes are awarded in each of the categories. The carnival brings in about 400,000 visitors each year. I tried to get to visit the theatre, but I did not manage to do so.

Paseo del Vendaval & Gran Teatro Falla Cádiz

Around 09:15 I decided to try my luck with the paperwork issue, even if it was early for my appointment, and I was successful. Since it was an important document, I ran back to the hotel to drop it there, and then headed off to the square Plaza de La Mina, where the local museum Museo de Cádiz stands.

It is said that Cádiz is the oldest Western city, founded around the 9th century BCE. Mythologically, it is associated with Hercules’ Columns and the city of Tarsis. The oldest archaeological remains date back to the 7th century BCE. The now-peninsula was originally a small archipelago where the Phoenicians settled down as it was a strategic point for commerce and mining of copper and tin, naming the settlement Gadir. It was later conquered by Carthaginians, whose march to Rome led by Hannibal started there. When Carthage lost the war, the city was taken over by Romans and became Gades in the 2nd century BCE.

As the Roman Empire declined, the city was invaded by the Visigoths, then the Byzantine Empire, and again by the Visigoths. In the year 710 CE, it was the first stronghold to fall to the Moorish conquest of Spain. After the Christians took it over again, it became a key point in commerce with the American territories.

In 1755, Cádiz was damaged by a three-wave tsunami caused by the so-called “Lisbon Earthquake”, 8.5 degrees in the Richter scale. In 1812, during the Napoleonic Wars, the Spanish patriots wrote the first Spanish Constitution, and throughout the 19th century, it was key in the numerous wars and battles through the return of Alfonso VII, the Republic and the Restoration of the Monarchy periods. However, during the 20th century, the city decayed suffering from lack of infrastructures, and rampant unemployment. Thus, it is happy to focus on tourism and the money it brings.

The Museo de Cádiz tries to follow this trail of history, but only the archaeological floor was open. The most important artefacts date from the Phoenician, Roman and Moorish periods. Of particular interest are two Phoenician sarcophagi which were found in completely different areas, but are presented as a couple of sorts, and a complete dowry. From Roman times, they exhibit a few dozen amphorae, sculptures and columns. Finally, the remains from the Moorish domination are quite colourful in comparison with everything else. The second floor of the museum was closed, so I was done earlier than expected.

Cádiz Museum

Thus, I decided to push my luck a little and try to get to the archaeological site called Cueva del Pájaro Azul for the 10:30 visit in English. The place is a former flamenco tavern built within the repurposed dry docks of the Phoenician Gadir. Most of the structure has been covered in brick and barely the original shape can be traced back, enough to calculate that the dry docks served war ships. While building new stairs, they did find part of the original Phoenician harbour though, the most important remain that survives. The tavern itself might be considered of minimal historical importance as it was a considerable cultural hub in the 1960s.

Archaeological site Cueva del Pájaro Azul

To keep in the mood, I decided to visit the archaeological site Yacimiento Arqueológico de Gadir, making a stop for a coffee first. Unfortunately, the site was closed that day. Thus, I decided to check out the Roman Theatre Teatro Romano de Cádiz – it might feel a little back and forth, but distances in central Cádiz are small and I wanted to prioritise Phoenician remains (I said I lived in the area, but all these archaeological remains are newly discovered). The theatre is the second largest one in what was Hispania, and dates from the 1st century BCE. It could host up to 10,000 people, and the stage, stands and the vomitorium (corridor underneath the seats) can be visited. There is an extra room with miniatures of the different stages of the history of the theatre.

Roman Theatre Cádiz

I left behind something called “The Elf’s Alley” Callejón del Duende, the narrowest street in town, now closed off. Very near both the alley and the theatre, I found the old cathedral Catedral Vieja de Cádiz officially Parroquia de Santa Cruz. This was the original cathedral of the town, commissioned by king Alfonso X around 1262. The original building was destroyed during the scuffles between the Spanish and the English at the end of the 16th century, and a new one was erected a few years later in a mixture of the Renaissance and the Baroque styles.

Former cathedral of Cádiz

Next to the old cathedral stands the museum of the cathedral Casa de la Contaduría. The museum comprises a number of rooms disseminated in a conglomerate of buildings dating back from the 16th century – including the tower of the old cathedral and a Mudejar courtyard. The museum holds – obviously – religious items: paintings, sculptures, mass paraphernalia, codexes…

Cathedral Museum Cádiz

Afterwards, I crossed the city centre all over again, and reached the park Parque Genovés, a sort of botanical garden and the largest park in the old town. It has a small lake with a waterfall and a man-made cave with a lookout of the town and the ocean.

Park Parque Genovés in Cádiz

Then, I had booked lunch in the café of the Parador de Cádiz – Hotel Atlántico, a cute not-so-little place called La Tacita del Atlántico. I had set my heart on a grilled urchin dish – erizo de mar relleno y gratinado con huevos de arenque ahumado which I combined with a salmorejo (a creamy soup with a base of tomato and bread, garnished with ham and hard boiled eggs), though the dish had a local twist salmorejo cordobés, huevo y mojama. The urchins were delicious, but the salmorejo was lacking. I liked the idea of exchanging the ham for salt-cured tuna (mojama), but overall I found the food overpriced and the service mediocre. On my way out, I stopped by reception to get my stamp for the Red de Paradores rally.

Lunch at La Tacita del Atlántico

I stayed at Parque Genovés for a bit after lunch, then headed out towards the “new” cathedral Catedral de la Santa Cruz. The cathedral was built between 1722 and 1838, in a mixture of styles – Baroque, Rococo and Neoclassicism. It was erected in an assortment of materials, from noble marble to the humble local piedra ostionera, a sedimentary rock with a high concentration of seashells (biocalcarenite). The interior has three naves, and a Latin cross floor plan, over whose crossing there is a has dome, covered by golden tiles on the outside. The main altar is neoclassical.

Underneath the cathedral stands the crypt, and one of the towers can be ascended, leading to a great view of the town. The tower has very few stairs, most of the way is done on a ramp. Unfortunately, though, the cathedral is in rather poor state, and a net is cast under the ceiling to prevent debris from falling. I also climbed the tower since it was included in my combo ticket.

Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Cádiz

View of Cádiz from the cathedral tower

Behind the cathedral, I found myself back at the promenade Paseo del Vendaval, and I walked towards the beach Playa de la Caleta. In historical times, it was the natural port for Phoenician, Carthaginian and Roman shops, now it is a small-ish beach in the heart of the city. It is located between two of the castles of the old city, and its most characteristic structure is the bath house I saw in the morning.

The beach has a sand area where most people sunbathe, but there is a long bridge separated in two sections – one directly built upon rock, Puente de Hierro and the other with arches to let the water flow through, Puente Canal. At the end of the half-kilometre of bridges, stand the ruins of the castle Castillo de San Sebastián, which today includes a working lighthouse, and an archaeological site. The first structure in the ancient island dates back from 1457, and the castle itself was built in 1706. Though it was warm and sunny, I walked the bridges and around the castle walls.

La Caleta Beach Cádiz & San Sebastián Castle

Upon my “return to mainland”, I passed by the bath house again and I reached a second castle, Castillo de Santa Catalina. The outpost, in the shape of a five-point star, was built towards the end of the 16th century to defend the city form sea warfare. In later years, a church and a sacristy were added, and from the 18th century onwards it was used as a prison. Today, it mostly hosts cultural or cinema-related events.

Santa Catalina Castle, Cádiz

I continued on my walk around the city, left behind a knee cramp, the Parador de Cádiz and Parque Genovés until I reached the bulwark Baluarte de la Candelaria and the park Jardines Clara Campoamor. From there, I went on towards a second bulwark and the remains of the city walls Baluarte y Murallas de San Carlos. The bulwark was built towards the end of the 18th century to protect the harbour. Not far from there stands the square Plaza de España with the monument to the 1812 Constitution Monumento a la Constitución de 1812, the political response to the Napoleonic invasion. A bit further away stands the fountain Fuente de la Plaza de las Tortugas, with lots of cute turtles as decoration.

San Carlos Bulwark and Walls Cádiz

Monument to the 1812 Constitution Cádiz

Turtle fountain in Cádiz

At this time I decided to get an early dinner around 18:30, so I bought some fast food to take to the hotel. That is when the ant invasion started. It was something I was not expecting – one or two bugs is workable, but this was a whole nest out for my fries. It was not nice. I decoyed them into bathroom and decided to have the room cleaned the next morning.

I set off again about 20:15 to look for a place to watch the sunset at the beach Playa de la Caleta, which did not disappoint, and I sat there until the sun disappeared beyond the water line. Luckily, I made it today, as it would be ridiculously windy the following day.

Sunset at La Caleta, Cádiz

I then found the street Calle the la Virgen de la Palma, at whose end stands the small church Parroquia de Nuestra Señora de la Palma. It was built in the 18th century and it hosts a sculpture of the Virgin Mary credited with stopping the waters during the 1755 tsunami. In the street, there is a signal marking the highest water point, but there were so many restaurants and people that it was impossible to find it!

