Road Trip from Pamplona to Frigiliana

We were on the road by 8:00, heading south.  In Spain they do not put any hints about east/west/north/south on their signs.  They just put the name of a town that is ahead, usually a major one.  We americanos miss the sense of direction greatly, especially as we occasionally head off in the wrong direction, not really knowing which towns are relevant all the time as we are relying on erratic GPS information through the phones.  Not my problem, I just go where they tell me when it is my turn to drive and if we get off course they eventually find us and get us back on track.

We drove through big agricultural spaces all day long. In the morning it was mostly vineyards, patchworked up the hills on both sides of the roads, in addition to olives and green cover crop.  Both today and on the trip from Barcelona there were big wind turbines on the ridges and acres of solar panels sprinkled around. For the first half of the day it didn't seem like there were any houses or tractors or farm equipment associated with the fields (where do the people live who do all this work?) and then when we got closer to Madrid there were small farms with houses and trees around them.  And the olive trees kept on coming.  

De rigeur picture of picnic table.

We stopped at a supermarket on Ocano and bought lunch and then we stopped at a rest area and had a picnic, always my favorite.  Bread and cheese, hummus, lettuce, yogurt, orange, a sweet coffee and milk drink -- all for about 12 euros total.  

While the boys napped and I drove I began to notice that the olive trees were endless.  For over an hour, at 120 km/hour, there were olives growing all the way to the horizon, up the hills and over the plains. When Benjamin and Jon woke up, we talked about the incredible number of olives and of course Benj did some research since we couldn't even begin to describe the quantity. He read that there are 300 million olive trees on 5 million acres in Spain and most of them are right in the region we were crossing through.  In 2012, an especially good year, Spain produced almost half of the world's entire olive oil crop.  Italy came in second with 25%, Greece was third with 20%.    In recent years there has been a bad pest that has damaged the crops in Europe and Tunisia has stepped up production.  But still Spain ends up pressing most of the olive oil, and Italy ends up blending and packaging the most.  Or so says the google.

Very hard to relay how the olive trees go on as far as the eye can see.

Meanwhile, we were hurtling down toward the coast, traveling about the same distance as between DC and Boston -- but so much easier driving and so much more beautiful.  It was hazy, which was too bad, because we couldn't see the Sierra Nevada mountains clearly.

Finally we got to the east-west road that would take us to our destination, Frigiliana, about 6 km inland from the coast.  We went east instead of west for a while, which made Jon fret, but we saw acres and acres of some mysterious crop that was shrouded in a tight cover.  We have to find out what is inside those plastic structures   wrapped up so snugly. It can't be olives, unless the fly is particularly terrible near the coast.  

We arrived at our lovely apartment which we have rented for a whole week -- a friend of our neighbors owns this place.  The back balcony overlooks a deep chasm in the mountains, and way down the hill we can see the Mediterranean.  The town is perched on a steep hillside, rows of white houses along curvy narrow roads, all very tippy.  After we got ourselves settled in, had some tea, read the guide book about local points of interest, we decided it was time to go out in search of dinner.  We have been trained to think that dinner is not until 9:00 at the earliest but when we walked around, almost everything was dark and closed.  After about two blocks we decided we were not that hungry anyway and we would go home and make dinner from the leftover groceries plus things that were nicely left in the pantry.  It was still a mulit-course dinner with salad, soup, bread and cheese, a fried egg, an after dinner hot drink and chocolate.  We know how to camp.

Jon found a lizard from Muskitz hiding in our dirty clothes and Benjamin caught it for us, then tortured me with it before letting it go outside.  Poor lizard has been moved to an entirely alien climate. 

Benjamin is with us for two more days so he gets to choose what we do until he leaves.  We can be lazy after he goes.  

Muskitz, Day Two

We all slept as long as we wanted this morning, wandering into the kitchen whenever we got up.  Found nice rolls baked by Uxua (sister of Ramon, not niece), tea, fruit.  By about noon we were all ready for some low level activity -- although it must be said that Ramon's brother Mickey was cooking up a storm in the kitchen. He had pots bubbling on many burners, preparing the vegetables for a huge dish for dinner.

Ramon's siblings and in-laws arrived through the day, and by lunchtime they were all here:  Mickey and Teresa, Koldo and Sylvia and daughter Uxua, Maria, Uxua, Javier, Inaki, Ramon and Laura, Marta and 3 year old Otto. Their oldest brother Juan died about ten years ago.

