Days 61-67 (Oct 29th continued - 4th Nov) - Allende - Ribadesella - Cudillero - Madrid - London - Seoul -Sydney
Day 61 continued (29th Oct) (14.33 km) - Allende to Ribadesella: After our hike we wended our way back down the winding road to the coast and then to a town called Ribadesella. On our way we had lunch at an interesting town called Colombres. We did not really explore (nothing much was open anyway - not even the tourist info).
I think this is the town's emblem.
We also walked around to the lighthouse. This coastline is so rocky there must be dozens of such lighthouses around. Someone has tried hard to maintain a neat little garden there too. There was a good view of the harbour from there.
Even when we returned after 8 o'clock only one place seemed open. We were then surprised by little children coming for lollies dressed in Halloween costumes. They were having a great time. I think the six of them must have been the only children in town because they kept reappearing. The restaurant was participating and had tape over doors and windows showing how spooky the place was. I convinced Pete to help me enjoy my last fish meal in Spain. It was a huge delicious sea bass (we were given half each) but different to what we call bass here in Australia.
Day 63 (31st Oct) (8.63 km) - Cudillero to Segovia to Madrid: Our last stop in Spain was Madrid and so this meant a long 6+ hour drive from Cudillero. What fun ...
However, we did find a bit of history associated with the town that piqued our interest. There was a museum in a grand old mansion for Emigration. Outside one of the gates leading up to the museum was this sculpture.
There were other signs indicating that the museum was about 'Indianos'. Turns out that Indianos was the term given to Spanish people who emigrated to the Americas. Some made big money and returned to this part of Spain in particular, building these mansions to show off their success. Sounds just like what is happening now in Portugal where lots of the young people from rural Portugal are leaving to go and live in Belgium, Switzerland and France, returning later to build lavish holiday houses in their home villages to show off their success.
All this also relates to the town of Ribadesella which has been a tourist town for Spaniards for a long time. Until the early 20th century all the development was on the eastern side of the river/wetlands. Then at some stage Indianos returned and, reclaiming sand dunes and wetlands built a lovely promenade and lavish mansions, one of which we stayed in. In fact, we stayed in the most lavishly-looking one. As Pete says, just don't ask where our room was.
After having a rest, we promenaded down the promenade dressed in our finest gear (think half decent trousers, a 'nice T-shirt', and hiking boots). There is such an eclectic mix of architecture styles along this western part of Ribadesella. Fascinating. So many looked locked up for the winter.
We continued walking until a viewing platform at the westernmost end of the promenade. This part is under cliffs that have obviously been unstable lately. We walked quickly past here!
We decided to walk along a creek that runs behind the houses on this western side of town. We saw a lovely old bridge, a mosaic of footprints, quite a few beautifully flowering red clover flowers, and on one of them a beautiful butterfly. Later I discovered it is known as a Geranium Argus.
Nothing much seemed open on our side of the river so it was a good 15 min walk to dinner. The other side of town has so many old apartments, most of which are hotels I think, judging by how few lights were on inside them at night.
Day 62 (30th Oct) (13.94 km) - to Cudillero: In the morning we heard about the floods in the Valencia region. We were so glad we were not there, but devastated for the communities affected. What a tragic event! Later, Pete learned that the second place where we stayed in Valencia is only about 5km from where the flooding is. The reports are all commenting about climate change has played a part, but no doubt the redirection of the river from the centre of Valencia also has been a major factor in where the flooding has occurred. So sad, for so many.
After a sumptuous breakfast at our hotel, Pete and I walked down the promenade again to see if we could get access to the next little beach where there are meant to be dinosaur footprints. Unfortunately it wasn't accessible - a rockfall had severely damaged the stairs access and we decided against iffy rock hoping to get there. A little disappointing as this area is also known as the dinosaur coast. Apparently there are a number of places where you can find prints. It is also home to one of the caves with prehistoric cave drawings, but it is wasn't open. Apparently it closes for the year sometime in late October. Oh well - something for next time. We have missed out on a few such places in both Portugal and Spain.