Sculpture of the Virgin Mary

I went back to the hotel afterwards to have some sleep – I was beat. I did manage to make a stop at a supermarket to buy coffee and pastries for breakfast the following morning though. Because one late latte per trip is enough.

20th August 2024: The VIP treatment in Tendilla (Spain)

Posted on by

The catholic church in Tendilla is dedicated to the Assumption of Mary, thus the name Iglesia de la Asunción. It was designed in the 14th century CE, financed with money from the Mendoza family, one of the most important clans at the moment. It was projected as a great work, possibly the biggest church in the area – though Tendilla is a tiny hamlet now, it was an important villa during the Middle Ages, and the counts that ruled the enclave were very invested in it.

Church of the Assumption of Mary in Tendilla

The church was never finished – construction went on and off until the 19th century, when it was finally given up. Only one tower was erected, though two were projected, and this bell tower is separated from the building by a patio. The open area is actually a part of the nave that was not built in the end. The interior was decorated with a Baroque altarpiece, which still stands today.

Though still in use, the church has been gravely affected by time. The façade has greatly deteriorated in the last thirty years or so. The false floors have started collapsing and the roof is in dire need of repairs. The village is working on raising funds for a renovation.

A couple of relatives are very involved in the process, and at some point they offered to show me the inner areas of the church. I accepted, and was given the real VIP tour – they opened the church just for me too!

The temple is mostly Romanesque in style, aside from the Baroque altarpiece. The modern altar has been refurbished in marble. The altarpiece is golden wood, Baroque with columns, paintings and sculptures. To both sides of the altar, there are small rooms, connected to each other underneath the altar stairs. One of them has been transformed into the sacristy, the other one used to be an office, but now it is not in use because the floor is collapsing. Behind the altar, these two rooms give way to spiral staircases that ascend to the upper spaces, called La Gloria – Glory – and El Infierno – Hell – both of them unfortunately very abandoned and covered with pigeon excrement, feathers, rest of nests, and even dead pigeons. We climbed up to the Glory, but the Hell staircase is a bit unstable and crumbly, so we did not get far on that one. I scared the hell out of a pigeon though – it was mutual.

Church of the Assumption of Mary in Tendilla

Church of the Assumption of Mary in Tendilla

I climbed to the choir for a couple of pictures, and then we went up the bell tower together. It was a bit thrilling to do so, because I’ve seen that tower very often, but never gone up. It was all in all really cool – especially being alone and allowed complete freedom of pictures, including lightning and flash.

Afterwards, we went to the family home and had lunch. Later, in the yard, we “hunted” for the local fauna, including wasps, damselflies and wall lizards.

Wall lizard

Damselfly

31st May 2024: Santa María de Huerta & Medinaceli (Spain)

Posted on by

For the last few years, I’ve tried to do (or visit) something cool on my birthday, especially when it fell on a long weekend. In 2024 I could not plan anything big despite the long weekend,. Instead, I broke it off into a small outing with my sibling and a little road trip. There are a couple of places not too far away that I wanted to see, but the roads are not so great. One of my parents is keen on driving anyway, so they were happy to oblige, and I could get away with not driving the curves myself.

Our first stop was the Cistercian monastery Monasterio de Santa María de Huerta. The Order of Cistercians are a Catholic religious order. A group of Benedictine monks founded the new order in 1098, as they wanted to strictly adhere to Rule of St. Benedict, and felt that the other had “relaxed” too much. Cistercian monks are credited with creating very “pure” churches as they believed that ornamentation was superfluous and distracting from prayer.

The monastery is located in the village of Santa María de Huerta, which actually grew around its walls at the side of Jalón River. The building dates back from 1162, though the order had been in Spain for two decades at the time. Most of the building was erected halfway between Romanesque and Gothic styles, with some add-ons from more recent times, mostly the Herrerian cloister and a Baroque altarpiece – which distorts a little the idea of the “pure Cistercian lines” and no extra decoration. But then again, I am not a fan of Baroque decoration.

Entry is from the side of the church to the Gothic cloister Claustro de los Caballeros, around which all the dependences can be accessed. The first one is the church, the first area to be built. There are still some of the original paintings, and a baroque organ. The monks’ refectory is the most important room, built from 1215. It has large pointed-arched windows which allow light to come in, and it is communicated with the kitchen. There is a second refectory, more Romanesque, for the lay brothers who took religious vows but were not actual monks. The last cloister, in the Herrerian style, is severe and impressive. As we were leaving, there was a black out, not sure what that could have meant…

Santa María de Huerta Monastery

We went back to the car and we drove towards the town of Medinaceli, which has a couple of monuments I wanted to see. Reputed for dating back to Roman times, it has a free-standing arch Arco Romano de Medinaceli, the only one in Spain with three arches. It is a triumphal arch built in reddish sandstone during the first century, at an altitude of 1200 m, where it rains, snows, and so. It feels like a miracle that a small structure (around 13 metres long, eight metres high and two metres wide) has withstood two thousand years.

Medinaceli: Roman triumphal arch

We saw the collegiate church Colegiata de Santa María de la Asunción, built in a late Gothic style. Artistically, the most important item is the iron grating in front of the altar. Religiously, there is a figure of Christ, which is called Cristo de Medinaceli, a wooden sculpture from the 16th century (though the most famous sculpture with that name is in Madrid). It was a little underwhelming, and most of the sculptures were not pretty.

Medinaceli: Collegiate Church

Afterwards we visited the main square of the village Plaza Mayor de Medinaceli. To one side stands a 16th-century building called La Alhóndiga, current town hall and former prison, with rounded arches on the ground floor and a balcony all along the façade on the first floor.

16th Century commercial building turned into town hall

To another side, the palace of the former dukes Palacio de los Duques de Medinaceli, which was saved from the ruin turning it into a semi-private art gallery. Inside, the most important part is the Roman mosaic. The palace was built around 1430, and today only the Renaissance yard stays undisturbed. I am not a big fan of modern art, so I just can say that some of it was colourful and pretty. The entry ticket included entrance to a rural-house-turned-erotic-art-exhibition which… was weird. The whole house was painted pink, and the works were neither interesting and nor felt artistic at all. So 10 bucks to in the end see a Roman mosaic was a bit steep.

Medinaceli Duchate Palace

We decided not to stay in town for lunch, but – almost in a bit of a joke – we drove off to have lunch at what is probably the most iconic roadside restaurant in the centre of Spain – Área 103, a brasserie that is over 125 years old. It includes a small hermit-church built for truckers, Capilla de los Conductores.

Drivers' chapel, Area 103

It might have not been a glamorous birthday, but hey, along with the escapade on Tuesday, I guess I spent it doing what I like – discovering new things.

7th October 2023: The historical centre of Valencia (Spain)

Posted on by

I had the chance to spend a few hours – seven, to be exact – in Valencia | València (first name in Spanish, second one in local dialect) due to unforeseen circumstances. I’ve been there before, but it was to visit the Oceanogràfic, and I had not entered the historical area.

Valencia is the third-largest city in Spain. It is known for its love of pyrotechnia – Las Fallas – and its famous paella rice dish. The city dates back to the Roman period, in the 2nd century BCE. During the Middle Ages, it was one of the most disputed areas between the Christian and the Moor troops, changing hands a few times. The city flourished in the Late Medieval Period under Christian ruling. It played an important role during the Napoleonic war, and during the 20th century it became a great importer of wine and citrus, especially oranges. During the Civil War, it was the Republican capital, so it was heavily bombarded. With the advent of democracy, the city invested in development and tourism.

I arrived at the station Joaquín Sorolla around 11:30, which is not far from the centre. It was pretty hot, even if it was October, so I was ready for a few weekend-tourists. One detail that I had not planned on, nor thought about, was that it was a long weekend over there, Monday the 9th was a holiday, and there were way more than “a few” weekend-tourists. Also, I walked into a lot of preparations forfor institutional acts, which got in the way of photographs – the city hall square was cordoned off and it was really hard to get a good view. On one side of the closed-off area stands the town hall Ayuntamiento de Valencia | Ajuntament de València, on the other, the old central postal office Palacio de las Comunicaciones de Valencia | Palau de les Comunicacions de València. The town hall is actually a mash-up of two different buildings, one from the late 19th century, and another – the façade – from the 1930s, with Renaissance and Baroque inspirations.

Valencia town hall

I continued off towards the main market – Mercado Central | Mercat Central. This is an impressive Modernist building designed by architects Alejandro Soler March and Francisco Guardia Vial. Construction started in 1914 and finished in 1928 – the building was erected in iron, glass and ceramic tiles, the central dome is 30 metres high. This is one of those places I wish I were a VIP and could see closed, because it was fantastic. Unfortunately, though it is the largest market of fresh produce in Europe, it was extremely full, and it was hard to even stand to the side and take a photograph or two.