Un-renovated house to the left.

In the meantime, Laura and Peio took us on a full tour of Muskitz. First we went through the whole house from top to bottom. Then we went next door and explored the uninhabited house that the family owns but cannot possibly afford to renovate right now. They put a new roof on a few years ago, to keep it from falling down.  In the lowest level it is very spooky, with cobwebs dripping from the large oak beams, and chickens and rabbits living in cages.  Someone takes care of them.  The middle level has a vast hallway down the middle with five doors on each side.  Bedrooms, kitchen, dining room.  The kitchen has a huge chimney over the center, a cone that carries the smoke from the fire, up and out.  The top level is one huge space -- the whole building, which must be 80'x100' (wild guess).

Pretty loud when so close.

A reasonable distance when the
bells ring.

We went to see the recently renovated village church, even climbing up into the bell tower (which surprised us by ringing at 1:00 and then again at about 1:01 and then about 20 times...we couldn't figure it out).  Saw the new space for a new gastronomic society that Peio and Antxon now belong to (so much like the common house, but with a beautiful bar) and three apartments above that are soon to be rented.  They got funding from the valley (all the villages in this valley, together) to renovate the building, and the valley will get the rents from the building for the first 30 years.  Very cool.

I can absolutely imagine Peio being the mayor of this village at some time. He is exactly the same here as he was in Virginia. He stops and talks to everyone, everyone is a friend, he is interested in every possible conversation. 

From Benjamin's seat at the table.

At left, tuna, canned by Mickey; in center, big pan of
vegetables with white asparagus spokes and
fried cauliflower; and at the right, a salad of
pickled onions and olives.

Dinner was at about 2:30.  All the family around the table, with the English speakers clustered at one end.  First course was pickled onions and olives, second course was a giant pot of vegetables and ham and eggs (artichokes, cardoons, cauliflower, asparagus) called Menestra (mixture) that was a masterpiece, third course was sausage from their own pig, and for dessert cheese and nougat candy.  Then coffee and conversation.  Various people drifted off to the couches or chairs for a nap.  The family sat in small groups, big groups, hanging out for hours.  I typed and typed, trying to catch up with the last few days.  Benjamin and Peio and Jon went out for an early evening walk in the hills.

Javier (not sure of relation), Inaki, Mickey, Koldo, Uxua (the younger), Antxon (standing) and Sylvia
during the cheese course.

10:30 PM update -- 

We are now back at the apartment in Pamplona, have said goodbye to Peio who went back to school about 100 km away (a school for Basque people only, training them in maintaining and fabricating industrial machinery), and have had yet another delicious meal.  Chicory raw and cooked, both delicious. Not bitter at all, just like lettuce in salad or like spinach or chard when cooked.  Eggs, then cheese and apple jelly for dessert.  More lively conversation about the chicken/egg question, snapping turtles, and Laura's grandfather and father's life work spreading adult literacy throughout the world.  Tomorrow we leave the cozy care of the Ayestaran family and head south.

Muskitz, Navarra

Picture perfect house and village.

We are in a small village about 24 km north of Pamplona, in the country house of the Ayestaran family.  As we have never seen anything like this in real life, it is most like a movie set.  I am in the living room/dining room area on one of two large and comfortable couches in front of a fireplace that is big enough for a bed.  On the mantle and the beam above are collections of bells, small copper pots and crockery pitchers that have accumulated from the various families that come here for their weekends together.  All around the room are collections like these: antique copper cookware, dishes, tools for making sheep's milk cheese.  There is a long dining table with twelve chairs, and lots of space between all the furniture.  But what is most remarkable, other than the countryside just outside the windows, is the construction of this house, which must be four hundred years old.  A stone house with walls that are two feet thick, dark, hand-hewn beams holding up the ceiling.  White washed plaster between the beams on the ceiling, tile floor. On the level below are the tools and supplies that relate to the outdoor work of having a garden, some amount of surrounding yard, two donkeys, and cutting firewood.

There is a three year old coming down the steps as I write (hooray!) and I can hear the chatter of the family members on the other side of the kitchen door.  Upstairs Jon and Benjamin and Peio and Antxon are still sleeping.  Instead of glass windows, there are wooden shutters that keep every bit of light out when they are closed. It is easy to sleep long into the day in that much dark.  I haven't counted the bedrooms, but Peio says this house sleeps twenty easily.

