Trekkin

Day 58 – 5 September 2023 – Fatima, Obidos & Lisbon, Portugal

The landscape has changed again as we drive south from Porto, with lots of small farms growing corn, sunflowers & fruit. Some of the large steel electricity pylons have multiple stork nests in them. The trees we see are mainly eucalypts planted in plantations, with some of it destroyed by fires. There is a lot of regrowth occurring where they have been burnt. They make paper out of them.

Our first destination this morning is Fatima, an extremely important site for the Catholic religion. This is where three children of shepherds saw the vision of an Angel over a number of consecutive months at the same location. Now on the site where she appeared is a chapel, the tree where she appeared has been relocated a short distance, next to the chapel.  A large basilica (church) has been built nearby as well. There is also a new huge modern church at the other end of the massive square, which is bigger than the square in Rome where the Pope blesses people from his window. The devout arriving had candles with them, some long, some fat, some short & usually multiples of them to burn at the shrine. There were lots of candles burning & there was a thick pall of smoke from all the candle wax being burnt. There were desperate people crawling (in the rain) on their knees to pray in the chapel hoping for a miracle.

The Basilica inside is simple & elegant, the bodies of the three (then children) have been interred at the front of the church, Lucinda & Jacinta on the left & Francisco on the right. Again simple & elegant. There are a number of statues around the square & some crosses, plus a modern stylised angel that looks very creative. It is a very sober touching place. The rain stopped bucketing down, it wasn’t a miracle, only Mother Nature.

More rural countryside with grape vines becoming predominant plus a few more fruit trees. There are still enormous amounts of eucalypts in the hills with more farms growing grapes. The walled town of Obidos started out a long time ago as a hilltop fortress & when the Romans conquered this part of the world they built a more significant structure. Again, the Visigoths, the Moors, the Portuguese, the Christians & the Spanish, every man & his dog fought over Obidos. There is a Roman aqueduct leading into the town, not as imposing as the one at Segovia, this one is a lot shorter.

The gates to Obidos have some nice blue tiles inside with murals painted on the tiles. The main street is narrow with streamers between the walls & colourful Bougainvillea sprays. It is raining so we are carrying our umbrellas, all the outside displays of the many shops are getting wet & the umbrellas of the cafes are filling with water. We walk past St Mary’s Square & the St Mary’s church facing the square built in the 12^th century. At the end of the main street is the Santiago church, originally built in 1186 & undergone restorations & reconstructions over time. It is now a bookstore.

The old church backs onto the walls of the town & we walk out the nearby gate for a view down onto the surrounding farms plus up & down the valley, it is very pretty. We look along the wall as it meanders along the cliff top encircling the town from the high vantage point we have. We walk downhill, then turn past yet another church, then along another narrow & pretty Bougainvillea lined street. Chad, our Tour Director is sitting by himself having a glass of vino so we sit with him & order a “12 Apostles” pizza, this is also the name of the café. The pizza is good & so is the red wine to wash it down. The rain has stopped & it has got hot as we walk back to the bus for the rest of our journey to Lisbon.

As we drive into Lisbon we see another long & tall old aqueduct, this one does no look as elegant as the Roman ones. We find out it was built in the 18^th Century, however, re-used some of the existing viable Roman aqueduct infrastructure. The arches we saw are up to 65 metres high & completed in 1744 to supply water to the city of Lisbon. The aqueduct was last used in 1967.

Our hotel room is very nice, the hotel is an old hotel that has a very fancy old lobby area that looks very elegant, lots of brass & old furniture & decorations. We have views of the harbour from our window. After a brief rest we head out to dinner at 6.15 pm to the Adega Machado Restaurant, around 15 minutes by bus from the hotel. We have soup, the main course is cod fish pie then ice cream for dessert. During dinner we are entertained by four singers & three classical guitar players entertaining us with the Portuguese Fado style of music. Different & very enjoyable. Another good day.