Central Market Valencia

Next to the market stands the church Royal Parish of the St Johns Real Parroquia de los Santos Juanes | Església dels Sants Joans also known as St John of the Market. When checking if the city tourist card was a good choice for me – it was not – I bought a combined ticket that included this church and two other buildings for 12 € (considering that each on its own was at least 7 €, it was a sweet deal.

Church of the Saint Johns Valencia

Most of the original Gothic building has been destroyed, and its appearance today is mostly Baroque. It seems that the church is prone to fire accidents, and burnt down totally or partially at least three times. It is undergoing inner restoration at the moment, which takes away from the fresco decoration of the vaulted nave. The frescoes were carried out by Antonio Palomino in the 16th century, and the Baroque altarpiece was brought from another church in the north of Spain. An add-on to the church is the Capilla de la Comunión, the chapel of the Holy Communion was added in the 18th century. The church reminded me of the Italian Baroque I saw in Naples.

In front of the church, on the other side of the square, stands what I consider the most important building in the city – the Silk Exchange, or Lonja de la Seda | Llotja de la Seda, also called Lonja de los Mercaderes | Llotja de Mercaders. In Spanish, a lonja is a type of public building where merchants would negotiate and auction their produce, traditionally fish. In this case, instead, it was used for trading in silk during the Middle Ages. Silk was important for Valencia, and the city is considered part of the Silk Route. The Arabs introduced it in the 14th century, planting mulberry trees to produce it, and the trade became so important that it required its own building.

Lonja de la Seda Valencia

The Exchange was originally designed by Francesc Baldomar in the late 15th century, though he died before completing it. His disciples Joan Ivarra and Pere Compte finished the building according to Baldomar’s original plans and drawings. The building has four distinct areas: the Tower, the orange garden (Patio de los Naranjos), the Contract or Trading Hall (Sala de Contratación) – which were the original ones – and the Sea Consulate Hall (Sala del Consulado del Mar ). There is also a small basement.

The building is considered the masterpiece of the civil Valencian Gothic, a style that flourished in the east of Spain towards the end of the Gothic period. It is characterised by a heavy reliance of traditional Roman architecture and a little Mudejar influence. Wide open halls are typical, with decoration and sculpture influenced by Flaming Gothic. The Exchange is decorated with tiny gargoyles sprinkled all around the outside of the building towards the garden.

The Trading Hall has three naves which rest on eight helical columns and 16 pilasters that hold the vaults, eleven metres above ground. Further ribbing extends from the the columns, creating a net that spreads all over the ceiling. The combination of columns and ribbing tries to represent heaven – the palm tree trunks and the celestial sphere. Another ceiling that deserves admiration is the painted wooden one in the first hall of the Sea Consulate.

Lonja de la Seda Valencia

Wooden roof of the Consulado de Mar in Valencia

I loved the Exchange, but it is not as if I have ever scorned anything Gothic. However, I could not stay forever, so I pushed myself to leave. I went around the building once and then, after a short stop at a cute little round square, Plaza Redonda, I found my way to the large square Plaza de La Reina, where the cathedral stands.

The Iglesia catedral-basílica Metropolitana de la Asunción de Nuestra Señora de Valencia | La Seu is also built in Valencian Gothic on Romanesque foundations. It was erected over a Roman Temple, and part of the Roman remains can be visited in the “archaeological area” of the museum, underneath the current church. The main building that stands today was erected between the 13th and 15th centuries, thus the prevalence of Gothic, but there are earlier and later styles – as recent as Neoclassical.

Valencia Cathedral

In a side chapel, in the middle of an alabaster Gothic altarpiece (1777), the cathedral holds and exhibits its most important treasure – the Holy Chalice (Santo Cáliz), sometimes called Holy Grail. According to the Christian tradition, the Holy Chalice is the vessel used by Jesus Christ during the last supper. If we follow the Spanish legend, when the Virgin Mary died, Jesus’ disciples gathered everything that belonged to him, and Saint Peter took it to Rome. During the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire, the Chalice was entrusted to Saint Lawrence, who brought it to one of the former Spanish realms. It was eventually presented to the monarch in 1399. In 1437, King Alfonso V of Aragón donated it to the Cathedral of Valencia.

According to other legends, there was this King called Arthur, and something about a knights and a round table. In the Arthurian legend, there was a mystical object called the “Grail.” which was originally a Celtic cauldron with magic powers. However, the concept became mixed up with the Chalice when the story was “Christianised” – the chieftain on whom Arthur is based on, and his legend, originates in the 5th century BCE, so there is no way that Arthur looked for the Chalice anyway.

The Valencia Chalice itself is a stemless cup made of carnelian (dark red agate) – and that is the relic itself. It was most likely produced in Syria, Palestine or Egypt, and it has been dated between the 2nd century BCE and the 1st century CE. There is an Arab Kufic inscription on its base. I am not sure it fits what Indiana Jones would have called “the cup of a carpenter”. The cup is mounted on a gold stem embellished with gold, pearls and emeralds, with a foot and two handles, which were added in Medieval times. Now, the cathedral claims that it cannot be proven that it is not the Holy Chalice, and the translation of the Kufic script is supposed to be “Allah Josua”, translated as “Jesus God”.

Valencia Cathedral and Holy Chalice Chapel

The cathedral also has a museum and the previously-mentioned archaeological areas, with a Roman road and human remains. The museum has sculptures and paintings from the cathedral itself and religious artefacts. The bell tower is famous in its own right. Erected between 1381 and 1429, it is called Miguelete | Micalet – “Little Michael”, which is actually the name of the bell at the top. . The tower has eight sides on the outside, and is circular in the inside, with 207 steps up to the terrace. The bell-gable was added in the 18th century, but the tower itself is Valencian Gothic just like the cathedral. The views are not as impressive as expected as the whole thing is netted off and it is hard to see anything unobstructed.

Views from Miguelete

The cathedral is connected to the Episcopal palace on the other side of the street by a sort-of bridge called Arco sobre la calle de la Barchilla | Arc del Carrer de la Barcella that I saw when I went round the cathedral. I also saw the Tribunal de Aguas de Valencia | Tribunal de les Aigües de València and Palacio de la Generalidad Valenciana | Palau de la Generalitat Valenciana on my way to the church of Saint Nicholas and Saint Peter Martyr (part of my combined ticket).

San Nicolás de Bari y San Pedro Mártir | Sant Nicolau de Bari I Sant Pere Martir stands at the end of an alleyway that comes from one of the main arteries of the city. It quite humbly calls itself “The Valencian Sistine Chapel”. It is a single-nave church, built in the 15th century on top of a Mosque which was in turn built on top of a Visigoth palaeo-Christian temple. During the Baroque period, the whole vault was decorated with frescoes, to the point that. And when I mean “whole” I mean… whole. There was no space for an extra soul, saint, angel or whatever. It was so full I could not process the painting as individual items, just as a whole.

Frescoed Vault of Saint Nicholas church in Valencia

Afterwards, I went into the small streets that led into the Arab Quarter, marked by the archway Portal de Valldigna. I also spotted an Islamic tower Torre islámica | Torre islàmica in side a private parking lot, and the remains of the Arab walls Muralla Árabe de Valencia | Muralla àrab de València.

I finally reached one of the gates of the Medieval city walls – Torres de Serranos | Portal dels Serrans. The gate was flanked by two polygonal defensive towers built in the Gothic style and finished in 1398. They survived the destruction of the wall ordered in the 19th century as they were used as prison. Today, they can be climbed and hold a small museum, but I had already gone up the bell tower, so I decided I was good with heights for the day.

Serranos Towers Valencia

I headed back to the historical centre and reached the area of the cathedral. I decided to buy a stupidly expensive typical drink of the area, horchata de chufa | orxata de xufa, made from sweetened tiger nuts, usually with a severe quality control. I remembered trying it as a kid and that I did not like it much, but I decided to try it anyway – I had riskier culinary adventures in Egypt after all. It was not bad, but decided that I am still not a fan – and it was chilly, which helped against the heat.

There is another surviving gate structure of the Medieval wall, the Torres de Quart | Portal de Quart. They were a bit out of my way, so I left them for the time when I started retreating back towards the station. Unlike the Serrano ones, the Quart towers are cylindrical, but they share the Valencian Gothic style. They were built between 1441 and 1460 have been damaged in the different wars that the city has survived, and holes from shelling are clearly visible on the stone.

Quart Towers Valencia

Taking a small detour from my way to the station, my next stop was the silk museum – Museo y Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda | Museu I Collegi d’Art Major de la Seda. I only went here because it was the “extra” museum my triple ticket had it, and I had the time to do. I was not impressed though, as more than on silk it focused on the local re-enactment of the Medieval battles in Valencia and the costumes.

Just next block over however, I found the park Jardines del Hospital | Jardins de l’Antic Hospital, where the 15th-century hospital used to be until it was demolished in 1974. The park was reorganised between 2009 and 2012, and an “archaeological garden” has been prepared next to the skate park, with free-standing columns, and a shelf with chapitels and the remains of sculptures that have been found in the area.

