Nice places

A Walk at Lunchtime

~ Kate Wilson ~ 8 Comments

 

The problem with going out dancing tango at night is that the following morning I don’t feel like getting up before 10am (or later). By the time I am finally out on the streets I am often met with this……or thisOn Wednesday I set off to buy speakers for the computer and headed for Ronda St Antoni as it has a long run of electrical shops. (One thing I love about Barcelona, and actually other European cities too, is that shops of the same sort congregate together so you can easily browse without having to go too far) On this day I was met with the usual crashing down of persianas which signals at least two hours when I can’t get on with shopping. After 6 months here I am still always caught out.
I set off to walk down to the Maritim Museum to meet a friend for lunch – lunch here generally starting around 2.30 or 3.00pm.
Here are some of the sights on my route.
The Mercat Sant Antoni is one of several large steel skeleton markets in Barcelona. Until recently it was still open with fresh food and clothes and books and stamps and virtually everything you can want to buy, but it is now being refurbished.
There is a temporary replacement which sits in the centre of a now pedestrianised road opposite the original. Across the street by the metro entrance is a cafe called Els Tres Tombs which I have only now found out has nothing to do with Tombs but is named after the ritual which takes place on Sant Antoni’s day January 17th. Sant Antoni is the patron saint of animals – farm and domestic – and there are many festivals to celebrate this including a very famous one on Mallorca. The Tres Tombs signify Three Turns where animals – often horses – are taken around the streets to be appreciated and blessed. Other smaller animals are taken to church.

I then walked down Sant Antoni Abat and found these signs – I still am looking for the meaning of the red horse which appears all over the Ciudad VellaOn an old stone wall there were carvings of lions and this head- Sant Antoni himself?After I turned onto the Rambla de Raval I noticed yet again how much this part of the city is changing. A wide road has been created after knocking down some slums and the central part which is free from traffic is a relaxed place to stroll. Allthough the Rambla de Raval still carries a whiff of seediness there is also a tall hotel rising onto the skyline and a feeling of a place in transition where at the moment two worlds meet – the tourists are coming, new bars opening, people feed the pidgeons and read in the sunshine and women work on the streets.
Fernando Botero’s cat confidently stalks up the centre of the Rambla.

Bon Any 2010

~ Kate Wilson ~ 4 Comments

 

Because I am not in the UK I am not sure what ‘we’ are calling this new year.

Is it Two Thousand and Ten or Twenty Ten or just Ten?

I heard that some people here are calling it Any Deu – ‘year ten’ in Catalan but generally it is Dos Mil Deu. When deu is accented – ‘Déu’- it is the word for god but my ear still can’t tell the difference except when I hear Adéu (goodbye) and the vowel sound is often very long.
I brought in the new year on the Costa Brava in a beautiful place called Port de la SelvaWe drove there one morning without anywhere booked to stay which felt very much more the Catalan way than the British one! In Cornwall this would result in a very stressful search for a room at one of the years busiest times. But the Costa Brava is a summer destination so we easily found a small apartment overlooking the harbour with the mountains in the distance and again amazingly there was no problem about the presence of one DogThe first morning there was a very small market with fruit, vegetables and lots of pork! Also CDs and I bought one by Joan Manuel Serrat who is a Catalan singer-songwriter. In 1968 Spain entered him in the Eurovision Song Contest but later withdrew him when he asked to sing in his native Catalan. This was during the Franco years when the Catalan language was repressed by the dictatorship. Serrat’s records were then banned.
It is a short drive across the border to France or Catalunya Nord as it is also called as it was historically a part of Catalunya. We stopped to eat crepes in Colliure a beautiful medieval town which has attracted many artists such as Picasso, Matisse, Braque and the British writer Patrick O’Brian (Master and Commander) who lived here for many years.Another day we walked up to the Benedictine monastery Sant Pere de Rodes which nestles on the hillside. Its origins date from the 1st century and it used to be a centre of political power..It is very windy at Cap de Creus and any shelter is welcomeThe area is often blasted by a north wind called Tramuntana(beyond mountains) and although I don’t think it was blowing that day it was still almost unbearably cold. But out of the wind…..also very peacefulOn the way home a visit to the nature reserves at Aiguamolls de L’Empordà
It is one of the most important staging posts in Europe for the Spring and Autumn migrations of millions of birds crossing the Mediterranean to and from AfricaIt is protected and yet much smaller than in the past due to land drainage and development. If you want to see what can happen when development is permitted then look no further than nearby Empuriabrava a development build on the marshes begun in the 60’s and now an eyesore on the horizon. But thanks to a campaign that began in 1976 the whole coast has not disappeared under concrete and there is still a haven here albeit much smaller than before. I thought of all the birds which may stop off here on their long journey to Penwith. Here I saw my first storks – not nesting on cartwheels but on special platforms in a large colony.