Day 57 – 4 September 2023 – Porto, Portugal

Another early start & it is still raining as we leave Salamanca. We hear that Madrid suffered severe flooding & torrential rain with the Mayor issuing stay at home orders for the city. Glad we got out when we did. The rain gradually eases & the scenery changes as we near Portugal. There are lots of trees, lots of treed mountains & the houses start to look different. We stop for a comfort break just before the Portugal border at a roadhouse & I buy a couple of the famed Portuguese custard tarts, they are delicious.

It is only another hour to Porto & after we cross the border the houses change again. In the towns most houses have a yard & the houses seem to be well kept & two story, Portugal seems to be a wealthier country than Spain with less churches. The bus drops us off down near the Douro River near the cable car station. There r a lot of the old port wine transport boats moored, each a floating advertisement for their brand of port wine. Our Tour Director takes us for a short walk along the river to show us the port wine cellars then leaves us to find our own lunch among the many cafes along the shore. There are six river cruise boats tied up on the shore just nearby.

We decide to catch the cable car up to the top of the Ponte de Luis I bridge, a very tall bridge over the river that also has a double metro rail line as well as pedestrian access. The bridge was designed by the same engineer as the Eifel Tower. The views from the top of the bridge over Porto are very good, there are so many church spires & belltowers all over the city. Portugal apparently is a very Catholic country. After we arrive back on the river bank we decide that lunch is in order, Sancho Panza restaurant is next door & Chad recommended it so we decide on it.

We get a seat on the 1^st floor at the front overlooking the river, a great view. We share the specialty of the house, the Francesinha plus mussels washed down with a vino pinto (red wine). The Francesinha is a specialty food of Porto & is a cheese, bread, meat, sausage, sauce toasted sandwich that you eat with a knife & fork, absolutely delicious. The mussels are huge & also delicious.

After lunch we walk up to the Sandeman Port Cellars, founded in 1790 by a Scotsman & one of the oldest surviving port businesses in Porto. We are taken on a tour of the cellars by Monica, dressed in a black cape & a black hat, looking a lot like a female Zorro. She is very good, informative & entertaining & we learn all about the history of Sandeman, look through the port wine cellars & learn where the grapes come from & how the port wine is made. Afterwards we all have a taste of a white port & a 7 year old ruby port. Delicious. A number in our group bought wines & we all walked out happy.

A walk back to the bus in the rain & off to our hotel to check in, then afterwards we went for a walk down to look at the Cathedral nearby & the Porto railway Station. The Cathedral was built in the 12^th Century & underwent improvements & changes since. The Bishop’s Palace next door is also huge & well preserved, with great views over the river. The railway station is nearby but takes us a little while to find it, another large sandstone edifice that looks similar to a church. The inside entrance is very tall & impressive with blue tiles lining the walls with pictures on the tiles & is most unusual. The walk back uphill on the cobblestones is tiring & we get back to the hotel with only a few minutes to change for dinner.  At the door we met John from our previous trip, northern Spain, we happily exchanged a few words & hurried off to change.  When we came down we met John his partner & 2 of her sisters, we gave each other big hugs just like long lost cousins, they have been looking out for us as they knew we were in Portugal.  They are on another tour in Portugal.  On our previous tour (only 17 of us) we all became very close.  Tomorrow morning they are leaving in the opposite direction, at the same time as we are.  It will be fun, NOT, at breakfast time with over 80 people trying to serve ourselves at the breakfast bar.

Dinner is in the hotel & we sit with some others we had not talked with before, including a younger couple from Perth. Dinner was salad followed by fish with rice, then fresh fruit, plus vino tinto. Another great day.

Day 56 – 3 September 2023 – Salamanca, Spain

An early start as it is moving day, so alarm at 6.30am & on the bus by 8.30am. It is raining as we leave Madrid & the police have closed off the main road we want to travel on so our driver takes a few detours, nearly driving back past our hotel after a few kilometres. It is windy & raining all the way as we drive out of Madrid, it is early Sunday morning & there is not that much traffic.