Archaeological Garden Valencia

Unexpectedly, I walked by the monument to Spanish Medieval warlord El Cid Monumento a Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar | Monument a Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, a copy of the original sculpture of Anna Hyatt Huntington, which is in the Spanish Society of America in New York.Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, El Cid, became Lord of Valencia. He besieged the Moorish city between 1092 and 1094, until the city surrendered. Having proclaimed himself Prince-Lord, he died in 1099 – the legend says that after he died, he was placed on his horse and just catching sight of him made his enemies run away.

Monument to El Cid in Valencia

My final stop was the gastronomic experience Mercado de la Imprenta | Mercat de la Imprenta. Aside from horchata, Valencia is known for its ice-cream, and I was hoping to find one. There were none, unfortunately, so I just walked the last bit towards the train station – and had a sundae there, because why not?

All in all, I think I spent as much time on trains / at stations as roaming and visiting monuments, but I reckon I did a good job out of getting a feeling off the old town of Valencia. Lots of pretty Gothic buildings to see, which was enjoyable. It probably warrants a whole weekend to see the dozen or so small public museums. It was bit too hot, especially for October, but it did not feel as humid as I imagined it might be.

22nd July 2023: Half a morning in Naples {Southern Italy, July 2023}

Posted on by

For my last half-day in Naples, I had free entrance to the catacombs Catacombe di San Gaudioso, one of the monuments in the Catacombe di Napoli (Catacombs of Naples) network. These are in a really bad part of town that the cooperative is trying to revive – and they say they’re being successful. San Gaudioso – Saint Gaudiosus of Napoli – was a North African Christian bishop who fled persecution into Naples. His relics were buried in the Catacombs of San Gennaro and then transferred to his own around the 6th century. The Catacombs of San Gaudioso were “popular” at first, but they became abandoned, until eventually they were rediscovered and entrusted to the Dominicans in the 17th century. The Dominicans took over and developed a rather morbid interment tradition for the nobles and clergy. The body was drained, then buried. A wall would be built in front of the tomb, and the deceased person’s skull placed on it, with the frontal bones facing forwards. The body was fresco-painted as a skeleton underneath, with symbols and writings around it. Today you can see those frescoes, but the front part of the skull has been smashed away. There is also the actual tomb of Saint Gaudiosus and other 17th century paintings left. If you ask me, the guide went a bit into… excessive graphic detail about the body preparation.

Catacombs of San Gaudioso

The catacombs were restored and open to the public in 2017. They are accessible though Basilica di Santa Maria della Sanità (Basilica of Saint Mary of Healthcare), the Baroque church that was built by the Dominicans once they were entrusted the catacombs – with the money they had from the noble family’s interments. The church connected directly with the catacombs through a hole under the back area of the altar. There was a wedding, so we could not snoop around much. In the sacristy, there is a presepe which, aside from the standard Nativity scene, has scenes from everyday life, legends of Napoli and mythology touches.

Baroque church Santa Maria de la Sanita

I walked back towards the Historic Centre of Naples Centro storico di Napoli thinking that maybe I could get an early lunch, but the nice places were not open yet, and the smell was a bit on the overwhelming side. I went into Via San Gregorio Armeno – the Christmas alley – again. It was Saturday morning so the “good” shops had brought out what they offered and I finally got to see what makes the area famous.

Neapolitan nativiy figures

I finally decided to go towards the station, grab a bite to eat there, and head off to the airport. I had seen a huge bookshop near the food court, and I found something to entertain myself. I tried another piece of typical Italian food – a focaccia stuffed with cheese and greens. And then I realised that I had not had any real Italian ice cream! That was easily solved though…

focaccia and ice cream

The flight back was uneventful except I got emergency exit seat again, so I had to negotiate an exchange seat. The flight attendant this time was not as efficient as the one I had last time this happened. He had me wait until boarding was complete to find me another seat, which almost ended up with him having a riot in his hands. And here I had tried to board a bit earlier than usual to help the crew out… I will go back to boarding late-ish from now on.

Balance: Pompeii and Herculaneum are fantastic. Some people need to learn some respect and be civil – “no smoking” includes marijuana, don’t prance around with your shirt off in what is basically a ghost town, and for the love of that is holy, don’t poke the buildings. At least I did not run into anyone writing their name anywhere. Naples is not the best city, but it’s not as dangerous as I had worried about beforehand. However, maybe I should have done my planning a bit more carefully. Then again, not being too efficient allowed for downtime and resting, which I might have needed. I recently read that you should relax when you go on holiday?

21st July 2023: Naples, from the hills to the port {Southern Italy, July 2023}

Posted on by

Due to poor planning on my side – that happens sometimes – Friday was a weird day. Part of me keeps thinking that I should have taken a train or a boat somewhere, but I actually managed to do most of the key sights in Naples. Acting on a recommendation, I had booked a 10:00 visit to the Catacombs of San Gennaro Catacombe di San Gennaro, part of the Catacombe di Napoli (Catacombs of Naples) network.

I bought a multiple-trip public transit ticket and I set off around 8:00. The underground-bus commute was to take 45 minutes, but the underground alone took that long. Thus, I decided to do the second leg of the trip on foot, up the hill Collina di Capodimonte. The bus trip was to take 20 minutes, and the walk 22 – I took less than 20 and I did not even see any bus going where I wanted to be… then again I was stupidly early in the end…

The cult to San Gennaro (Saint Januarius) is deeply felt in Naples – the miracle of his blood turning liquid three times a year is just one of the signs. They buried, exhumed, and reburied the man up to seven times if I understand correctly, and he is not even in the catacombs any more, but in the cathedral. The catacombs are excavated into the volcanic tuff that conforms the hill, and they date back to the 2nd century CE. They were located outside the city walls, as were all the graveyards at the time. The original tomb was expanded to accommodate palaeo-Christian burials. The first patron of Naples, Saint Agrippinus, was buried here and a basilica was constructed in his honour. After his burial in the 4th century CE, the catacombs became… popular. Eventually, San Gennaro was buried there in the 5th century and the place became a pilgrimage site until his body was moved to Benevento.

The catacombs have two levels, and can only be visited in a guided tour. They were restored in 2006, and are currently managed, by a cooperative which tries to promote Naples heritage and improve the city, providing working opportunities for young people. They tackled the restoration of the catacombs in 2006. Our guide asked if anyone had visited any catacombs before, I said that I had visited the Catacombs of Paris, but she did not make any… further comment about anything. There are no bodies in the Catacombs of San Gennaro, which is almost weird considering how morbid Neapolitans are.

Catacombs of San Gennaro

What you can find in the catacombs is a powerful example of underground architecture. Everything is directly carved into the rock, except for a few bricks here and there (and some scaffolding). There are three types of tombs: fossa (ground burial, vaguely body-shaped), loculo (stacked tombs built against the walls) and arcosolium (a carved tomb carved into the wall and a protective arch surrounding it). Some of the walls and tombs still have frescoes, a few of them with recycled symbolism from the pagan times, such as the god of wine Bacus’ vines being reinterpreted as a Christian theme of Jesus as the ‘true vine’, God as the husbandman, and the disciples as the branches.

The visit ended at the basilica San Gennaro Extra Moenia or St Januarius Beyond the Wall – due to it being outside the city’s protective walls, even if these walls are long gone. As the reception area had a small cafeteria, I headed there for a late breakfast (second breakfast? super early lunch?). It was around 11:00 and I ordered a mini-pizza and got myself a cold coke. I felt much more alive after that.

Neapolitan mini pizza

I went uphill for Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte, one of the former royal palaces Reggia di Capodimonte, and the forest that surround it. The palace was built in the Italian Baroque and Neoclassical styles between 1738 and 1840. A cohort of architects worked on it, the most credited being Giovanni Antonio Medrano. Although today the palace is technically a museum, the ‘good’ paintings have been moved for restoration, so I decided not to go in. But I might have got sunburnt on the walk.

Royal Palace of Capodimonti

I went back down Capodimonte Hill towards Central Naples, and I made a stop at Galleria Principe di Napoli, a commercial gallery dating back from the 19th century. It was originally built in brick, with a cover of iron and glass. Today it is almost unused as most of the shops have closed or moved, and there have been recent mini-collapses which worry local authorities.

Commercial gallery in Naples

I walked into the underground system – which does not have air-con and was crowded. I stopped at Stazione Toledo, one of the stations belonging to the project Stazioni dell’Arte (Art Stations), a city project to beautify Naples’ transport hubs. Óscar Tusquets designed Stazione Toledo, and it has earned the reputation of being the most beautiful underground station in Europe.

Escalator in Toledo underground station Naples

Afterwards I went back to the platform to wait for a train to head to the harbour – the frequency is 15 minutes, but at least I was sitting down. I should have eaten something , but it was too hot – I bought a bottle of water and an ice cream (which was not even actual Italian ice cream) and continued off. I saw the outward of Castel Nuovo, a medieval castle dating back from 1279, commissioned by Charles I of Anjou. Had it had an open ticket office, I would have come in, but you could only book online and I really did not want to go around entering my bank data in the middle of Napoli.