We hopped in the car and drove back to the eastern side so we could walk up to the lookout on that side of town. It was a great place to view the coast and have a look back at the town and its setting.
As is often the case, there was a chapel at the top of the hill. Although we couldn’t go inside you could peek in through the windows to see that it was obviously dedicated to keeping ships safe. It was a bit weird though to see three or four cannons situated around the church. You can just see one at the bottom left of it in this photo.
We walked back down to the town a different way along paths with the usual mix of weeds, many of which are very familiar to us as Australians.
Again, we explored a bit more of the north coast, coming across, for the first time in Spain, some of their grain storage houses called horreos.
It might have been a bit of a rash idea to add another place on the north coast to our itinerary but I don't regret it. Pete had read about it in one of those ‘hidden gem’ articles in the newspaper at home - Cudillero. This town cannot be seen from land or sea apparently, certainly not from the directions we came from. There is no parking in the actual town. Even residents have to park a few hundred metres away next to the harbour, visitors a bit further away. There is one road through the middle of town which is the quickest way there but via which we couldn’t arrive because they were doing roadworks. Normally it is how residents and visitors would enter but to be honest, the town is much better with it closed. Easy for me as a visitor to say - I’m sure residents would think differently. Another route in enables supplies to be delivered but it is a more roundabout way to get there.
It is a very quaint town built on both sides of a steep valley. Our first views were these.
Once, there was a river running through the centre but it was diverted in the late 19th century to this tunnel which drains to the port.
Some more steps greeted us as we went to find our accommodation, but fortunately not too many. We were glad the accommodation wasn’t at the ‘top’ of town. We then went out for a wander around and wended our way up to a lookout. So much moss in some of the central, narrow alleys! I guess the town has relatively limited direct sunlight and so must, at times, be quite damp.
We finally got to the lookout. The climb was worth it.
After lunch we again explored around town and found some interesting places. It is very obviously a fishing village.
In the evening we went to the central plaza area to look around for dinner but nothing appeared open except for one bar. It was only 7 pm. We knew places often don't open until 8 pm so decided to go for a walk around the harbour. This was quite a long walk as it turned out but nice.
Day 63 (31st Oct) (8.63 km) - Cudillero to Segovia to Madrid: Our last stop in Spain was Madrid and so this meant a long 6+ hour drive from Cudillero. What fun ...
Fortunately, we always enjoy seeing new places and different things so a long drive through places we've never been isn't as bad as a long drive on roads we've been on many times. We decided to go on no-toll roads as we didn't know if the toll roads accepted cash or not and our car had not been provided with a tag. I think there were only two sections of road with tolls but our route took us well away from them anyway.
It was a foggy start to a place called Gijon.
Then we passed through a variety of hilly regions, rolling hills, these peculiar hills with very sharp jagged ridges, hills more like the Picos de Europa, and ones that had at some stage in history been roped on their side.
Then near León, we hit the 'meseta', a huge flat plateau at around 660 m in elevation that surrounds Madrid and makes up about a half of Spain's land area. All crops had been harvested but it it looked like wheat country. We almost could have been in Australia.
We stopped for morning tea at an interesting town called Valladolid, a big centre for this agricultural area. With a flour mill, my hunch about wheat country was confirmed. We found a fantastic, busy, busy cafe for our coffee that came, without extra cost, with a donut-like sweetmeats and a mini croissant.
As we were having our morning tea we noticed the buildings on the street, brick buildings supported by ancient timber beams and posts. We decided to wander down for further inspection and discovered that this old shopping street continued for ages.
We found a few interesting bits and pieces and discovered that the town has museums and an interesting history that we had no time to explore.
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I think this is a model of a crocodile, now in a museum, found in the waters of a nearby town when the church of this town was being constructed. Why the crocodile was there I have yet to discover. |
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Apparently a sculpture of a penitent and son |
With no more time to dally, we made our way back to the car intrigued by this town. Next stop, Segovia. Although we didn't have time to explore the many things this town has to offer, we were determined to stop there for lunch and see the famous Roman aqueduct. We did.