The drive through the countryside is pleasant, however, the mountains are covered in low clouds so we don’t see much of them. There are a few ploughed fields we see as we drive along & the odd small village with a ruined castle here & there along the way. We stop at the city of Segovia for a tour of the old city. We had a tour here a couple of weeks ago but don’t mind seeing it again. The aqueduct is just as impressive & our local guide has a slightly different explanation of the city & buildings, plus he is very passionate as he is a local & that makes it a little more entertaining. After the tour we stop at a café off the Plaza Major & have lunch with another Australian couple, Castilian soup, thick slices of fresh bread & tapas with a glass of red wine. It was good.

Back on the bus & more of a drive through the countryside & stop for a comfort break outside the old city of Avila. We have a good view of the old city from a vantage point called “Los Cuatro Postes” (the four posts, we are getting good in Spanish, we could understand what the sign said). This is a small simple four posts on a granite plinth, built in 1566 on the site of a former Roman Temple. The Avila city wall is in remarkable condition & there are a few significant buildings inside that dominate the town.

On to Salamanca & the rain continues as we reach our hotel, thankfully the bus parks directly outside. We have time to check in, collect our bags & ready ourselves for the walking tour of old Salamanca with a local guide. We all have umbrellas & coats.  The rain persists for the whole tour. This is another beautiful old city with well-kept buildings. A large part of the old city consists of university & churches, as this city is the only one in Spain with two Cathedrals, butted up next to each other. Our guide is very good, explaining the history of the city, why the university buildings & churches have “Graffiti” on them, written in bull blood.

We finish the tour in the Plaza Major & she explains why the balconies & windows surrounding the square have nothing on them. She points out a few places to eat that she recommends & we find one that has some seats upstairs in a cosy room with two other Australian couples. We have a good chat, some good food, some red wine & some sangria. Tereza & I share another paella with seafood & chicken. The waiter surprised us by bringing some Limon cello to finish our meal.  It is still raining as we walk back to the hotel & we manage to find our way. Another good, though wet day.

Day 55 – 2 September 2023 – Madrid, Spain – day 4

Toledo, the ancient capital of Spain is first on the agenda today, around an hour south of Madrid. As we drive out of Madrid we stop outside the Madrid Bullfighting Stadium, Plaza de Toros, opened in 1929 & the site of bullfights in Madrid. The stadium is the largest in Spain & capable of seating more than 23,000 people. It has a Moorish design & has ceramic tiles decorating the exterior. It is a large & imposing building. Our local guide points out other places of interest as we drive through the old part of Madrid, located on the highest hill around. We pass many beautiful old buildings & he explains what some of them are & a little of the history.

Before getting to old Toledo the bus stops for a comfort break, but as there are no (or very few) public rest rooms you have to go into cafes/restaurants etc. This time it was an old original jewellery & sword manufacturing place where they explained how they make the exquisite Spanish & Moorish jewellery & of course the toilets are downstairs where they have a big room displaying swords & jewellery to tempt tourists to part with their cash.  Ron decided that Tereza deserved a nice souvenir.  The toilets were nice & clean too.

Toledo is an old hill fort, (luckily they have several escalators to take people up into the old city) originally a Celtic settlement then the Romans invaded & built a fortress on the hill surrounded on three sides by the river. Later invaded by the Visigoths, then the Moors, then the Christians. It has had a very troubled past & the architecture of the city reflects all of these cultures in the buildings inside the city walls. These days the city outside the walls is significantly larger than inside. Toledo was the old Spanish capital for hundreds of years before one of the monarchs decided to move the capital to Madrid. The Cathedral in Toledo is the largest in Spain as Toledo was the capital & it had the largest Cathedral.

We drive through the new city of Toledo along the Tagus River & look at the imposing walls surrounding the old city, they are very tall & solid looking. There are some very large & imposing looking buildings that we see in the old city. We stop near the river & the ruins of one of the old stone bridges before catching a series of escalators to take us up into the old city. We are certainly glad that we didn’t have to take the stairs, there are hundreds of stairs up multiple flights. The only vehicles allowed in the old city are the cars of residents.