Outside of Castle Nuovo, Naples

Thus I walked past the theatre Teatro di San Carlo and headed off towards the square Piazza del Plebiscito. On one side stands the church Basilica Reale Pontificia San Francesco da Paola, which was getting prepared for a wedding. On the other side, the other Naples Royal Palace Palazzo Reale di Napoli. The palace was one of the Bourbon residences during the time of the Kingdom of Naples and the Kingdom of Two Sicilies. Like the Capodimonte one, it is built in a mixture of Italian Baroque and Neoclassical styles, and it is attributed to Domenico Fontana. I snooped around the free areas of the palace.

Basilica of San Francisco de Padua, Naples

Royal Palace, Naples

There is another shopping gallery next to the palace, the Galleria Umberto I, a little more alive than the Prince of Naples if only because there were tourists groups using it as a meeting point. I crossed it on my way to the underground stop. I took the train again and alighted at the square Piazza Dante, with the monument to the famous poet Monumento a Dante Alighieri and the school Convitto Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele II, whose tower is called the Equation of Time Orologio Equazione Del Tempo, with a double clock to reflect both solar hours (apparent solar time vs mean solar time) simultaneously.

Dante Square, Naples

I headed out to the chapel-museum Museo Cappella Sansevero, which is reported to always have long lines. I wanted to check if there were advanced tickets. Upon arrival around 15:15, I managed to get a slot for 15:30, and I was admitted a bit after 15:20. Pictures are not allowed and the guards patrol like eagles, so I could not even a sneak one. The chapel is home to a number of incredible Baroque and Rococo sculptures. The most important one is the masterpiece known as the Veiled Christ Cristo velato by Neapolitan sculptor Giuseppe Sanmartino (1720 – 1793). The sculpture was commissioned by Raimondo di Sangro and completed in 1753. It is so impressive that a legend says that an alchemist transformed the veil from a real one into marble.

Other incredible sculptures are Release from Deception and the veiled Modesty. When you go out, you are forced to cross a small cabinet which holds something called Le Macchine Anatomiche “Anatomical Machines” (Giuseppe Salerno) which are real-life skeletons with a reproduction of the vascular and circulatory system.

My final stop for the the day was Complesso Monumentale di Santa Chiara, a monumental complex comprising a church Chiesa di Gesù Redentore e San Ludovico d’Angiò, a cloister Chiostro maiolicato, a museum Museo Di Santa Chiara and a Roman archaeological excavation Scavi archeologici Santa Chiara.

This religious complex started off as a Clarisse monastery built between 1313 and 1340. The cloister is square, and the arcades are covered in frescoes. The cloister itself is considered unique, as in 1742, Domenico Antonio Vaccaro built two avenues of octagonal columns. These pillars, along with the benches that join them, are decorated in the Rococo style, covered with majolica tiles in floral and everyday-life themes. A bit too fancy for a Poor Clares convent… though I really liked the columns and the cloister.

20230721 Santa Chiara Cloister Naples

The library contains codexes. The Roman ruins are from a Roman bath, but with Pompeii and Herculaneum so recent in my mind, they were not that impressive, I guess. The museum holds pieces from the baths, religious artefacts from the church before it was burnt, and other religious paraphernalia.

Altar. Santa Chiara, Naples

The church was originally erected in the Angevin Gothic style, with some original Romanesque left, and it was redecorated in Baroque style in the 17th century. After being damaged during the WWII bombings, it was restored “in style” – meaning, how it was supposed to have been before the Baroque decorations.

After the church, I went back to the hotel and I decided to try one of the McDonald’s item that is typically Italian – not found anywhere else, a Tasty Basket: McNuggets (found everywhere), chicken wings (found in more places), and panzerotti con pomodoro (typical Italian, a panzerotto is a small calzone with the same dough and seasoned tomato as pizza). It was either strangely good or I was hungry.

panzerotti con pomodoro

18th July 2023: Naples from below and above {Southern Italy, July 2023}

Posted on by

Naples [Napoli] was waking up when I walked out into the heat. It was a bit after 8:00 because I was… not really planning, just expecting to get lost. My hotel was right next to the Porta Capuana and Castel Capuano, remains of the Medieval times and ancient walls. There is where I took my first wrong turn – the nice receptionist at the hotel had tried to explain to me how to get there, and I tried to follow his instructions – which meant I did not follow my original route and I got disoriented. Fortunately, phone GPS came to my aid and I eventually made my way to the Historic Centre of Naples Centro storico di Napoli. While on principle I understand the protection of a Unesco Heritage Site, it did not feel like one, mostly due to the smell – a mixture of human urine, cooked flour and raw fish – and the crazy traffic. I don’t think “pedestrian” means the same thing in Italian as in any language I speak.

I was around the area I wanted to be about 9:30 for my 10:00 visit, and I took the time to wander up and down Via del Tribunali. Off to one side stands the metal sculpture Busto de Pulcinella – a character of the early theatre school called Commedia dell’arte, where different characters wear masks to be identified as an archetype. Pulcinella is an opportunistic anti-hero from the lowest social strata recognised by the black mask. Italians like rubbing body parts of different statues for luck, that’s why his nose is polished off.

Napoli Storico - the centre of Naples

I had a booked guided tour at 10:00 for a place called Napoli Sotterranea – Underground Naples. It is just one of the companies that give tours through the hundred of kilometres of tunnels that cross the Historic Centre. The city of Naples was built on and out of tuff, a volcanic rock made out of compacted ash, with a yellowish colour in this area. Tuff is easy to dig and excavate, and the Greeks used it to build an aqueduct to serve the city – that later the Romans expanded – 40 metres under the ground. When I arrived at the gate, there was a crowd – and even if I had a “skip the line” reservation, my English tour did not start till 10:20. The whole thing was a bit chaotic, and I later realised that as convenient as online pre-booking is, it is not covered by the Naples Tourist Card, so a lot of people had no option but to call at the attractions to get their discounted tickets – I decided not to get the card because I had booked or planned to book most things in advance so it was not value for money for me.

Napoli Sotterranea starts off going down over 150 steps into the excavated tuff to visit the aqueduct. There are a number of galleries where the water used to run, and at some points you can even glimpse the original paint to help prevent the water filtering into the rock. Then the guide explains that during the WWII bombings, the tunnels were used as air raid shelters and you are shown the “showers” and “latrines”, followed by a morbid recall of the stench and the conditions, and some art exhibits and objects from the time. It was at this point I started thinking that the Neapolitans had a thing for the macabre.

Fortunately, we moved over soon, to a tiny garden that is not watered nor lit by sun, and yet it thrives in the tunnels due to humidity and artificial lamps. Then we went further into the earth – you have to walk along a very narrow tunnel, sometimes only practicable sideways. They used to give you a candle for it, but now they tell you to use your phone torch. It was a bit claustrophobic, but at least you did not need to crouch like in the pyramids. At the end of the tunnels there are several underwater ponds and fountains.

Napoli Sotterranea: tunnels and underground water reservoir

As you come out from the tunnels, there is a small “museum of war” with some uniforms and so on, and then they take you to see “the Roman Theatre”. Here’s the thing – the theatre is kind of there. Throughout the centuries, it has been incorporated into the rest of the architecture of the city, so only bits and pieces are visible, mostly those that remain underground, like the actors’ tunnels, and a hall which holds a collection of Neapolitan nativity scenes or presepe.

After the guide set us loose, I walked towards the Montesanto funicolare cable car station. Naples’ rope way is a tourist attraction in its on right, some people say. I’m not a fan, but I really did not want to climb up Vomero Hill Collina del Vomero in the sun and heat. The ride did not take longer than a few minutes, and after a short stroll I reached one of the city’s castles – Castel Sant’Elmo.

This fortress and former prison dates from the late 13th century. It was built in volcanic tuff, and the structure was mostly developed throughout the 14th century, though it was severely damaged in an earthquake in 1456. Construction continued, and then in 1587 lightning struck the ammunition depot and the explosion destroyed several parts of the castle, including the church. Throughout Naples’ convoluted history, Castel Sant’Elmo has been a stronghold for war, and a prison. Today, it’s a monument, a museum, and a viewpoint of the port and Mount Vesuvius Il Vesuvio in the distance.

Naples Castel San Telmo

Next to the the castle stands the monastery-museum Certosa e Museo di San Martino. It originally was a Carthusian monastery inaugurated in 1368 and dedicated to St. Martin of Tours. The monks were expelled by French soldiers in 1799, and they were never allowed back. In 1866, it was taken over by the state. The monastery has a Baroque church – Naples is after all the birthplace of the style, but in a different way from the Spanish one, so I don’t dislike it as much. The monastery also has two cloisters – one of which with a cemetery in the middle. There are also hanging gardens and orchards and the different rooms of the building host religious artefacts, items from the Bourbon times, and one of the best presepe in the world.

