…and Away We Go!

On Thursday morning  we took a cab to the Seville rail station to make our way to Malaga.  Unlike most of the journeys by train that we have made, this one was slow and the train arrived late – it took four-plus hours to make the trip. Once in Malaga, we walked to our apartment, dropped our luggage and went to explore. The first thing we noticed was how busy and crowded the city is – we arrived at the beginning of a holiday weekend – May 1 is an important date in most of Europe so people were arriving for a long holiday weekend.

Malaga is a port city so our first stop was to see the sea.

There are yachts in the harbor and the port is glitzy compared to the port in Cadiz. The beaches are somewhere nearby but we haven’t made our way to find them yet. The weather has been a little cool and sometimes rainy.

While here, we had a chance to celebrate another important event…Larry’s birthday on May 1! We were fortunate enough to arrive at the just right moment and were able to get a table for 2 at Bodega El Pimpi – a place partially owned by Malaga native and actor Antonio Banderas. It was a lively place with very good food. We really liked the salad  with marinated figs, toasted almonds,  strawberries, and lots of Spanish blue cheese.

A delicious mix of fried sardines and white fish was next! It was a memorable meal.

We spent the rest of the day wandering around town and Larry got a haircut.

We saw:

After 6:00 p.m. is a quiet time for a museum visit so we stopped in to see the collection at the Museo Carmen Thyssen, Malaga. This looks like a merry scene!

For an additional 2 Euros we toured the Roman ruins; the remains of a Roman era fish processing facility discovered beneath the foundation during a museum renovation in 2011. It was an amazing discovery!

Malaga is a great city with many good restaurants but it’s very popular and extremely crowded this weekend. We are looking forward to a quieter day on Monday when we hope to visit the Picasso Museum.

Sending our best wishes!
S & L

We feel a bit like lazy travelers although yesterday a walked over seven miles exploring the city. We started our day with a visit to the neighborhood called Triana. It’s on the other side of the river and it feels a little less polished and more like an area where locals live.

We stopped for a selfie along the Guadalquivir River which runs through the city.

Then on to the Triana Market – loaded with fish, fruits, veggies, cheeses, pastries and souvenirs.  The fish below is called a Merluza similar to our Sea Bass.

As on previous visits to Seville, we made a visit at the Cathedral of Seville – the largest Gothic Cathedral in the world! There is always something new to learn or discover in this awe inspiring place.

Inside there are many treasures; like this painting by Goya;

The tomb of Christopher Columbus;

And many small chapels filled with treasures adorned with gold and jewels.

Tomorrow we will pack and leave for a morning train to Malaga, Spain. Like Seville, it’s in the region of Andalusia and but unlike Seville, it’s on the Mediterranean Sea and considered the capital of the Costa del Sol. We will be in Malaga for a 5-night stay.

We have had a nice time in Seville…one of our favorite things to do is to wander around the city after sunset to view to beautifully lit buildings.

We hope all is well with you! We read that Atlanta got some much needed rain and we are happy about that! Sending our best wishes.  Sharon and Larry

We left our hotel in Cadiz Saturday morning and took the 10:50 a.m. train to Seville. The weather is nice…not too hot so we walked to our hotel from the train station. The city was bustling as it’s the last day of a week-long spring festival. The surprise for us was that we’d forgotten just how beautiful this city is – especially on a perfect spring day…Larry’s favorite tree, the jacaranda is in full bloom.

The monuments around town look spectacular against a bright blue sky.

And in the early evening, people, many elegantly dressed, are streaming into the bullring for the Festival Bullfight.

Nighttime scenes around the city are just as spectacular.

A simple tapas dinner and lots of walking around a lovely city makes us happy travelers.

It’s Monday morning and the streets are still bustling – not only is Seville beautiful…it’s popular!

We’ve spent the last few days wandering around town. We really like this small city on the southern tip of Spain. It’s been fun to explore the streets and alleyways.

Cadiz is the last cruise ship stop on the Atlantic side of the Strait of Gibraltar.  Each day there are a couple of large ships in the harbor, but it doesn’t seem to impact the city center much, as far as we can tell. Yesterday at the laundromat, we met a couple from Maryland who were doing laundry while on a 12-hour stop here in Cadiz. They were unhappy with their cruise as bad weather had diverted the ship from a stop in the Azores, a port that they most wanted to see. In the evening we watched as the apartment-building-sized-ship (on the right) departed while the smaller ship on the left was in port for a few more hours.

We were last here in 2021 when there was a lift of travel restrictions due to the pandemic…the contrast between then and now is interesting to us. We remembered a lunch we ate at Casa Lazo when there were only a few diners besides us in the restaurant and the owner looked sad and weary. On this visit, the restaurant was crowded and the cheerful owner was happy to know that we had returned for lunch 5 years later.