In Toledo we walk down narrow streets with overhanging balconies before the street opens out into a small plaza with an important building. We walk up & down hills on cobble stone streets & one majestic looking building after another. At one point we come across a group of monks walking along, we also see some nuns dressed the way they used to, in black habit & black veil head dress. There are monasteries, convents, universities, churches, municipal buildings, all stone & all very old. Plus lots of cafes & bars & shops. Then we reach the Primo Cathedral, the Primary Cathedral of all Spain, it is massive.

Inside the Primo Cathedral the centre is dominated by a huge choir stall with inbuilt organs. The decorations are ornate & the carvings are plentiful & amazing. Then we see the altar, it is massive, with the gold story display behind the simple altar dazzling with gold. Our local guide explains lots of things in the church, including that all the side chapels were financed by very wealthy people so that they could be buried inside the church. So much money. The places where the Cardinals are buried inside the church are marked by their scarlet hat hanging above the crypt. Right in the back of the church we see the most holy of the objects inside, the Monstrance, a large gold, silver & precious jewel structure that is used for important religious ceremonies, originally made around 1500.

We wandered the streets a bit more before arriving at the Plaza Major & having a bit of time for lunch. We sat & ate in the shade, then I had a gelato & we gathered again for the walk back out of Toledo & down another different set of very long escalators to get back down to the bus. Another hour back to Madrid & then Prado art museum.

Our guide this time (we had a guided tour last trip) explained things a little differently & again we enjoyed seeing the work of the Spanish masters from a slightly different perspective. Back to the hotel for a short break & a refresh.

Dinner tonight was again at the same theatre restaurant as our last tour, although this time we had the whole restaurant to ourselves. The food & drink was just as good & the entertainment was superb. We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves & the singers got the group involved with singing & dancing. It was a thoroughly enjoyable evening. Back to the hotel, shower & bed. Another great day.

Day 54 – 1 September 2023 – Madrid, Spain – day 3

Another easy morning, the Museum of Natural History doesn’t open until 10am so we took an easy stroll along the promenade a few blocks from the hotel & took a walk through the native gardens surrounding the museum. That was pleasant & afterwards we went to the ticket office to purchase our tickets for the museum entry – another pleasant surprise, zero cost as we are seniors.

The ground floor has a collection of stuffed animals, not too overwhelming, enough to be interesting in a huge area. One thing that surprised us, they had an Australian eastern grey kangaroo, echidna, Tasmanian Devil, blue tongue skink. There was also a Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger), extinct in Australia since the 1930s. It is apparently one of the few examples in a museum in the world, it is one of the Madrid Museum’s most valuable exhibits. Above the exhibition space is the giant skeleton of a fin whale, they are such a large animal. There is a great hall on the wildlife of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain & Portugal), with a focus on what is being done in the preservation of the environment & wildlife in the national parks.

The next part of the museum we need to walk out & down to the other end of this huge building. This part focuses on geology, fossils & evolution, with a great display of minerals from around the world. Nature is amazing with the variety & the colours & shapes of the various minerals found on this planet. The evolutionary story of humans is also told, with various lineages of the Homo species, from just past the apes all the way through to homo sapiens. That was very interesting, we are not that far removed from the apes. There is also a great display of dinosaur skeletons, fossils & parts of dinosaurs. Some of the full scale dinosaurs are very scary, they are huge. The teeth & jaws are enormous. On the upper level they have exhibition about space & space craft, very well done. An amazing museum, well worth seeing.

We had a few days on our own in Madrid, a time to unwind after a full on fantastic tour.  As we have been here in Madrid before we decided to visit some fantastic museums & as a bonus 3 are walking distance from our hotel.  The museums were fantastic. They have tree lined walkways in the middle of the busy road thoroughfares, we enjoyed the shady paths to walk even when it got warm or late at night.  Little cafes/restaurants with shady umbrellas pop up along the way, we sampled some Spanish cuisine, very good.  We had a lovely relaxing time together.

