"Walking Holiday for Two in the Pennines"

The story goes as follows.  Candid Camera is positioned next to a Safeway check out counter in the UK.  They are filming the winners of prizes for being the , or close to Safeway's billionth UK customer.  First up is customer number 999,999,998.  She is the lucky winner of a state of the art colour tv (a big deal in those days) - at this point the Candid Camera pans over to the customer two places behind in the queue, and he's starting to smile.  The next customer wins a Jaguar (also a big deal in those days).  By now the 1,000,000,000th customer is beside himself, he's jumping up and own, breathing heavily in and out, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

The Safeway "president" walks up, "Congratulations, as Safeway's Billionth Customer, and to commemorate this historic occasion, I am delighted to inform you, that you have won a Walking Holiday for Two in the Pennines."  By now we all realize that the poor fellow has been set up and everybody's having a great time except him.

Walking in the Pennines lets you experience the magnificent scenery described by the Bronte sisters in their novels.  However all I remember is the feel of soggy socks, the smell of wet wool and the sight of girls doomed to become presidents of their local Women's Institutes. 

The one time I tried to get Michele to ramble in the Pennines, she told me to take a hike. 

In this context it is somewhat surprising that we are about to start a walking holiday for two in the Alpujarras south of Granada - here's the link: 

http://www.casa-ana.com/pdf_documents/Schedule.pdf

The two great draws are the Alpujarras scenery itself and more importantly the company of the author Chris Stewart.  Chris Stewart is most famous for his best selling autobiographical book:

Michele and I actually prefer his three sequels even though they have not been as commercially successful.

If Chris is half as entertaining in real life as he is on the page, it should be a great week.

Seville:  First Flavor of Flamenco

Visiting Seville without seeing Flamenco would be like going to Burgundy and not drinking the wine.

I have to admit that I have tended to bracket Flamenco with those cheesy Mariachi bands you get at a Mexican all inclusive.  I started to realize how wrong I was, when we visited the Flamenco Museum in Seville.  We got to see a young Iranian woman, who grew up in California, practising in front of a mirror.  We were blown away by her skill.  She told us that she was only a student.

We have now seen two shows, one in Seville and one in Cordoba.  These pictures are from the first show in Seville:

The two shows highlighted the trade off between passion and power on the one hand, and polish on the other hand.  Kind of like the difference between a bracing young wine and a smooth vintage year.  

Today's show in Cordoba featured smiling beautiful women dancers.  Yesterday's show, the guy had a small hole in the seam of his pants.  Personally I preferred the intensity of the first show.

Gibraltar:  True Brit, Strong and Free

Three things you need to know:

A.  Gibraltar is the Anti Separatist colony

Gibraltarians are British and very proud of it, e.g. British mail boxes

and traditional British modes of transportation:

B.  Gibraltar is strategically located at the cross roads between two continents and two oceans:

C.  The monkeys are important

Legend has it that if the colony's monkey population dies out, the British will no longer rule.  In the Second World War, Winston Churchill ordered that special measures be taken to preserve the monkey population.  Even now, you are not allowed to feed the monkeys.

Add caption

But that did not stop Michele from making a friend:

First Days in Andalucia

Andalucian countryside

Eating in Hemingway's footsteps - Lunch in Ronda

Ronda featured in Hemingway's Spanish Civil War novel For Whom the Bell Tolls.  It is unusual in that one community has been built on two sides of a deep canyon:

The "white towns" of Cadiz - not built for traffic

The best job in the village is collecting tips from tourists looking for a parking spot.

But the views are worth it:

The anarchic kids of Cadiz

Cadiz is the only city centre I have been to where the loudest noise is that of kids playing.  Maybe it's to do with so much sunshine and a lack of playgrounds, video games and organized sport.

Tarifa:  kite surfing capital of Europe

Looks a lot of fun, but I think I'll stick to windsurfing in sheltered bays

Spanish with Cati

This Spanish jaunt was not supposed to be all beer and skittles.  Michele and I eased our conscience by claiming we were going to improve our skills in the language.

We were fortunate enough to find an excellent language school in Pollenca - "Idiomas Pollenca".

We were even more fortunate to find that they could provide private lessons with Cati in our apartment in Port de Pollenca.  Here is a picture of us hard at work:

 

Cati is a genius at improvising all sorts of verbal and visual cues so that we could actually converse with her in our pigeon Spanish.  Fortunately she has a great sense of humour.  Michele told Cati about the latest fitness craze in Montreal which involves studios with ballet barres, heated to Bikram Yoga like temperatures.  Quite reasonably, Michele referred to such a studio as a "Barre Caliente".  Cati had to explain to us that in Spanish, "Bar Caliente" was the accepted phrase for a brothel. 

Why go to Barcelona?

When you can go to Palma, Mallorca?  Ok, so Palma does not have the bucket list cachet of Barcelona, but in most other respects, I think it stacks up quite well:

but that's just my opinion - here are some photos so that you can judge for yourself:

https://picasaweb.google.com/110075170705323340117/PalmaOct22014?authkey=Gv1sRgCK2But3Jo9z8oAE#

Pollenca:  Three fabulous weeks

I am very sorry to be leaving Pollenca.  Here are some of the highlights:

A.  Sir Bradley wuz here:

On the day that Bradley Wiggins won the time trial in the world road racing championships, we were eating in "Tolo's" (his favorite Mallorca watering hole - as evidenced by the memorabilia in the restaurant):

Unfortunately on the day we were there, the weather was not quite so nice:

The clientele here is an odd mixture of people like Steve F, Steve B, and Dean W, who do not look embarrassing in lycra on the one hand, and pale Brits like me on the other.

B.  From the land of Shakespeare, Milton and Wordsworth, comes today's tabloid front page headline:

"Sponger wants sex swap op reversed!"

C.  My own "Chip Wilson" moment

Occasionally I try and follow the Lululemon precept "Do one thing a day that scares you".

No - I was not brave enough to buy some Lululemon shares:

But I did the next scariest thing.  There is an excellent sailing outfit on the beach next to us called Sail & Surf Pollensa.  It is run by young Germans who combine BMW efficiency with a Westfalia vibe.  I rented a windsurfer from them.  

They asked how long it had been since I last wind surfed.  I said ten years - in reality it's closer to twenty five years.  I asked for the smallest sail they had, but was told rather sniffily, that the smallest sail was two square metres and was reserved for children.  I had to settle for a 4 square metre sail installed on a barge like board.  It sounds pretty tame but it was exciting enough for me!

D.  So what does 400 Euros a week buy you, out of season, in Pollensa?

As you can see from the pictures, it's not a palace - no ocean views, polyester bed linens, the odd but extremely persistent mosquito!

However we have absolutely loved staying here. Here are ten reasons (in descending order of importance to us):

1. Wi-fi works great
2. Our own laundry
3. Our own kitchen
4. Very safe
5. All the appliances actually work
6. Tons of room for two people
7. Two terraces for enjoying the evening sun
8. Air conditioning
9. Near to my favorite windsurfing school
10. In the middle of town

All the comforts of home, but none of the chores - which is why I am somewhat reluctant to get moving again!