Day 7 - 9 May, 2006: Seville

We got terribly lost this morning just trying to get into the center of town to find a parking space. We got caught up behind a delivery truck in the narrow warren of single lane roads/alleys in the old part of Seville. It was a nightmare. After much consternation and not a small amount of back-seat driving, we were finally able to get back out onto a main street and find our way to the same parking lot that we found on Sunday.

Today we saw our first good example of the Moorish influence on southern Spain. The Alcazar was enormous, with an equally enormous walled garden with all sorts of different flora. The stone carvings were very intricately made and had a likeness to Arabic script. Honestly, all of the carvings and geometric abstract frescoes were a little over the top for my taste, but then I'm not a 13th century Moorish aristocrat, either.

One of the other main historical sites in Seville is the Cathedral; reportedly the largest Gothic building in Europe. It was a beautiful building; not unlike the other Gothic cathedrals and churches we've seen in our travels. The stone work and stained glass was exquisite. The wood carvings on the choir and clergy pews was amazing; each pew having a different "character" carved into the armrest. The must be having some issues with structural aging, since several of the giant pillars had some sort of reinforcing collars attached to their bases.

After the history lessons, we went in search of the Barrio Santa Cruz (Seville's Jewish Quarter) and some lunch and shopping. We had a nice lunch at an outdoor cafe; and proceeded to peek into most every ceramic shop there. The girls knew they wanted to buy something, they just couldn't decide what. There were many different styles of pottery; some classically Andalusian; some much more modern. Ultimately, Angela decided on a couple of bowls. It was during this time that we saw several flyers for various Flamenco shows around town. Since Seville is renowned for its Flamenco dancers, we called one and made reservations for the 9:30 show. That would give us some time to have a nice leisurely dinner beforehand.

We had an awesome dinner of paella (what else) and sangria at a restaurant that had a great outdoor seating section on a small plaza in the Jewish Quarter.

I gotta say; I don't really like Flamenco. To me, it's just a bunch of foot-stomping and finger-clapping. The vocals for the music sounded like some sort of bird dying. We were under strict instructions from the proprietor to not take any photos until the final dance, but this one guy with an SLR camera and a very long telephoto lens decided to get a little shutter-happy about half-way through the show. This wouldn't have been a huge deal, except the flash he was using lit up the small room like the sun. I literally watched the dancer stumble and get disoriented. The 2nd to last dance was a dude. He looked a little like a cross between Will Ferrell and Tim Robins. He was dressed completely in black; black pants, black shirt, black sportcoat. During the course of his dance, he started sweating profusely. I had a real hard time not laughing. At one point during his dance, he took off his jacket, and I swear I thought he was going to twirl it around and throw it into the crowd "stripper" style. Suffice it to say that I could have just gone back to Carmona after dinner and been no worse for wear.

Day 6 - 8 May, 2006: Carmona

Somewhere along the road from Puerto Lumbreras to Ceuta, we gave our trusty steed, Patsy, a pretty good boo-boo. We put a pretty hefty gouge in her right-front fender. Don't really know when or where, or who was driving, but it was a doosy. Anyway, we noticed a pretty big Renault dealership in Seville, so we were going to try to get some touch-up paint to make an attempt at fooling the Hertz people when we returned her.

If felt real good to sleep in this morning. We all met up around 10 or so for breakfast. Honestly, it feels like our vacation is finally getting started. Even after 4 days in Spain; it's just been so hectic that to be able to unpack and just take it easy is really nice.

After a quick jaunt into the outskirts of Seville to the Renault dealership, and after coming up empty on the touch-up paint idea, we decided to go back to Carmona and see what it had to offer. See, most museums in Seville are closed on Mondays, so to spend today in Seville would have been less than productive.

Back in Carmona, we hit the terrace of the parador for a wonderful lunch consisting of huge queen olives, some ham and cheese sandwiches and some ice cold cervesas and sangria. After lunch we headed out for our exploration. The timing couldn't have been worse. Damn those Spaniards and their siestas! The little town of Carmona, at least the historic part, was beautiful. There were huge fortified gates at the base of the hill on which the old town was built and at the other end of the town below our parador.

It was so hot today; at least 90 with absolutely no shade. It was kind of funny really; we would walk down the street on whichever side had the most shade, and when the shade changed we would all switch sides.

The women-folk found some nice looking shops; but of course they were closed for their siestas; somewhere to go after dinner. Speaking of dinner, when we drove into town last night, Adam noticed a place that was the namesake of one of his favorite Mexican places in Atlanta, El Potro. It was our first taste of "locals only" Spanish fare; and our first exposure to the classic spanish dish, Paella. Until I almost ate the shrimp head, it was fantastic. Even after the near-head experience, it was delicious.

Today was a wonderfully relaxed day. Tomorrow will be a little less so, since we're going back into Seville to tour the Alcazar, the Barrio Santa Cruz, and the Cathedral.