At 6pm we meet with the Tour Director of our next tour & leave at 6.30pm for our welcome dinner at a restaurant near the Royal Theatre, the Opera Victoria Restaurant. We were served a very nice 3 course dinner. Our bus parks underneath the Royal Palace, all 3,418 rooms of it, then we walk up the stairs & are surprised to see a Spanish bride & groom walking along to have their photos taken in front of the palace, she looks stunning in a beautiful bridal gown. The walk to the restaurant is not that far & we sit at the table with three Americans & chat during the meal. It was very pleasant.  Amazing huge crowds were out on the streets as we headed back on the short journey to our hotel. There are thousands & thousands of people out enjoying Friday night in Madrid. We are always amazed how many people are out eating lunch in those little street cafes (around 3 pm) then everything quietens down, even a lot of the shops close for fiesta time.  It starts to get busy again around 6 pm & once again the little outside cafes become busy by people socialising over drinks.  Don’t expect dinner until after 8 pm unless you are with a bus load of tourists.  Another good day.

Day 52 – 30 August 2023 – Madrid, Spain

A sleep in this morning, we are not out for breakfast until 8.30am & afterwards I had to catch up with some paying bills (bills don’t go on holidays unfortunately) & the like plus some sorting out of what we are doing next. Afterwards we walked around 200 metres to the nearby Museo Lazaro Galdiano.

The museum is in the former mansion of Lazaro Galdiano, a former very successful magazine & newspaper publisher in Spain.  He built the mansion in 1903 & collected exceptional works of art & fine objects worthy of any national museum. He left it all to the nation upon his death in 1947.

One of the first items I liked was an exquisite bronze cat head water jug made in the 6^th century BC. This amazing house is filled with extraordinary high quality paintings from Spanish, English, Italian, Greek, German & Dutch masters. The painting of a young Jesus by Leonardo Da Vinci is exquisite. Some of the ceilings are adorned with art. The collection of fine art & objects is large, with all the display cases having large drawers underneath full of more of similar style objects. The collection is extraordinary & Tereza & I were kicked out at the 3pm closing time with a whole floor & more yet to see. If you are ever in Madrid, make the time to see this museum, it is far better than the Prada Museum.

After we were kicked out we all of a sudden felt hungry, so we stopped at the nearby Café Lamucca de Serrano for a late lunch. I had a very tasty black dough pizza with Spanish sausage, cheese & tomato with honey & walnuts. Tereza opted for the crispy chicken burger (she isn’t very adventurist), also very tasty & all more than we needed to eat. Washed down with a 3 Euro beer, what more could we want. It is amazing here, people have siesta around 3 to 6 when things open again.  There are no places to get lunch until about 3 & around 6 people sit in cafes, bars for drinks & there is no dinner until about 8. Back to the hotel as it is siesta time & everything closes for the afternoon.  Their siesta is understandable, it gets hot here.  We are starting to get accustomed to the Spanish way, at the hotel we first checked emails & started to read & we had an afternoon sleep.

After our siesta, the time is 8 pm & still light, temperature cooled down to 24C & 32 percent humidity, time for our walk on the beautiful tree lined boulevard, ah, delightful. Back at the hotel neither of us feel hungry, so we will give dinner a miss.  Another wonderful day.

Day 51 – 29 August 2023 – Barcelona to Madrid, Spain

An early start this morning as our tour group disperses with the four winds. We depart at 8.30am.  First stop at Barcelona Airport to drop off some travellers flying out home or other adventures plus Sonia & Norberto to fly home to Portugal. There are six of us that stay on the bus for the trip to Madrid with our new driver Antonio. The sun is out & the temperature slowly increases to 28C as we travel. There is not that much traffic & the roads are good, it is dual lane divided road all the way.

The scenery is mostly very dry & desert like, with the occasional green farming areas around the odd river. Most of the towns we pass are small, always with a church spire or two. There are monasteries or ruined castles on some of the hills. Closer to Madrid we drive through some large mountain ranges, but these are also mostly dry. We stop for lunch at a fuel station & cafeteria out in the middle of nowhere, we had toasted roll with tomato & Iberican ham, it was very tasty. We also had breaks for morning & afternoon tea at similar small roadside stops.