What a structure! This was built by the Romans somewhere between 97 CE and 117 CE, entirely without mortar (bar the actual water carrying part at the top), and was used up until the 1970s. It is huge and beautiful
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The arches become smaller and smaller as it descends |
We then headed to the last stop of our trip, Madrid. We had to go via the airport since that is where we were dropping the car. Fortunately, the metro was very convenient to our mid-city accommodation near Sol.
By the time we had dropped off our luggage and tidied up a bit it was well and truly evening and Pete and I were in for a surprise. We had thought Halloween was over and done with, but it appeared that the night after was the adults’ turn to dress up, without the trick-and-treating, and roam the streets! The plazas were packed with people, many shops were decorated and everyone was having good fun.
We later discovered that this day was the real day that Halloween is celebrated in Spain, not the previous day. Madrid partied on until the morning, as heard by us from our accommodation window (Apparently we were in the quiet room). I'd hate to have been in a noisy one! Madrid is known as the city that never sleeps. As soon as the partying quieted down the street cleaners/sweepers started. All good fun.
Day 64 (1st Nov) (15.37 km) - Madrid: We had a big art day ahead of us on this our last day in Spain. It felt impossible to be in Madrid without visiting the Reina Sofia and Prado Museums.
First up was the Reina Sofia Museum where Guernica by Picasso can be found. We were able to get there before it opened and had pre-bought tickets so were able to get in very easily and before the crowds. However, the lady at the information desk gave us a bum steer about the location of Guernica so it was a while before we got there. Nevertheless, we saw it before all the guided tour groups arrived so we able to view it well. It is an amazing piece of artwork and much bigger than I had imagined.
I had forgotten the story, if I had ever known it, about Guernica. During the Spanish Civil War, Nazi Germany decided to help Franco and bombed the living daylights out of the town of Guernica in northern Spain, a town whose only military/strategic value was a munitions factory. They obliterated 80% of the town and one third of the town's civilians were killed or wounded. It is known as the first intentional bombing of a civilian population. When the rest of the Spanish population heard about it they were horrified, including Picasso who read about it in the newspaper. His Guernica portrays the anguish and horror unbelievably well.
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This was a preparatory drawing |
In addition to Picasso's painting, a photo journalist friend recorded the process of the painting so we can get a real insight into Picasso's method. Really fascinating.
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One of the photos of Picasso's preparatory work |
Of course, we also looked at some other work in the the museum. There is so much interesting material there. We briefly looked at some more Dali and Picasso works, including this beautiful painting by Dali and this bronze by Picasso.
I was also introduced to another Spanish artist in a retrospective exhibition of her work, Soledad Sevilla. I really enjoyed her work. The last two photographs are just portions of larger works.
When we emerged we were met with a performance of some description. It was interesting, but with no Spanish, difficult to ascertain what it was all about.
We left the museum then wandered through the Botanic Gardens to give ourselves a break. There was little flowering but plenty of signs that autumn had begun.
The gardens are arranged in a much more formal manner than we are generally used to.
Interestingly enough there was a large section devoted to food plants.
The glasshouses were also interesting.
Next stop, the Prado Museum where we also purchased an audio guide to give us more information about some of what we were to see. There is so much to see, it is all a bit overwhelming. We had decided to concentrate on Heironymous Bosch, Veláquez, Goya and El Greco, and even then there was so much. While Las Meninas by Veláquez is perhaps one of the most famous paintings in the Prado, I loved how he was able to render faces even more. There were highly compassionate portraits of jesters, dwarves and disabled people that were amazing.
Goya's Naked Maja was fascinating to see as one of the rare works of that era where the naked woman stares back at the viewer, totally unashamedly and in full control of herself.
Heironymous Bosch's work was amazing. The colour in his paintings was incredible, especially in The Garden of Earthly Delights. His depiction of the seven mortal sins was also wonderful.
As we found the areas we were interested in, we passed by works by Rubens, Titian and many more. We managed almost two hours before feeling utterly saturated.
One thing that does make me sad in a museum such as the Prado is the lack of art from a female perspective. I know we speak of the Great Masters for a reason, and my comment does not diminish the greatness of their work. However, that women often weren’t allowed to paint reminds you of how one-sided history often is. Even as subjects, few had a chance to be depicted unless they were royalty, slaves, or prepared to pose nude.
