Considering Bugs and Elmer

 

Surely there are a lifetime’s worth of more things to still feast on here in Seville.   But there is also enough time for randomness built into this trip to allow for some spontaneity. Page 689 of the Lonely Planet Spain suggested a rather unique way of getting from where we were in Seville to where we were heading in Ronda: “Driving Tour White Towns.”  A straight-line heads out from Arcos de Frontera on their map and squiggles about after you get into the green coloring of the sierra and the Parque National Los Alcornocales, and though the whole trip would be longer than we’d have time for we could jump off the path half way at Grazalema and make our way straight down to Ronda and Mijas where we were to spend the night. 

 

Before we left Seville our Airbnb host had left instructions for us to make sure we took out the garbage with instructions on how to do so.  I told the kids they had an hour before we needed to leave and schlepped down the four flights of stairs when the elevator wouldn’t come and found a trash bin immediately outside which I decided would do just fine.  Up the street, towards the Cathedral, I’d noticed a wine shop and bought myself a bottle of my new favorite Tio Pepe and some whites from Galicia from a nice lady who ran the place.  

 

The elevator wouldn’t come when I returned either and as I plodded painfully up the steps, I stuck my head in the third floor apartment where it appeared they had commandeered the elevator, explaining that I’d be needing it soon to lug bags down. “Ahh but you see its broken” he explained.   They guy’d be here to fix it in an hour.  My kids and the one fifty-pound bag they have between them were ready and I commenced the lug.  The workman below gallantly offered to help but I could manage.  On the drive out of town I felt obliged to play “The Barber of Seville” and considered that I would alas, never be able to listen to this without considering Bugs and Elmer. 

 

El Bosque and Ubrique were both beautiful, but though I tried I couldn’t find anywhere to park and made them both drive by’s.  The ride up and hour of Brique was lovely, with hard granite rock cliffs, sparse greenery and traffic signs that warned we should be careful in snow.   In Grazalemus I vowed to park somewhere found a public lot just above the idyllic town square.  All along the walk down to the outdoor café I identified one after another new plants, some of which, like the Marvel of Peru and the Peruvian Peppertree spoke to the seeds that must have been brought back home from elsewhere in the former empire.   

The descent to the sea was dramatic.  Coste Del Sol was all rather built up , looking like an aspirational Shenzhen.  We were late when we arrived in Mijas but were fortunate to have a rather gracious, if loquacious host who booked us a reservation for dinner at a place down, not far on the beach. Later, when we were seated he and his family walked by, to make sure we were all set.  

Friday, 8/20/21

Grateful That She Hadn't

Late, again.  Stressed, unnecessarily, again.  I tried to let them ladies all sleep late.  I took a call with Tokyo and Tel Aviv and procured tickets for the Cathedral for 11:40AM.  We strolled up shortly after noon time and walked inside without a problem.  I must have missed the papal bull on this one but aren’t Cathedrals supposed to be free?  You don’t pay to go in Notre Dame or York Minster.  In Seville, like Toledo, you pay.  We climbed the tower to the thirty-fourth floor, first thing while the girls were still fresh and considered the city, the bull ring, the orange grove and what we reckoned must have been our apartment among the rooftops below.  Above us, only bells.  Checking the time I was glad to see it 12:33 when presumably nothing would be ringing any time soon. 

A towering altar of gold, what must have been a twenty-foot tall monstrance of pure silver.  How much of this was all taken from the Aztecs and the Incas, and Potosi and shipped across the Atlantic to here?   I reminded my gals that their grand mom had visited this place when she was their age and was considering whether or not she should become a nun.  Three of our group certainly grateful that she hadn’t.  Similar thoughts of gratitude for the work of Christopher Columbus to whom all the New Worlders owed something of our complicated existence.  Chris has a strange tomb that seemed to be held aloft to the side of the nave but it was, we ultimately surmised, an ornament, rather then he himself riding to-be-buried along above the faux pall bearers.  Still, the overall effect of the enormous cathedral was mesmerizing. 

The Alcazar, like the Mezquita is light and contemplative after the weight of the Catholic iconography.  Patterns of tiles on the wall. Patterns in the ceiling and each combination of shapes and colors slightly different.  Shapes of rooms that lead you on, mysteriously, rather than the obvious cross of must churches.  My wife and I took some photos in one room and another and eventually wondered just where it was our kids were by the time we came to the entrance of the Dame’s Garden.  We tried them on the phone.  Tried them on wechat.  I second guessed whether or not I’d actually seen them enter the building.  I had.  They came out of the garden, terrified at the thought that we hadn’t yet enter and still needed time for it.  We made it quick and, with the little one now complaining of a raging headache, I resisted the urge to identify all the plants I was seeing and we made our way out and over towards a nearby place for lunch. 

 

That evening we found that many of the recommended restaurants were closed for August but we found a notable one up in the Macarena that welcomed us in.  We took a cab up to the Macarena neighborhood and passed the lovely façade of that church.  After so much tapas, it was good to sample distinct meals of food which we ordered way too much of, as usual.  Our waiter was from Argentina and after realizing I could ask not only for “dry” white but “mineral-amente” and he served us something from Galicia which was perfect.  The walk home was quicker than we figured and I was off to bed not long after heading up the steps. 

 

 

 

Thursday 8/19/21