Barcelona to Madrid is around 630 kilometres & we got dropped off at our hotel at around 5.30pm, so it was 9 hours of travelling all up. After checking in & settling in to our room, a very nice 5 star hotel, we went for a short walk. Our hotel is not far from the one we stayed in last time we were in Madrid so we are familiar with the area. It is an embassy boulevard, we see beautiful big buildings with flags, security cameras on high walls & police outside guarding. The walk was very pleasant & we strolled along a leafy boulevard admiring some of the stately homes & buildings. It is light until late in Madrid & we got back around 9pm. A long, tiring, but good day.

Day 50 – 28 August 2023 – Barcelona, Spain

A lazy late start this morning, our wake-up call was at 8.30 am & on the bus at 10 am for the drive into the centre of Barcelona & la Sagrada Familia, designed by Antoni Gaudi the famed Spanish architect. The Sagrada Familia was commenced in 1882 & has been under construction ever since, it is still unfinished. This church is now a Basilica after being consecrated by the Pope. The building of it is not funded by the government or the Vatican, but by the people, the congregation is getting less but the tourists are getting to be more & more so the tourists are the people funding it. It is an absolutely amazing building & the architecture is way before its time. This building is visually stunning from the outside. Our local guide explains to us the details regarding the stage the church is at & what it needs to be completed.

There are thousands of people outside waiting to go in, we have our tickets & entrance time already booked so we are first in the line. We move in through the security, as thorough as most airports, then stand on the portico of the side entrance. The attention to detail is amazing. Our guide now shows us a model of the church, with the completed parts in grey & the uncompleted parts in beige. There is still a lot to finish. Given that it has taken 130 years to get this far, who knows when it will be completed. Next she explains all the nuances of the statues, the order they are in & the importance of them in the story of Jesus, all very interesting. The doors are covered in ivy leaves with beetles & spiders amongst the leaves.

Inside is another level again, it is a sensory overload. The vaulted ceilings & the support structures are stunning, we stand there open-mouthed in awe trying to take it all in. Then we look at the walls, the stained glass windows on either side are an explosion of colour, they are extraordinary. Each way we look we see another part of the building we are amazed at. Our local guide does a fabulous job of explaining the inside structure as well & the meaning of the different symbols & the reasons why some parts are the way they are. The altar piece looks unlike any we have seen in any church previously, it looks a little like a large parachute.

We walk out the side exit, the main entrance has not been built yet, the sculptures on this side of the church are different again, in a different style of shaping. The body & features are all very angular with the sculptures depicting the death of Jesus. We again marvel at the architecture of Gaudi, with his site office plus a school he built on this side of the church.

At the front of the church there is some controversy as some old apartment buildings are to be demolished so that the front can be extended for 200 metres. Some of the apartment owners want to stay in the building they are living in.

The church tour over we are back in the bus & have a look at some other buildings in Barcelona that Gaudi designed. These buildings are amazing pieces of architecture as well, he was an extremely talented man.

We get dropped off by the bus at the main square in Barcelona & walk down the La Rambla promenade to the harbour area. There are thousands of people crowding the street going in all directions. As we get closer to the harbour they start to lessen in numbers & when we turn to the Maritime Museum there is hardly anyone. The Maritime Museum is in part of an old shipbuilding yard that was building ships in the 1300s. A 1563 drawing of the city shows theses large stone buildings next to the city walls. The museum is nearly empty, we have it nearly all to ourselves.

The centrepiece of the museum is a replica of the King’s Galley that was built in these shipyards in the 1500s. It is a huge boat, 60 metres longs & over 6 metres wide with space for 236 men (slaves mainly) to row with 5 men to each oar, plus room for soldiers & sailors. There is a good layout in the museum with a good spread of maritime history with all explanations in English as well. We enjoyed all of the displays.