Yesterday morning we were supposed to leave at about 9:30 to go to a farmers market in a village to the northwest.  I woke up when I heard some creaking boards and I asked Jon what time it was.  9:30.  We hustled into our clothes and came downstairs to find Benjamin on this couch and others in the kitchen but Peio and his brother were not yet up. Phew.  We had a quick breakfast of toast and oranges and grapefruit (local) and then we piled into the minivan for a long day of touring.  I felt like we were traveling with Uncle Babe and Auntie Arlene -- the plans were all made, all we had to do was sit in the back and listen to the stories and background about what we were passing.

We are in the Basque Country.  No flat areas, all hills, with mountains all around.  The roads are narrow and winding, sheep are on the grassy slopes (we saw a shepherd moving a flock down the middle of the road in one village) and the villages are clustered tightly with no houses on the hillsides between.  We drove on a road that followed beside a brisk stream, winding through the woods, and Laura told us that this area had been early to industrialize, as it had water power and lots of natural resources.  Over the years, this part of the region got richer and more people were landowners than in other parts. As we got closer to the town with the market, we saw various large factories tucked into the landscape.  Lumberyard, cookie factory, and then we were suddenly in town again with roundabouts and narrow streets and no easy parking.  All the signs are in Basque and in Spanish.  

Cheeses at one end ...

... and vegetables at the other.

The market was far more sophisticated than our markets -- it has probably been in existence for centuries, in some form.  It has a large covered space with no walls, heaters in the ceiling, benches down the center facing outward in both directions, and the vendors are lined up all around the outside edge with an aisle between them and another row of vendors.  Just outside was the river, with boats of young rowing teams practicing.  It was a stunningly beautiful day, with deep blue skies and sunshine, about 17 degrees C.  In season now: leeks, cauliflower, cabbage, chard, beets, carrots, cardoons, endive and escarole, spinach. The leaves were sometimes full of holes.  Everything looked like it was grown without pesticides.  Also lots of beans that the region of Tolosa is famous for, and every possible cut of pig meat.  The market provides the space, the tables, the table cloths (as far as we could tell, since they were all the same and there were carts of tables at one end of the building), electricity.  It would be so much simpler to load up to go to market if all you were bringing was the food.  There were no grand efforts to display anything differently from the others.  They just put the vegetables out on the table, loose or in boxes. Benjamin bought a bowl of beans from the Slow Food kitchen at one end of the market and they were tasty, just plain with nothing but a slice of bread.

The colors were irresistible.

The cafes were packed at midday.

We walked around the town, wandered through other markets, stopped at a bar for a pintxo (Basque for toothpick, but it is the same as tapas).  At noon the bars were crowded with people stopping for a drink and a snack, as lunch was still a few hours off.  We had some hake, some fried calamari, various beverages, and moved on.

The family discussed the various options for our next destination -- with 20 km of coastline and 17 villages, they were trying to decide which one was best to visit.  We would not have known the difference. Everything was picturesque and beautiful to the extreme.  

Peio, Benjamin, Antxon. To the left is France,
to the right is Spain.

Out of place maybe, but still
scenic.

We went to a fishing village, Hondarribia, crowded with cars and walkers on such a gorgeous day.  Parking was hard, so Ramon let us get out and he went to find a place to put the car.  We walked down the wide street lined with bars, with tables and people outside. The street echoed with conversation.  The trim on the houses was brightly painted in green and red mostly, and Antxon said those are the only true colors.  The blue houses were inappropriate in his view.  The sidewalks were swept clean, and all the buildings were in excellent condition.  We walked out to see the boats and to see France on the other side of the bay.  We could see surfers and walkers in France, probably speaking French or Basque.

The family, and we, take part in the ritual.

We meant to stop for a quick pintxo, with someone going into the bar to choose the plates, but a waiter came out so we just ordered and ended up having a light lunch. Sardines, anchovies, mixed salad, mushrooms, croquettes (fried balls of ham and cheese), drinks.  By now it was about 4:00, maybe.