Day 5 - 7 May, 2006: Seville

Today was so much easier. We woke up around 9 or so, met in the lobby of our parador in Ceuta, and had a nice breakfast at a cafe on the main street of Ceuta. The town was, in fact, lovely, just as we suspected last night. We had to make an 11:30am ferry back to Europe, so we called a couple cabs, loaded up, and got down to the ferry terminal.

Once back on the European mainland, we found Patsy safe and sound right where we left her. Loading up this time was much simpler, since we already knew how to put the luggage puzzle back together. The drive up to Seville was very easy. We went up past Jerez de la Frontera, stopped for gas and got a quick update on the F1 European Grand Prix at the Nurburgring, and got to Seville by 2:30 or so. Since we're not actually staying in Seville, but rather a small town outside called Carmona, we drove into the center of the town and found a parking spot in a public garage. Adam and Carlisle picked up the tickets for the bullfight later that evening. Fortunately, they were able to get seats in the shade. It was brutally hot.

After securing the tickets to the bullfight, we decided to do the hop-on/hop-off bus tour of the city. We're going to be here for a couple days; so we figured it would be a good way to get our bearings of the city. Got to tell ya, besides the historic part of the town that surrounds the cathedral and Alcazar, Seville really isn't that much to write home about. The bus tour wound through the site of a World Expo that looked like some sort of event occurred that forced everyone there to leave all of a sudden. It was very "Mad Max" or something.

After the bus tour, we just found a bar outside where we could people watch, have some Sangria, and hang out until the bullfight. As the time for the fight drew closer, the crowd around the bullring grew and grew. I felt like I was at the Kentucky Derby; with all the men in their linen and seersucker suits, and the women with their big hats. These are quite the social events, apparently.

The bullring was very crowded. The "seats" were barely big enough for a 10 year old to fit in, so we felt packed in there like sardines. Now, I don't really know anything about the history of bullfighting or anything, but the pageantry was incredible. The matadores in there costumes, dancing with the bull in very well choreographed steps; the horseman with his spear; the final "deathblow." It was all very impressive. Carlisle had to leave before the first bull was finished. I noticed a couple other tourists get up and leave, too.

The fight ended, and since we had a short drive to Carmona, we didn't bother to hang around afterwards. Carmona is a small town about 12 miles from Seville. As we approached the town and wound around the small streets, following the signs to our parador, we realized that we should maybe spend some time there tomorrow. By the time we got to the highest point of the town, we finally saw our parador. We were stunned. The parking lot was in the courtyard of a restored fortress; dating to the 13th century. It was unreal. The whole complex was stunning. There was a beautiful interior courtyard, a huge vaulted dining room, a lovely terrace overlooking the countryside.

We had dinner in the dining room. Part of the parador experience is the "adventurous" dishes cooked up in the restaurants. Last night, in Ceuta, I had stewed veal tail. Tonight, fish.

I think we've decided to sleep in tomorrow. We deserve it.

Day 4 - 6 May, 2006: Costa del Sol, Gibraltar, Ceuta

Good lord! Today was a long day.

Our plan was to drive down the Costa del Sol to Algeciras, and then hop the ferry to Ceuta, a Spanish city on the African continent. It was a good plan, to be sure.

The drive down was simply spectacular. We drove generally within site of the water the whole way, and when we got a little further south, we noticed all these plastic tarps covering acres and acres of land. After consulting the books, we learned that the tarps exist to trap the very last but of residual moisture released by the soil at night. It looked like the whole landscape was paved over. We ate breakfast in the town of Almeria, on the seawall right on the beach. It was lovely.

We made a couple of unscheduled stops as we saw unique rock formations or interesting "coves" with secluded beaches. Consequently, it was already 4pm before we got to Gibraltar. We parked in La Linea de la Concepcion, the small border town on the Spanish side, and walked into the UK. It was serendipitous that we missed the last gondola to the top of "The Rock," since we were able to hire a private van tour for just 2 euros more. After buying some peanuts to feed the Barbary Apes (they're not actually apes per se, they're really tailless monkeys), we headed out on our tour of Gibraltar. Our guide was very personable and we learned a fair bit about the history of, and current situation in Gibraltar. Our experience with the monkeys was priceless. Our guide warned against keeping the peanut bags visible, but Angela scoffed at that and within 10 seconds of getting out of the van, she was "assaulted" by a monkey who made short work of stealing the whole bag. We all got a good laugh out of that, and spent about 30 minutes or so feeding the monkeys and taking pictures from the top of the rock. The air was clear enough to see the African continent across the strait, so that was pretty cool.

We left Gibraltar around 7:30; feeling slightly concerned that we might not be able to make the last ferry from Algeciras to Ceuta. Now, Algeciras is just across the bay from Gibraltar, so it didn't take any time to get there.

Until we got to the ferry terminal, there really hadn't been any drama today, unless you consider the monkey that climbed up onto Carlisle's head, or the hot, topless sunbather we saw on the way down. Turns out I grossly underestimated the price of the ferry ride, so we huddled while we considered our options. We ended up completely unpacking Patsy and leaving her in the lighted parking lot at the ferry terminal. That was fun; muscling all of our luggage up the gangway and onto the ferry. It was 11:30 before we checked into our parador in Ceuta, and we barely made it in time for dinner. Ultimately, we decided to spend the morning in Ceuta, partially to be able to get _some_ sleep tonight, and partially because Ceuta looks like a pretty cool town.