Perfectly grilled sea bass, croquettes, potato salad swimming in olive oil with parsley, and a slice of toffee-topped cheesecake was just the perfect meal.

An excellent restaurant for tapas is Cumbres Mayores. Here, aged hams hang from the ceiling.

In addition to seafood and ham, Spain has excellent produce. The local market in Cadiz is filled with many choices for making a nice lunch or dinner in an apartment.

The market is also a great place for lunch…we especially like the tuna bocadillo supplied by another friendly owner that we remember from our past visit. The small sandwich is served warm with a slice of freshly grilled tuna. A paper cone filled with fried calamari is delicious too!

Cadiz is mostly surrounded by the sea with walkways by the water all around the city. There are churches, ancient forts, stops for a snack, access to beaches and parks along the way.

Today is our last full day in the city. Temps have been cool with a little rain. Cadiz is a city we hope to return to…we like it here!

 

For us, Tavira was a town for leisurely walks and sitting on park benches. We didn’t go inside any one of the twenty-two churches (!!) in town nor the museum. We left town on Wednesday morning on our way to our next stop.

We’ll remember our quirky room in this former chapel (ours was the door on the left);

The simple and delicious tapas meals;

And the sun setting over the River Gilao.

Wednesday we grabbed some ham, cheese and butter sandwiches as we left town on our way to Cadiz. The roads were good and the trip uneventful until we arrived in Cadiz. It’s not the sleepy town we remembered from a visit during a fall trip in the middle of the pandemic in 2021.

Now, it’s a bustling cruise port with mucho traffic. We managed to return the rental car and find our apartment near the city center. The apartment is small, quiet, and well-equipped and we will be comfortable here for the next few days. We are happy to be be back in Cadiz!

 

Most of the roads between Evora and Tavira were very good but there was one long stretch of roadway that was one-lane only and very hilly. It could have been a road in rural Iowa or Nebraska! Luckily we didn’t see another car on this stretch of road.

It was thrilling to see the many storks with nests high above the ground on tall poles. We read that many storks return to Portugal from Africa in April to build their nests.

We arrived in Tavira in time for the freshly baked cake that the hotel chef makes for guests every afternoon. Our room is in a section of an old church and is decorated with many religious artifacts. It’s a small space and very impractically arranged. On the bright side, the breakfast is good and the staff members are kind.

Tavira is a lovely city on the Gilão River. The houses are whitewashed and the streets made of cobblestones. It feels very much touristed but for a good reason – it’s compact, walkable, and there are many good seafood restaurants.

Today we walked uphill to the Torre de Tavira and Camera Obscura (Camera Obscura in the Tavira Tower.) We were the first and only guests so Clive, the British owner who constructed the camera, showed us the main sights in town via an early optical device called a ‘camera obscura’. Clive transformed an abandoned water tower into a dark space to project a live image of the town onto a circular canvas. He gave us a fascinating view of the city. The water tower with the Camera Obscura is in the top right corner (next to the church) the photo below. It was fascinating and Clive was an enthusiastic narrator.

Around town, streets are marked with colorful signs like this one.

Not everything is pristine here, but it’s pretty close. We planned for three nights here and we have 2 more.  Just enough!

Spring flowers are blooming, the city is bustling, and there are plenty of shady parks for relaxing. We have learned that expats are here from Sweden, France, the United States and the U.K.

These flowers are so pretty that they almost look plastic (they’re not!)

We’ll spend tomorrow seeing some of the sites that were closed today (Monday). On Wednesday we will dip back into Spain for a four night stay in Cadiz.

We walked around town to take a longer look at some of the main features.  The Roman Temple was part of the Roman Forum and the main square in the first century AD. We learned that open-air concerts are staged here today.

We visited the Evora Museum with displays of Roman artifacts found around the region. We admired these beautiful hand-blown objects of Roman glass.

The museum retains some wonderful old architectural details.

And here’s Larry posing as a rare museum specimen!

We found a very nice restaurant for a late Saturday lunch called “O Gandim”. Larry asked the waitress what the name of the restaurant means as it’s not a word that translates as Portuguese. She told us that it means “a bad man with a good heart.” At that moment the chef wearing a bandana and a great smile popped his head through an opening into the kitchen. He looked like a pirate! The food was some of the best of our trip so far. To start, a simple plate of olives, olive tapenade, olive oil with a dot of balsamic, and flavored butter for bread.

Evora has been a good place to wander. It’s a touristy town with many tour groups and more American tourists than we’ve seen here so far.  Today we are packing up to drive 3 hours further south to Tavira, on the Mediterranean coast.  We are looking forward to checking out a new destination!

 

 

 

 

 

 

We like the freedom that having a rental car gives us but in a small city like Evora, narrow cobblestone streets, stone archways just wide enough for a car,  and lack of parking spots inside the city center make for a stressful arrival.