After a late lunch we retired for a rest before heading out again to enjoy our last Spanish evening. As it was a Friday, the plazas were pretty busy again, but not quite as busy as the previous Halloween celebrations. We found the main cathedral, the Royal Palace and the Royal Theatre.
We found a plaza where felons were once hung.
We found markets with their endlessly fascinating stalls. We should have had dinner here but the crowds were a bit overwhelming. Instead we had a mediocre meal overlooking one of the main plazas.
We found funny T-shirts for infants (there was also one for Guns 'n Roses).
We found the Bear and the Strawberry Tree sculpture in the Plaza de Sol. This sculpture represents the city of Madrid with its heraldic symbols. We had seen the Strawberry Tree (Arbutus unedo) while walking in the Picos de Europa. I did try to take a selfie of us both here but when I checked the photo later it was a complete blur. I had forgotten the timer was on!
Instead we took one at our last dinner in Spain, at the Plaza Mayor.
Day 65 (2nd Nov) (9.14km) - Madrid to London: Finding a place open for breakfast provided us a last opportunity for a look around. The Plaza Mayor was empty at 7:30 and dead - nothing open there. This gave me the opportunity to better see some of the buildings which had been used by royalty at some stage.
But our sightseeing was short- lived. We had an airport to get to. We had plenty of time and as the public transport was very convenient we got to Madrid Airport with no hassles. We were able to check in our luggage and pass through the security check very quickly. So, we sat down for a relax and a coffee with about 2 hours up our sleeve.
About half an hour later, Pete noticed that our flight had a 'proceed to gate' which I considered rather premature, but there was also a '23 mins to gate sign' so at Pete's insistence we headed off towards the gate. Lucky. The next hour was nightmarish. We walked for ages, up and down escalators only to find we had to catch a train. Everyone was packed like sardines in the train. When we got off, we were herded into what I call the cattle queues, EU passport holders one side and everyone else on the other. We were a long while in this queue and then after another escalators were greeted with another huge queue. This one had ten lines of art least 30 metres in length, packed with people all waiting to get through passport control. None of the electronic machines were working. This part took ages but basically an hour after we left coffee, we arrived at our gate, just before boarding time.
The flight was uneventful and we arrived at Heathrow with 6 hours until our next flight. Unfortunately, because we were with a completely different airline for the next two legs, we had been unable to check our luggage through to Sydney in Spain and here in London, we couldn't check our luggage in until just under 3 hours after we arrived. This meant we were stuck in the most boring part of an airport. No seats, no shops, only two eating establishments (one of which we of course used so we could sit down in comfort for some of the time) and a long wait.
Finally, following after four tour groups, we managed to check in our luggage and proceed to the next part of the airport journey. It was not as bad as Madrid, but you can see from the kilometres we have covered today that it was long enough!
Onto the plane and the loooong journey home. At least you can choose movies to watch these days.
Day 66 (3rd November) (?? km) - ? to Seoul: As I had no sim operating, there is nothing to indicate that I even existed on this day. I did, but mostly on a plane and two hours in Seoul airport. I wonder how long this day even was for me travelling forward in time as I was.
Day 67 (4th Nov) - Seoul to Sydney: We have touched down and are back on Australian soil. What a trip we've had. We only scraped the surface of Spain. There is so much more to see there but I thoroughly enjoyed what time we did have.
My highlight in Spain would have to be the Gaudi buildings and park in Barcelona, places I have waited many years to see. Also, I really loved the Picos de Europa and wish we'd had more time to explore that area and the north coast.
What didn't I like? My biggest gripe was about the smoking in public places. There is still so much of this in Spain, even in restaurants. My second biggest gripe was about the thoughtlessness of tour guides in art galleries. So often they hog an artwork for a long time when many of the people they are talking to are looking at them not the artwork! Discuss the artwork somewhere else, then come and point out the bits that need pointing out, then leave the viewers to look at the artwork in their own time. But, these were both minor concerns. Overwhelmingly, we had a great time!
Adios all.
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