Naples Monastery of San Martino, showing the church, the cloisters, and the entrance to the hanging gardens

Then I went back downhill, again using the funiculare. My next spot was Naples Cathedral, dedicated to the Assumption of Mary, known as Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta, Cattedrale di San Gennaro in honour of Saint Januarius, the patron saint of Naples. However, the most common name it receives is simple Duomo di Napoli. The current building was built in the Angevin Gothic style (gotico angioino) back in the 13th century, over palaeo-Christian buildings. The interior is strongly Baroque, though there are still some 14th century frescoes.

Collage. Duomo the Napoli: façade and main nave

For reference, Italian churches claim that walking into them showing shoulders or knees is disrespectful – so they encourage visitors to show “decorum and modesty” because “it demonstrates respect in the house of god”. I think their obsession with joints is exaggerated (especially considering the heat), and there was a certain event that highlighted the hypocrisy of it all. I visited the palaeo-Christian baptistery, one of the parts of the cathedral that you need to pay in order to access – and all tickets in Italy have been increased 1 € as part of the recovery plan of the area of Emilia Romagna, affected by heavy floods in May 2023.

The Baptistery of San Giovanni Battistero di San Giovanni in Fonte is a basic round pool on the ground, but the mosaic above it is super-detailed. It dates back from probably the late 4th century. The centre has the Chi-Rho symbol, and it is surrounded by scenes from the Bible, animals and plants, and allegories. Well, while I was admiring the art, the guy from the ticket booth came over, pulled his zipper down and urinated into the remains of the original wall. Talk about Catholics and respect in the house of God…

Next I went to the side chapel Reale cappella del Tesoro di San Gennaro (Royal Chapel of the Treasure of St. Januarius) and the Museo del Tesoro di San Gennaro (Museum of the Treasure of St. Januarius). San Gennaro / Saint Januarius is the patron saint of Naples. He was a Catholic martyr in the 3rd century, who died during the persecution of Christians by Emperor Diocletian. After his beheading, his blood was saved and it is said that the blood liquefies three times a year. The chapel holds a reliquary, and the museum some religious artefacts, including the “treasure” – reliquaries, jewels and other religious paraphernalia in noble metals and gems.

Collage: Baptistery of San Giovanni and Royal Chapel of the Treasure of St. Januarius

After the cathedral, I found Via San Gregorio Armeno, an alley that is famous because it concentrates the sells of handmade figurines for the nativity scenes presepe. However, as I walked I could only find cheaply-made expensively-sold figures of politicians, footballers and so on. I have to say that I know or understand nothing about football, but apparently Naples’ city team has won the national championship, and that’s a big thing? Everything was full of football references, posters, banners… and the alleyway was not an exception. It felt a bit… disappointing as I had heard so much about it, and I saw very few things that were “classical” there – I would come back another day and found the real thing though.

I made a visit to a local supermarket to find something to drink, dinner, breakfast and snacking the following day – because I had packed some, but I had forgotten that I had. Italian people don’t believe in either sandwiches or refrigerated coffee, which was a bit of a bummer. They have a lot of stands to grab something on the go, and they are keen on cafés, but I really did not feel comfortable sitting around in the city.

I went back to the hotel with my “groceries” because I did not want to be walking around after sunset, and I spent the rest of the evening watching British Museum’s documentaries about Pompeii and Ercolano to get ready for the following day. One of the things that drew my attention was how the documentaries kept emphasising the “importance” of the archaeological sites, and that it was important to respect them. I did not understand why, as I felt that is quite obvious. I would later discover… yes, people need to understand their importance.

9th June 2023: Arribes del Duero & Ciudad Rodrigo {WNW Spain, with a splash of Portugal, June 2023}

Posted on by

We set off from Zamora in order to drive up towards the Portuguese town of Miranda do Douro, though we were not due to reach the town itself. We were heading to the International Biological Station, which organises environmentally-friendly cruises up River Douro.

The drive was to take around one hour, and we stopped at the reservoir Embalse de Ricobayo, which has a dam and a hydroelectric central. We stumbled upon a nice little outlook above the reservoir to see both the dam and the meandering river. It was not long before we noticed the vultures – a kettle of Eurasian griffon vultures (Gyps fulvus), and even some solitary birds that showed off (or were trying to find breakfast, who knows?).

Meander and Dam of Ricobayo

We reached the International Biological Station Estación Biológica Internacional | Estação Biológica Internacional (EBI) in time to swap our 12:00 tickets for 11:00 tickets, and the little boat took off. The cruise runs up the area of River Douro Río Duero called Arribes del Duero, a gorge nor dissimilar to the Galician gorge of River Sil. It was an hour-long course where we got to see some more birds of prey, a few nests, lychens and local flora, but none of the wild otters that are supposed to swim on the river. The guide collected some water to observe under the microscope and show us copepods and water fleas. At the end of the boat ride, we saw the “emotional therapy otters” (Lutra lutra) that the EBI keeps at the entrance. Oh, and had a sip of Porto wine. I was not too keen on the whole thing though, despite the pretty landscapes.

Arribes del Duero

Otter playing in the water

We “boycotted” Miranda do Douro as the ascent road from the river to the town looked horrible and full of curves. Thus, we headed off to Ciudad Rodrigo, in the Spanish region of Salamanca. We had booked at the local Parador Parador de Ciudad Rodrigo, Castillo de Enrique II de Trastámara. It is a really cool building – a castle from the 14th century, commissioned by the King . The main feature of the building is the keep, which you cannot climb (technically you can, but you have to know that you need to ask beforehand), but you can walk around the walls to have a look at the skyline. In front of the Parador stands a pre-Roman sculpture of a verraco – a granite animal, maybe a pig or a boar, dating back from the Vettones (3rd century BCE – 1st century CE).

Parador of Ciudad Rodrigo

There was a mishap with our reservation, so instead of getting a three-person room, we got the doggy-friendly room. I’ve been long-supporting of pet-friendly travel, but this made me rethink my stance. The room did have a pull-out sofa bed, but the layout made it awkward to share it among three people. Furthermore, it smelt and there were a bunch of flies and fruit-flies at the windows. That was a bit of a bummer.

We went to walk around town and found the tourist office in the mansion called Palacio de los Águilas, a 16th century Renaissance building erected by the family in charge of the castle upkeep. It has two patios with arches, and an exhibition area about the role that the town had in the war against Napoleon’s armies in the 19th century.

Palacio de los Aguila

We wandered around the town for a little, but then it started pouring. Thus, we hurried towards the cathedral Catedral de Santa María de Ciudad Rodrigo. The original building dates back from the early 12th century, and it was in construction and reconstruction until the 18th century. The main building was finished in the 14th century, but the tower collapsed after the Lisbon Earthquake in 1755. One of the most important features of the cathedral is the Romanesque portico Pórtico del Perdón, similar to the one in the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela. The gothic cloister is really nice, and it holds frescoes from the Romanesque period.

Cathedral of Ciudad Rodrigo

Cloister in the Cathedral at Ciudad Rodrigo

By the time we finished, the storm was over. I climbed up the remains of the town’s defensive walls Adarve Juan Martín Zermeño.

Ciudad Rodrigo: wall

We ditched the chamberpot museum (yes, it is really a thing) and to end the day we walked around the town for a little to find the traditional buildings – the manors Casa de la Marquesa de Cartago and Palacio de los Miranda, the square Plaza del Buen Alcalde, the old army HQ Antiguo Cuartel de Artillería,–the churches Iglesia de Cerralbo and Capilla de la Venerable Orden Tercera, and the main square Plaza Mayor.

Ciudad Rodrigo typical buildings

8th June 2023: Tordesillas & Zamora {WNW Spain, with a splash of Portugal, June 2023}

Posted on by

Tordesillas used to be one of the Spanish Crown’s strongholds throughout the Middle Ages, starting around 1340 when Alfonso XI ordered the construction of a palace. In 1494, the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs signed a Treaty which divided the lands “discovered” by Columbus among them – of course, this Treaty was largely ignored by any other European powers which wanted to explore America, and never acknowledged by any indigenous people. In 1519, the town was part of the rebellion against Carlos I, naming his mother – and daughter of the Catholic Monarchs – Juana as queen, despite the rumours that she was insane. After the defeat of the revolts – and beheading of the instigators – the town lost importance.

We left early in the morning to try and ditch the traffic, but we were not successful – driving around Madrid, we ran into a couple of jams traffic caused only in part by the intermittent storms, which made the beginning of the road trip stressful. Thankfully, we parked at the outskirts of Tordesillas and the sun was shining again, as we had to cross the village on foot. Our first stopover was the Main Square Plaza Mayor. In the Castilian Main Square fashion, it is actually square in shape, with the main buildings supported by columns, where cafés and shops stand today. The current plaza dates back from the 16th century, and has been painted in a questionable bright mustard colour.