Once we found our way to our hotel we dropped off luggage and made our way to a free parking lot just outside the city walls (not as easy as it might sound.) The photo below shows Larry parking our rental car. This lot is also used by locals who work inside the city walls and is nearly full during the day.

The car park just happens to be next to a Portuguese National Monument. The construction of Agua de Prata Aqueduct was started by King João III in 1532. We read that the piping and granite arches in Renaissance style were most probably laid over the old Roman aqueduct.

We settled into an apartment near the city center with plenty of space and a nice small kitchen.

The main meal is lunch usually eaten around 1:30 or so. This hearty dish was Pork Cheeks with Mashed Potatoes.

After a big lunch, sometimes we gather supplies for an evening “Snack Meal” – a phrase for a small meal that we learned from our Great-Nieces and Nephew. Prices are inexpensive here and we created a healthy “snack meal” for less than 10 Euros (price did not include the welcome gift of a bottle of Portuguese Rosé wine from the hotel.)

We visited the Church of St. Francis and the Chapel of the Bones. The Gothic Cathedral was built in the 14th century.

The Chapel of the Bones was built by three monks who wanted to create a helpful place for people to meditate on the transience of material things. The chapel contains the skulls and bones of 5,000 monks. We didn’t linger long here.

The Town Square is pleasant in the evenings,

and it’s nice to just wander around the meandering city streets.

It’s early spring in Portugal and this redbud tree is blooming in the courtyard of our hotel.

Locals tell us that it’s been a chilly winter, but today, the temps here will be in low 80’s. We will pick up our dusty rental car in a couple of days to head to our next stop.

We had one last day in Cáceres to visit the sites that were closed on Sunday and Monday, so, on Tuesday, we made the most of it. Our first stop was the Cáceres Museo. It is partially closed for renovations but free. The small museum was sparse on objects but everything is nicely displayed…sometimes less is more. We saw a small collection of prehistoric artifacts, gold jewelry, bronze armor and locally made ceramics. The second floor displayed  some wonderful contemporary art.

We liked this cheerful piece, titled A La Fiesta del Pueblo created in 1916 by Spanish artist Eugenio Hermosillo Martinez.

And this one titled Turner y La National Gallery by Equipo Cronica. It seems as if we are looking down the hallway when in fact, it’s the painting.

This pigeon was looking in while we were looking out! Adding that pigeons are a big nuisance here – a city with many outdoor dining options and too many pigeons looking for leftovers.

One of the main attractions here is an underground cistern which was unfortunately closed for renovations.

The 15th-century Gothic Cathedral of Santa Maria was our next stop. It has a prominent place in the city and is beautifully lit at night.

The bell tower is one of the prominent features. We walked to the top for a view of the city.

Inside, Gothic style archways and a beautifully carved wooden alterpiece are especially impressive. The well-done audio guide highlighted the important  features of the cathedral.

One of our favorite sights was the Cáceres Arabian House Museum. A local resident bought the building in the 1960’s and made it his residence. During a construction project he discovered the remains of an Arab dwelling erected on an ancient Roman site which dated back to the 12th century. His dream was to make it a house museum – which took him fifteen years to complete. He did extensive research to discover more of Caceres’ ancient past. Now, his children have taken over his endeavor and continue to open the museum to any curious travelers who pass by.

Our last full day in Cáceres was interesting and adventure-filled but it was time to move on.

Larry observed that, while Cáceres has great appeal, with its rich history and well-preserved medieval old town, it will probably never be a major tourist destination because of its remote location on the edge of Spain. Tourism brings development money, and Cáceres doesn’t get enough of it to reach its full potential.

This morning we picked up our rental car and drove 2.5 hours to Evora, Portugal. It’s been many years since we visited Portugal and Evora is a new destination for us!  We are looking forward to more adventures!

It was a busy weekend in Cáceres but a very quiet Monday morning with few people on the streets and many of the museums and major sites closed.  We walked to nearby Botanicc Grand Cafe for good coffee and a bowl of yogurt with granola.

After breakfast we picked up a few things at the Tambo Grocery Store. Just inside the front door is a display of freshly caught fish…even though we are a bit far from the sea.

After our errands were done, we set out for the Old Jewish Quarter of Cáceres  (Barrio de San Antonio). It is described as a peaceful, centuries-old neighborhood of narrow cobbled streets and whitewashed houses hidden just behind the Moorish city walls.

The neighborhood has whitewashed walls and lovely flowers along the pathways.

We visited the small chapel of The Ermita de San Antonio which stands on the site where the Jewish community’s early synagogue once stood. The original synagogue was demolished and this small chapel was built in its place around 1470 — roughly two decades before the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492.

Towers near ancient wells just outside the ancient city walls gave us excellent views of the modern city.

The days go by quickly! Tomorrow the city museum will be open and we will learn more about this fascinating corner of Spain.