Afterwards we walked down to the boat harbour, saw where the America’s Cup boats are training from for the competition next year & marvelled at the sheer quantity of sailing boats at dock in the harbour. We walked over a large footbridge that is under repair, the underlying support timbers are rotting & are being replaced. The bridge splits open to allow sailboats to pass through into the docks & we watched as the pedestrians hurried to cross & the bridge was swung open. It did not take long for the bridge to open fully, then closed just as quickly afterwards after the sailing boat went through.

We walked to the Basilica de la Merce nearby through a narrow alleyway to get to the large square in front of the church. The church was temporarily closed so we sat in the shade for a while & rested our legs. The walk back to a taxi rank was not far, it was just next to the large column built in 1888 called Mirador de Colum, which is a tribute to Italian explorer Christopher Columbus, the sea captain attributed with discovering the Americas.

A taxi dropped us back at the hotel at 5 pm & we had time for a shower, as the walk was fairly hot & tiring, a little rest, then off on our bus for the farewell dinner. The dinner is at Dolca Herminia, a restaurant in downtown Barcelona & we have a delicious 3 course dinner, again too much to eat, washed down with a sangria for Tereza & a red wine for me. We had a great time chatting with our fellow travelers before it was 10 pm & back to the hotel. Inside the bus it was merry, loud music, singing & the bus driver flashed the inside lights to the tune.  At the hotel we had a farewell photo with the group & saying our good byes.  Thanks to Sonia our tour leader we all became a close knit group. Another 8.5 kilometres of walking & another very good day.

Day 49 – 27 August 2023 – San Sebastian to Barcelona, Spain

An early start as we have a long distance to travel today to Barcelona. The rain was heavy last night & thankfully has eased a little for us to board the bus. We drive through the tall mountains of the Pyrenees with deep valleys & small towns & farms tucked away in them. The vegetation is lush & everything is so green, it is still raining as we drive through the mountains & as we drive down towards Pamplona there are less mountains & it looks so dry.

Pamplona has a large light industrial area as we drive in & the traffic is very light, it is Sunday & it is early. We stop in the old town area near a very impressive group statue of men & bulls running together, most of the men are on the ground getting trampled. It is not the time for the bull runs, that is in July each year. The Bullring in Pamplona is very large & there is a concrete chute that guides the bulls into the bullring from the street. We walk the length of the bull run, it is 800 metres long & follows some of the streets in the old town. The streets are narrow & it is easy to understand how so many people get injured each year. Sonia, our guide, tells us that balcony windows overlooking the street of the bull run are rented for 200 Euros per day.

The rain is light, we hardly need our umbrellas, there is hardly a person around as we walk the deserted streets of the bull run. The Pamplona Town Hall is the square where the bulls are released from & it takes the bulls a little over 2 minutes to run the 800 metres. We walk a little further to the main town square, on one corner is Hotel La Perla where the writer Ernest Hemingway stayed in the early 1900s. A little further on is Café Iruna, a beautiful old café that was also frequented by Ernest Hemingway. Inside is absolutely beautiful, old charm, stepping into Agatha Christie’s stories, with mirrors on the walls & wonderful ornate decorations, so we sit down & order hot chocolate & coffee. Really good coffee & chocolate like it really originally used to be made.  The atmosphere is amazing & in the bar next door is a life-size bronze statue of Hemingway standing at the bar.

Back on the bus & the weather starts to clear as we travel through the dry plains of central Spain. The wind is now really strong & we feel the bus shake as it gets hit by very strong wind gusts. There are hundreds & hundreds of wind turbines as we travel, we turn our head & there are even more wind turbines. There is also the occasional solar panel farm. We stop for lunch at a roadhouse, it is absolutely packed as Europeans are travelling back home from school holidays after spending time in Spain or Portugal. The range of food is fairly broad & we order a seafood paella, yum.

The land gets dryer & flatter the closer we get to Barcelona, then it starts to rain again. There is not that much traffic as we drive into the big city of Barcelona & check in to our hotel. There is time for a short rest before we are back on the bus for the drive to the Guell Park on the inland mountain side of Barcelona. This park was designed & built by Antoni Gaudi, an absolutely amazing Spanish architect. Our local guide walks us around the park in the rain, explaining all of the facets of the park that Gaudi built into the design & why he did it that way. After seeing all this & the reasons for the design, I now understand why so many consider him as a brilliant designer. In the distance we see the towering spires of the church he designed.