Main Square in Tordesillas

In the end, most of the history in Tordesillas is linked to Alfonso XI’s palace, known today as the Convent of Saint Clare Convento de Santa Clara, which stands a few minutes’ walk from the square. It was home, and later prison, to royal women, both loved and unwanted ones. It became a convent of the Order of Saint Clare in 1363, and the nuns living there were tasked with praying for the health and salvation of the Royal Family. Today, it is managed by the Spanish National Heritage Foundation Patrimonio Nacional. It can only be visited under supervision – seriously, aside from the guide, you get a security guard following you around – and photography is forbidden in all the interior areas.

The castle-convent was built throughout the 13th to 18th centuries. The oldest part of the building is a chapel dating from the 11th century, and the bulk of the construction was carried out in the 14th century. The monarchs employed Mudejar builders, a fact that yielded to multifoil arches, ceramic decorations, and Quran verses (officially “decorative nonsense”) in some of the chapels and the façade of the building.

Inside the palace there is a Baroque cloister and the gothic church, with a wooden ceiling painted gold and the emblem dragons of Carlos I’s shield. Truth be told, the church had been pretty much hyped up on me, so I found it a bit underwhelming.

Santa Clara convenent in Tordesillas

The party separated for a bit so I could explore on my own for a while. I got to the stone bridge over the River Douro Río Duero, just called “the bridge” el Puente, right at whose ends stands a monument to the fighting bull Toro de Tordesillas. The associated bullfighting festivity was one of the oldest in Spain until it was vetoed by the regional government – the fighting bull was set loose in the meadow, chased by horsemen and lanced to death. Today, the festivity is controversial and it’s trying to find its place in the midst of new sensitivities.

Tordesillas

I climbed up the medieval wall Muralla de Tordesillas to the park where the monument to Queen Juana Monumento a la Reina Juana I de Castilla stands, in front of the museum dedicated to the Treaty Casas del Tratado, and the church Iglesia de San Antolín.

Monuments in Tordesillas

We walked back to the car to drive off to the next spot in the route, and Tordesillas became the first spot where we spotted birds of prey during this trip, maybe a golden eagle Aquila chresaetos. Or, you know. Anything else.

Eagle

We drove off towards the municipality of Zamora, a Medieval town and villa by the Douro, known for its Romanesque churches. We reached the Parador de Zamora in the middle of a horrible downpour that was over as quickly as it had started. The Parador hotel is a former noble family’s Renaissance palace, with a military style and a middle patio with a glass-window gallery

Parador in Zamora

We had a late lunch and walked to the manor Palacio de los Momos, near the Main Square Plaza Mayor, home to a church Iglesia de San Juan de Puerta Nueva which has a sculpture representing two figures of the local Holy Week celebrations Monumento al Merlú. Other buildings include the old and new town halls Ayuntamiento Viejo and Nueva Casa Consistorial, and blocks of colonnaded buildings.

Buildings in Zamora

The first Romanesque building we came across was the church Iglesia de Santa María Magdalena, which contrary to many other places has got rid of the Baroque add-ons, and stands severe and naked in its stony glory. It is considered one of the most important and pure Romanesque constructions in Europe, sparsely decorated save for the tomb to the side.

Church of Saint Mary

From a side stop I overlooked the river Río Duero and the medieval bridge Puente de Piedra.

Zamora Medieval Bridge

We continued off to the cathedral Catedral del Salvador de Zamora. It is considered the first cathedral in the “Douro Romanesque” style. After the original cathedral was destroyed during the Muslim conquest of Spain, the reconstruction began around 1151. It must have been finished towards the beginning of the 13th century. The building has two particularities – the thick tower, and the umbrella dome, in a style that travelled from Byzantium to the Islamic architecture and reached Spain with the Nasrid artists. The inside holds a cloister and two small museum – one of religious art and the other of archaeology.

Zamora Cathedral

Afterwards, we visited the ruined castle Castillo de Zamora – a purely-defensive Romanesque fortress built around the 11th century. The castle has a moat, and you can wander up the walls and defensive towers. The interior is ruined, but the ancient structure can be guessed by the arches and different walls that would have separated the fortress’ halls.

Castle in Zamora

Finally, we explored a few more religious Romanesque buildings: Iglesia de San Pedro y San Ildefonso, Convento de Clarisas El Tránsito and Iglesia de San Cipriano. From the viewpoint next to this last church, we got to see a stork nest with a baby chick in it.

Zamora churches

Stork nest

We had dinner at a restaurant called El Horno, a traditional places that offers tablas – wooden trays full of treats to share. We shared a serving of tabla de fiambres – Iberian sausages (ham, loin, chorizo…) and cheese on a bed of crisps.

Zamora at night

22nd and 23rd April 2023: A date with a dinosaur (London, England, Great Britain)

Posted on by

Since I cannot keep my mouth shut, I offered to organise a trip to London with some people from work. Despite prices skyrocketing everywhere and my ridiculously hectic schedule, I managed to secure a weekend when flying would not be stupidly expensive, and an activity I would really be looking forward to – the Natural History Museum was running couple of things I was very interested in. One was an exhibition on a gigantic dinosaur: Titanosaur: Life as the biggest dinosaur. Well, twist my arm – NHM is much closer than the actual Titanosaur home in Argentina. Furthermore, there was a collaboration with Jurassic Park (‘an adventure 63,000,030 years in the making’ is the motto), and coming back to the museum would give me the chance to purchase the rock I wanted the last time I was over and did not get because I was heading out to Stonehenge on the same day.

In the end, only one person took up the offer, and I figured out that well, London is pretty much always a good idea for a weekend – so I figured I’d arrange myself a date with a dinosaur. Unfortunately, it turned that London Marathon was held that weekend. Hotel prices were bloated for the night and we ended up at Earl’s Court because I wanted to stay close to South Kensington and the other person wanted the cheapest place possible. We left on a red-eye flight to London Stansted which took a long time to land – we spent about an hour circling the airport, and eventually the head cabin attendant said that there was bad visibility at the airport, and that the pilot required all electronic devices to be turned off so he could use the autolanding system. I did not like that one bit – after I visited Santiago de Compostela in 2022, I felt that I had got over the bad-visitiblity near-miss when I was a teen. Apparently not, the feeling of uneasiness is still there. We landed over an hour late, but we were on our way on the first Stansted Express a few minutes after getting on it. After reaching Liverpool Street Station at around 9:30, I asked my companion to take us to Guildhall as part of the incentive of the trip was introducing them to international travel. It was not a good idea. Their phone trolled us and tried to take us to Guildhall… in Stratford upon Avon. The Costa at the station was closed, but at least I had got myself a sandwich and a latte before we started walking.

After backtracking, we were in known territory around 10:15. As it turns out, my companion was only interested in “walking the city” and shot down any activities I had proposed – thus, some things I just imposed in order not to feel that I had wasted the whole day away. By 11:00, I had confirmed that our travelling styles were not compatible. After some time at the docks next to the Tower of London, I wanted to enter the Anglican church All Hallows by the Tower. All Hallows is the oldest church in the City of London – founded in 675 CE, it predates the nearby Tower of London. The parish used to take care of a lot of the prisoners executed there. The building withstood the Great Fire of London (1666), but it was severely damaged through The Blitz – the German WWII bombing campaign against the UK throughout 1940 and 1941. The church was rebuilt and reconsecrated in 1975. Its windows are decorated with symbols from the different London guilds and some families.

Collage of a church. The outer building is brick and it has a tower crowned with a greenish metal spire. The inside has huge windows decorated with guild symbols. The small crypt inside is covered in white stone.

Underneath, there are a few chapels and a small Crypt. Most of the crypt is a museum which chiefly holds artefacts from the Roman period – including remains of an old road. There are other historical items from the Saxon and Medieval times, and the 20th century Crow’s Nest of the vessel Quest, in which Sir Ernest Shackleton sailed for Antarctica for the third time, and where he died.

When we were done, we went to Saint Dunstan in the East Church Garden. I was hoping to use this as a relaxing point for a few minutes, but there was work being done on the parterres. We continued towards the River Thames for some views of Tower Bridge, the museum HMS Belfast and The Shard skyscraper.

We walked by the Monument to the Fire of London on our way to the Sky Garden. The Great Fire burnt inside the Roman city wall for four days after breaking out a bakery after midnight on the 2nd of September, 1666. Though the number of victims is (theoretically) small, the fire destroyed over 13,000 houses (15% of the city’s housing), almost a hundred parish churches, governmental buildings, St Paul’s cathedral, and even some of the city gates.

Afterwards, we walked over to Leadenhall Market, a covered shopping street which can be traced back to a 1321 food market, and marks the centre of Roman Londinium (ruins from the Forum and Basilica are buried underneath). It was given to the city in the 15th century, and in the 19th century, the City Architect Sir Horace Jones designed an iron-and-glass arcade. Today, it holds restaurants, wine bars, varied shops and even beauty parlours.

A covered shopping gallery or street, in dark red and beige tones.