Then on to the next town.  I think only Ramon stayed awake, since he was driving.  We woke up in a large and elegant city, probably less than a half hour from the village.  We were in San Sebastián, where it feels like Nice or somewhere on the French Riviera.  A wide promenade with a fancy white iron fence to walk along and stop to lean on as you look over the beach and the surfers and the other people walking up and down.  We ambled along. Benjamin tried to listen to the languages going past to see who was here -- almost all Spanish and Basque, a small amount of French and almost no English.  All the most expensive real estate overlooks this view.  It surprised me that they weren't all hotels, that real people live in those grand buildings at the edge of the water.

The carousel and city hall with the spires. The whole
town, plus tourists, on the promenade.

We sat down on a bench to watch the carousel with all the cute kids, we watched someone blowing giant bubbles, we went to the Naval Museum where we thought we would see an exhibit on boats and history but it was a new exhibit on Women and the Sea. Ah well, we learned something about how women do most of the work in fishing, really, and they don't get paid as much as the men, and they have been an integral part of the industry forever.  They don't go out on the boats so much, but  they do all the prep work with nets and gear, they pull the boats, and they do all the post-fishing handling.

Pintxo, on the bar in San Sebastian.

The sun setting behind Jon, Benjamin and Hana.

Then we wandered the streets of the old city, looking in the shop windows, admiring all the bar food, stopping once for a quick snack. I wanted a bag of potato chips that were being made right in front of our eyes, so Peio bought them for me (why struggle with language when you have your own Peio). The main plaza, once again, was something out of a movie.  Surrounded on all four sides with identical arches on the ground floor, and identical windows for four stories above.  The windows had numbers above them to show where the spectator boxes went during the days when the plaza was used as a bull fight ring.

Ramon, Laura, Hana, Benjamin, Peio and Jon,.

Antxon filling a glass with cider,
at the typical distance of 3 feet.

Finally it was time to go to dinner at the cideria, back in the country closer to their village.  We took a bigger highway this time.  The village was completely dark, with winding streets, no light shining through the shuttered windows, but we wound our way to the parking lot behind one of these huge stone buildings and ducked into a doorway. A low-ceilinged room with huge barrels of cider along one wall, tables and benches around, and one small wood stove in the middle of the room. It seemed like the show started at a certain time, as everyone arrived at once, at about 9:15. The proprietor would open a barrel, yelling "gozhe" (or something like that) and everyone would crowd around, glass in hand, to catch the stream of cider as it poured straight out of the barrel. Peio told us to catch the cider, letting it hit the edge of the glass, and to get about a finger or two and then step back and let someone else catch the cider.  This went on all evening, with pauses. The owner would yell GOZHE again and everyone would get up to taste the cider from a new barrel. It was stronger than English cider, and less sweet.  After a few small samples, I was done. Dinner was served without plates, just a serving dish to the middle of the table, and we each had a knife and fork. First course was an egg and cod omelet. Yum.  Second was a hunk of steak, warm all the way through, grilled and juicy on the outside, rare on the inside. We ate and ate. She brought a second plate out and we ate some more. Peio said he could have eaten more but the rest of us were finished. Dessert was quince jam and sheep milk cheese.  All of this was with two giant loaves of bread. At the very end of the evening, the last barrel was in the room where  they press the cider, and we all wanted to see the press, so we waited to the end. The owner explained it all to Ramon and Peio in Basque, while the rest of us tried to figure it out for ourselves. The machine could process 3000 kg of apples an hour (about ten of our little 17 bushel bins) and it was understandable up until the part where the pressing actually happens.

It could not be more authentic: the post-and-massive-beam construction, the wide plank tables, the small wood
stove in the middle of the room, the 2200 liter cider barrels, the basic menu of bread, eggs, fish, meat and
cheese, he loud communal atmosphere fueled by all the hard cider you could drink.

We got home by 12:30 and went straight to bed.  Touring is hard work, even when you stop to eat a bite every few hours.  Tapas is a way of life, not something that happens only in one restaurant.  And dinner is late. What a day.  

Barcelona to Pamplona

Completely empty plaza, at midday.