Back to the hotel for a little while then at 6 pm we are taken down to the harbour for dinner at the Marina Bay Restaurant. We order seafood paella again & what a feast it is, prawns, mussel, squid, langoustines, all delicious. Plus a glass of red wine for me & a Sangria for Tereza. Before we know it is 10 pm & back to the hotel. A long & tiring, but good day.

Day 48 – 26 August 2023 – San Sebastian, Spain day 2

Another delicious breakfast this morning, the food is really good again with another great selection. We are on the road by 9am as we are crossing the border into France this morning & we need to beat the traffic of people from all over Europe returning back home after their holidays in Spain & Portugal. School holidays are ending.

We cross the border with no hassles other than the bus having to pay the road toll, there is no traffic backlog & we drive through to Biarritz in France. Our first stop is a lighthouse where we get a great view looking back over Biarritz beach & the city itself. Our local guide, a Basque person from San Sebastian, tells us that the normal population of Biarritz is 30,000 & it swells to 90,000 during summer school holidays. There are large apartment buildings overlooking the beach the full length. The style of houses in France is different than that of Spain, with different designs, different window quantity & shapes & different colours.

Next stop is the main street of Biarritz & our guide takes us for a walk around explaining some of the different notable buildings & the real estate prices are eye-watering. He points out Maison Adam, the shop where the macaron was originally created & it is doing a roaring trade with a line up out the door. Le Bellevue is a former casino built in 1858 & is now an up-market motel, it has a great location overlooking the Biarritz beachfront. Another shop that catches my eye is called 1001 Fromages, a cheese shop with the most amazing variety of cheeses.

Our guide then takes us through the Biarritz Market, there is a great selection of fruits, vegetables, meats, cheeses & seafood. The seafood is more expensive than we are used to, for example, large prawns are 70 Euros per kilo (around 100 Australian dollars), in Australia they are around $30 per kilo. A little more walking around on or own before finding our way back to the bus meeting place for the drive to the nearby Saint Jean-de-Luz.

Saint Jean-de-Luz has different architecture again & a different streetscape & seems a little more vibrant as it is more crowded. Our guide takes us into a church where a former king & queen of France were married in 1660, Louis XIV & Marie Therese. The church is very nice inside, another variation, however, this one has tiered wooden balconies on three sides to fit more people in. We get guided around a few more streets with more interesting things explained before we are given a couple of hours to have lunch & explore on our own.

I had spotted someone having a pot of mussels earlier so we go back there & manage to get a table inside, everyone prefers to sit outside in summer. We order a pot of mussels, grilled squid with salad & a glass of red wine once we get past the language barriers. Tereza & I shared the meal, absolutely delicious & reasonably priced. The building is really old & the ceiling has exposed beams, the restaurant is called Le Fandango Brasserie.

We explore on our own a little more after lunch, look at the fishing boat harbour, walk out to the river mouth & look at the paintings displayed by artists in one of the squares, some of the artists are very good. We then meet up with the rest of the group & walk back to the bus together, we come across a bride just walking into the church to get married followed by four cute little bridesmaids.

Back to San Sebastian & we settle into our room again, I have a little snooze as it is raining outside, then after the rain stops we go for a walk. Just down the hill from our hotel is a former Queens’ summer palace, it is only about 600 metres away & is a very pleasant walk. The palace commands a great view over San Sebastian & the bay, now the palace is owned by the local government & used for other purposes. We read the story boards about the history & construction, it is very interesting.

As we get back to the hotel there is a crowd of cameras & media waiting for someone. Two black cars pull up & people get out, we don’t know who they are. The young man stops & chats briefly to the media whilst posing for photos. The media scrum moves inside the hotel foyer & we ask who he is. A soccer player that has transferred from England club Arsenal to a Spanish club. Don’t know his name. We walked a little over 6 kilometres today, another great day.