Around the market stands a mixture of modern buildings and traditional buildings, mostly small churches. Among the former:

  • The Lloyd’s Building (25 Gresham Street), sometimes called the “Inside-Out building”. It was finished in 1986 and it is consider a great example of Bowellism – an architectural style that maximises inside space by building ducts, lifts, and other structural necessities on the outside. It was designed by Richard Rogers & Partners, and it still maintains the original entrance of the building that stood in its place in 1928 – the East India House.
  • The Leadenhall Building (122 Leadenhall Street), designed by the Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners. It opened in 2014.
  • The Willis Towers Watson (WTW), designed by Norman Foster, it was finished in 2008.
  • The Scalpel (52-54 Lime Street), which yields to cool reflections along with the WTW, and has a strange sculpture at the entrance – it made me think of several ship wheels fused together. The building was designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox and only completed in 2018.
  • And of course The Gherkin (30 St Mary Axe). It was designed by Foster + Partners and it is the first ecological building ever built in London. It opened in 2004.

The historical buildings we encountered (having survived both the Great Fire of London and the Blitz) include:

  • Saint Andrew Undershaft Church. It dates back from 1147, although it has been rebuilt several times. The current building was erected in 1532.
  • Saint Helen’s Bishopsgate Church, where Shakespeare himself used to worship in the 1590s. The building can be traced back to the mid 12th century, and it was restored during the Victorian period and later during the 20th century.

Skyscrapers reflected on the glass that covers yet another huge skyscraper

A small church built in Stone in the background with a huge modern high-rise building behind it

Afterwards, we headed towards Embankment on the Tube. There, I was happy to find a Costa Coffee and get my vanilla latte fix. In the area, we saw the Victoria Embankment Gardens and I wanted to visit Cleopatra’s Needle – half of a pair of obelisks (the other one is in New York), originally made and carved in Heliopolis, what is Cairo today. It has inscriptions from the 18th and 19th Egyptian dynasties (around 1450 BCE). It was presented to the United Kingdom by Sultan Muhammad Ali in 1819, and later transported to London in 1877. Two sphinxes and other decorations were added when the Needle was erected, and the plinth under one of the sphinxes was damaged during London Bombings – it was never restored as a tribute to memory.

An Egyptian obelisk standing against a cloudy background

We walked over to the Westminster area to see the Palace of Westminster and Elizabeth Tower. There was an environmental protest there, which made it packed, but at the same time diverted traffic, allowing for new views from the middle of the street. On the way, I encountered an adorable pit bull mix I got permission to pet – coffee and dog pets made everything better.

A view of the palace of Westminster, with the Elizabeth tower on the left

We continued off to Saint James’s Park, home to squirrels, geese, swans, pigeons, mallard ducks, robins… all of them extremely used to people and tourists, and rather unconcerned by dogs being walked. We ditched the marathon fencing and reached Buckingham Palace, but by then my companion was beat. Thus, we had to go to the hotel so they could get some rest. The hotel was better than expected for a London 2*. It was nice and warm, although the bathroom was tiny – it was difficult to stand inside and close the door.

Buckingham Palace and some of the animals at Saint James' parks

A couple of hours later, we were off into the evening to see Piccadilly Circus, the entrance to Chinatown, and Leicester Square. Companion was beaten, so they were not sure they would be up for anything the following day – we arranged to touch base at 9:00 for them to evaluate. Once in my room, I had a shower and booked a free time slot for the British Museum the following day, just to avoid the queues. I thought, even if we did not make it, at least we had assured entry if we did, and I could always cancel and release the ticket.

Central London at night - Picadilly Circus' Eros and entrance to Chinatown

The next morning, I left on my own around 8:00 to look for a nearby Costa Coffee for a large vanilla latte breakfast, and I came across Brompton Cemetery. This had not been on my radar, but since I had time, I decided to explore it a little. Brompton Cemetery, formerly West of London and Westminster Cemetery, opened in 1840, and it has belonged to the British Crown since 1852. It is on of the oldest garden cemeteries in Britain and comprises around 35,000 monuments. I wandered for about half an hour before I had to head back.

Brompton cemetery, a 19th century graveyard and garden

We managed to get to to the Natural History Museum on time for my date with a dinosaur just after opening. I had my Titanosaur ticket at 10:15, and left off my companion to wander on their own after agreeing to check with each other around noon. The exhibition Titanosaur: Life as the Biggest Dinosaur brings a cast of Patagotitan mayorum to Europe for the first time, along with a few real fossil bones, of a front leg, some teeth, and an egg.

Patagotitan mayorum is one of the largest known animals to have ever lived. It was a sauropod dinosaur – a tetrapod with extremely long neck and tail. It lived in forest regions during the Late Cretaceous (102 to 95 million years ago) grazing on ferns and tree leaves. The species was discovered in Argentina in 2010, and it’s calculated that it could have been up to 31 metres long and weigh over 50 tonnes. It is widely considered the most complete of the South American dinosaurs. The cast that the Natural History museum brought is considered the holotype, and it was reconstructed from the partial skeletons of six specimens.

Titanosaur skeleton. People walking around don't even reach its knees.

The best thing about the exhibit was being able to actually touch the cast, so I kinda hugged my date, I guess. As far as I know, there are only three casts of titanosaur – the one in Argentina (Museo Paleontológico Egidio Feruglio in Trelew), one in the US (Field Museum, Chicago), named Máximo, and this one.

After I had pranced around the exhibition to my heart’s content, and as it filled up with kids, I moved on to reason number two of this visit having to happen asap in 2023. To celebrate 30 (thirty!) years of the 1993 release of Jurassic Park, the Natural History Museum was running a limited-time-only collaboration pop-up shop – the Jurassic Park 30th Anniversary #NHMxJURASSIC store in which I did not even spend that much! I bought a replica badge and a commemorative coin, both limited, numbered editions. The shop had both Jurassic Park and Jurassic World merchandise, especially toys and T-shirts, and a few props, including a life-size sculpture of Blue the velociraptor.

Jurassic Park pop-up shop, with Blue the velociraptor just hanging out

I then headed to the official museum shop to get myself the rock I had wanted – a piece of aura silicon carbide, a shiny mostly-artificial mineral. I also bought a souvenir guide, just because. They did not have anything from the Titanosaur exhibit there, so I backtracked to the exhibition shop to buy a pin.

Whenever I got to the Natural History Museum, I end up in the dinosaur gallery (well, there was that one time I walked through the whole thing throughout a winter day). This time, however, I decided to wander the upper area of the historical building. I was drawn to the Treasures in the Cadogan gallery. I had not been there since it opened in 2013, and my mind was blown. The collection includes a first edition of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, and some of the pigeon specimens that he used to develop the theory of evolution. I also got to see the first-ever-found iguanodon teeth (not the replicas), the first fossil ever found of the Archaeopteryx (the link between dinosaurs and birds), and a skeleton and egg of the great auk, the first confirmed victim of anthropogenic extinction (due to human activity). I was very impressed, these were all treasures indeed – no overselling.

Treasures at the Natural History Museum - ancient bird fossil, extinct penguin-like bird, a book, dinosaur teeth. Whale skeleton.

After wandering the second floor for a bit, I ran into my companion and at noon we left towards the British Museum, where I had booked entry for 12:40. I left them to their own devices again and headed off to the Japanese galleries, which had been closed the last couple of times I was in the museum. I was… a bit on the disappointed side, I remembered them being way more impressive from my early 2000s visits.

Japanese Galleries at the British Museum: Samurai Armour, lion dogs pair, articulated metal animals, a standing Buddha.

I visited the Moai, the Elgin Marbles, the Babylonian bulls and the Rosetta Stone, and I headed off to the shop to get myself a treat – retail therapy is a thing. Eventually, we left the museum and managed to get to Liverpool Street to take the Stansted Express to the airport. Security was smooth, not as crammed as other times, and then, as tradition calls, I got myself some sushi at Itsu.

When we boarded the plane, I had been assigned an emergency exit seat. In order to sit there, you need to be able to take responsibility about opening the exit if something happens. I flagged a flight attendant to inform them that I would be physically unable to do so. I had a new seat in 4.5 seconds, and it turned out to be a window seat. We took off a few minutes late, and landed with a delay of almost a quarter of an hour. Nevertheless, after passport control and all, I managed to reached the parking lot payment machines with a few seconds to spare the overstaying fee – all good!

Balance – The marathon barely interfered with the weekend. I had a date with a dinosaur and hugged them. That was awesome. I got limited edition Jurassic Park and Jurassic World merchandise. I found some Kettle Sea Salt and Balsamic Vinegar of Modena crisps at one of the supermarkets. I got two new books, commemorative coins and a shiny rock. I also discovered new places to explore in the future, and had Costa – twice. Unfortunately, we ran out of time for extra visits on Sunday – so I could not fit in either the HMS Belfast or the Jack the Ripper Museum. Furthermore, the Grant Museum of Zoology is closed for renovation, and the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology does not open on Sundays, so in the end I was not really able to scratch much off my list. Whoops!

Souvenirs from London: books, crisps, commemorative coins and Jurassic Park merch