After breakfast we made our way to the car rental place and got into our VW Polo and left Barcelona.  Benjamin navigated, Jon drove and I sat in the back and went to sleep.  We drove on toll roads and saw lots of dry fields and vineyards and not much of interest.  Eventually we got hungry and wanted to stop for lunch so we left the highway and found a small town.  It seemed to be asleep, or perhaps abandoned.  The shutters were closed and the streets were mostly empty.  The signs said they were closed for the afternoon.  We walked through the empty plaza and decided this was the wrong place for lunch. Just as we were leaving town we decided to stop at a Bar/Restaurant that seemed to be open.  We had lunch, nothing special but all fine. The dessert options were all different kinds of custards or puddings, which seemed like heaven to me.  We had creme caramel and mango mousse and a baked custard, the house specialty.

It was my turn to drive after lunch and the boys snoozed.  With only the skimpiest of instructions, I followed the signs to Pamplona until I needed a nap too, and we switched drivers.  When we got to Pamplona we found a parking spot and Benj sent Peio a text.  Peio and his mother Laura found us asking for directions in a shoe store owned by the Ayestaran family, as we had been instructed.

Roman ruins in parking garage in Pamplona.

After a brief orientation to their lovely 11th floor apartment (where they have lived for  their whole lives -- Peio grew up with his older sister Ione and brother Antxon, playing on the big balcony that is their outdoors) we scurried off downtown to soak up the sights. Laura is a tour guide occasionally so she could tell us about the buildings, the bulls, the history of the Basque people as they keep trying to gain independence (it has been pointed out that we have not yet been to Spain).  We saw where the bulls run, the whole 823 meters, along cobblestone streets, up hill, around corners, all the way to the ring.  There are large photos of the last 100+ years of bull running, with thousands of people cramming the sides of the roads.  We learned that most people only run for about five steps in front of the bulls before they veer off to the side because bulls are faster than people.  At the turns, the barricades are reinforced to withstand the bulls that crash into the walls, and the surface of the street is rougher so they can keep their footing.

Along the way we stopped for a pre-dinner snack in a bar.  There were plates of snacks lined up on the bar and people get a drink and a snack to keep them going until dinner, which is late.  Jon's stomach was not so good, but Benjamin and I enjoyed our little open faced sandwiches of egg and mushroom and cod.  It took me until the next day to realize that we had started on our tapas adventure.  They don't call it that.  It's just a bite, a snack, a pintxo (pin'cho).

The Gastronomic Society dining room, underground. At
far left, Laura. With their backs to the camera, Uxua,
Sylvia and Koldo. Facing the camera, Hana, Benjamin
and Peio. At far right, Inaki.

Eventually we met up with Peio's dad Ramon who had finished his workday and we all went to the Gastronomic Society -- their version of a Common House, with members who cook and eat together after work sometimes.  They can bring any guests, they keep track of who uses the kitchen and how many people they bring, and there is space for two separate dinner parties or one big party for 30 or 40 people. Peio says it is a modest version of a gastronomic society, not so fancy or rich, just a bunch of friends.  Laura had organized a dinner for us, her family, Ramon's brother Koldo and wife Sylvia and daughter Uxua and one more brother, Inaki, who has Down's Syndrome and in the last few years also has Alzheimer's.  Inaki is 51 and is cared for by various members of his family on the weekends, in a rotation, and by the housekeeper who worked for his parents before they died. (All weekend long we saw his siblings taking care of him with patience and love, seamlessly.)  We had a dinner that might have been designed for Benjamin's birthday, it was so perfect.  An endive salad, a main course of fried eggs, and sheep milk yogurt for dessert.  At every single meal there is fresh bread. Without bread they cannot start the meal.

Antxon, Sylvia and Koldo trying to scoot across the
wall standing on a ting ledge.

Eating with these brothers and wives and cousins helped us understand how and why Peio was so comfortable melting into our lives.  He has grown up in the same sort of pile of cousins as our kids did, with uncles and aunts around all the time.  After dinner Antxon amused himself by trying to balance on a little ledge sticking out of a stone wall, crossing from one side of an arch to the other. Benjamin joined him, then Peio, and eventually just about everyone was trying, and the rules of the game evolved.  It was nearly impossible since the ledge got narrower and narrower, so it became the rule that no one could touch the ceiling or the side wall to keep balance, only the wall they were clinging to.  It was most entertaining.

We drove to Muskitz and went to bed at about midnight.

Sagrada Familia and Catalan History

Last night we left our hotel after 9 PM and walked a few blocks to a restaurant that was highly recommended by the guy who took our tickets at Dulles. He told us that he goes to this restaurant every time he comes to Barcelona.  Having no other personal recommendations, we found it with his directions -- about a block before you get to the big Columbus statue, on a side street.  We managed to remember the name for a whole day because Benjamin said that "caracoles" means snail.