Now, Angela really wants to see a Bull Fight in Seville tomorrow (they only have them on Sundays), so I had to take our cell phone down to the front desk and have the receptionist listen to message at the ticket center to tell us the details of tomorrow's fights. Tickets go on sale at 10am, and the fight is at 7:30 at the "Maestranza" bullring.

Like I said; it's been a very long day.

Day 3 - May 5, 2006: Valencia, Puerto Lumbreras

Man, getting to Valencia last night was a cast iron bitch. We were half an hour late landing in Barcelona; it took 25 minutes to get our luggage; and then we had to figure out the rental car situation. Adam and Carlisle were waiting for us by the Hertz counter when we emerged from baggage claim. I was slightly relieved, since my phone wasn't working as I expected it to.

I had originally reserved an Opel Astra wagon, but when the guy behind the counter saw all of our luggage, he very plainly said that there wouldn't be enough room in the car for our luggage. He happily upgraded us to a Renault Espace, which would accomodate our luggage with no problems. The car was really nice albeit underpowered; a 1.9L diesel with a 6speed manual tranny. It had 3 rows of captain's chair type seats that could be arranged in a multitude of different ways. Since we were only 4 people, we didn't need that last row, but the Hertz people wouldn't allow us to leave the back 2 seats with them. Consequently it was like solving some bizarre 3-D puzzle designed by M.C. Escher getting all of our bags into the car. It took an hour. and we had no visibility out of the rear window. Oh, and it was raining, too.

Anyway, we made our way to the Autopista and headed down to Valencia. It took forever to get to Valencia, and by the time we got there and found our hotel, it was 11:30pm. Talk about a long day. We checked into the hotel, found a gyro (Donners in Europe) place still open and were able to get something to eat.

It was agreed that we would sleep in this morning, since we only had to get to Puerto Lumbreras sometime today. I wanted to see the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias, since that's where BMW does a bunch of their press photo shoots for their new models. It looks awesome in the PR photos, and I wanted to see it for myself.

Our first task was to get the Espace (named "Patsy") out of the garage. That was quite a challenge. It took an hour to extricate Patsy from her stall, and the only one able to get her out was Angela. We discovered that Patsy really didn't have quite enough torque to get up the ramp, so we had to give her a running start.

Parking at the "Ciutat" wasn't nearly as challenging, since we parked in a garage for the main shopping mall where the spots were almost as big as back in the USA. The Ciutat itself was amazing. The architecture was simply astounding. You just don't see buildings like that in the states.

After a quick bite to eat in the food court, we got underway. Initially, we took "B" roads, but became evident that it would take us quite a while to get there that way, so we just hopped on the Autopista and rolled in to our Parador in Puerto Lumbreras around 6:30 or so. It's not one of the historic Paradors, but it's nice nonetheless. We ate dinner in the hotel restaurant, since the Parador restaurants are supposed to be very good. This one didn't disappoint.

As a whole, Puerto Lumbreras is nothing to write home about. Of course, it was never intended as anything more than a place to stay while we drove down to Andalusia. There's a supermarket right across the street from the hotel, so we're going to get some breakfast food (read: chocolate croissants) there in the morning and have breakfast on the road to Ceuta.

Day 2 - May 4, 2006: London

Man, the London Eye was cool. It's a giant ferris wheel right on the Thames River with amazing 360 degree views of London. It was very warm today; with bright sunshine and not too much haze, so the views were pretty amazing. We missed our first appointment, thanks to the London traffic. We took a cab from Victoria Station to the Eye, but we probably should have just taken the "Tube."

The flight over was nice; we had the whole row of 3 seats to ourselves, so Angela could stretch out a bit. The Ambien that dad gave us allowed me to get a solid 4 hours of sleep, which is more than I've ever gotten on an international flight.

We're waiting for our flight to Barcelona, from where we will pick up our car and immediately head to Valencia.

Day 1 - May 3, 2006: Departure

We're leaving for our 2006 European Vacation today. Angela bribed me with tickets to the Formula 1 GP to go to Spain this year. I wanted Ireland, but F1 doesn't go to Ireland, so Spain it is. We're travelling with another couple (my good buddy Adam and his wife Carlisle) for the first time, and we're very excited about having another couple with whom to share the experience. It will be wonderful to have someone to talk to at dinner, and I'm going to enjoy having someone to help split the driving chores.

Our itinerary takes us to Barcelona by way of a 7 hour layover in London (we're gonna do the London Eye). We'll rent a car in Barcelona and drive to Valencia, Puerto Lumbreras (just a waypoint), Ceuta (a Spanish city on the African continent), Seville (actually Carmona, just outside of Seville), Granada, Alarcon, then back to Barcelona for 4 days. It's an ambitious itinerary, but we will certainly see alot of Spain on the trip.