Just as the ticket agent described it: we went down some steps, past the bar and right through the kitchen to the dining rooms.  It was a well established place, with walls full of signed photos from famous diners like Danny Glover, OJ Simpson, Jimmy Carter, Metalica, Bon Jovi.  We were very glad when the loud-voiced tourists from Boston finished their meal and left.  The food was fine. Not incredibly memorable but made of real ingredients and well worth eating.  Benjamin and I ordered some things that were outside of our safe experience (fish dishes) and Jon had some razor clams for his first time.  We agreed that they were expert at cooking garlic to its exact crispy edge, before it gets burnt.  Dinner lasted until after 11:00 but we were some of the last to leave.  On the way out, Jon and Benjamin took a closer look at the huge stove in the kitchen and saw that it was coal-fired.

This morning we had a very nice breakfast in the hotel (it's much bigger than it appears -- the room was filled with groggy tourists).  There was a machine that made hot milk which made me happy.

Four of the eight completed
towers, out of eighteen, with
the big ones still to come.

The "trees" supporting the vault.

Jon and I took the Metro to the one sight that everyone seems to agree is a mandatory visit in Barcelona.  Of course we had not done our homework, but we have been to enough cathedrals to know as soon as we came above ground that this one is remarkably different.  It is absolutely a must-see, even though we were part of an ocean of tourists, which is unusual for us.  Everyone else probably already knows all about the Sagrada Familia and the famous architect Gaudi, but for us it was a busy couple of hours soaking it all up.  The exterior, while dramatic, is much less exciting than the interior which is filled with light and space and playful color and soaring columns that are like trees.  To our eyes, the inside space is mostly finished while the towers and turrets outside are only about a quarter done, maybe.  The official timeline for finishing is in ten years, the 100th anniversary of Gaudi's death but I cannot imagine them getting that much done in that amount of time. It has been under construction for about 120 years already (it was started before he signed on in 1883), with interruptions for war and fire.

The church has a lot of stunningly colorful light. The
stained glass was designed for the total effect,
not to tell individual stories.

Gaudi designed the vaulted
arches by hanging strings with
weights (to represent the loads
of the building) and then
flipping the result, so what you
see is the structure of the
church, upside-down.

We thought we were finished with our visit so we went outside to admire the building again and finally saw that there is an extensive museum downstairs.  Oops.  Back inside to learn all about the process and the construction and the architect and the materials.  Always so impressive to see what geniuses can do.  The geometry, the building of all those models in plaster, the engineering, and finally the art. Jon says he imagines that Gaudi did not suffer fools.  No time.  Gaudi died in 1926 (I think) after one set of towers for one portal was up, so there have been decades of faithful architects and craftspeople carrying this out.  We wonder how they are paying for all this, but it is so unusual and gorgeous, it seems worth it.  Way, way more worth it than the Crazy Horse memorial, for example.

Then we had to rush to meet Benjamin (who had already been to the cathedral/basilica/temple on an earlier trip) at our next stop -- the Museum of Calalunya.  He had spent his morning walking around and searching for a comfortable chair in a coffee shop.  For some reason, we had the impression that this would be a small museum so we decided to do that before having lunch.

Benjamin, living up to his
younger aspirations.

Now, all three of us like history and we especially like museums that tell the story of the place we are visiting.  But this time, with both Jon and Benjamin and their tendency to check facts and find out the real answers, it took us forever to move through the exhibits.  It started with 10,000 years of caves and bones and pottery, which we walked quickly through as that didn't seem particularly specific to this story.  That was the only part we sped through.  After that it was a long and slow journey starting with the Romans and moving through each century, with narratives about governance, war, civic life, changing rulers, manufacturing, religion.  Because we have been trying to piece together the history of the world for most of our adult lives, it took us a long time to try to fit the facts together with what we remembered (pitifully little).  So there was lots of stopping to use google/wikipedia to help us fit the puzzle pieces together.  After three hours we had made it through the 17th century and we thought we were finished, but Jon pointed out there was another floor above.  We were starving but we decided we had to continue.  We thought we would know a much higher percentage of the rest of the story, since our collective knowledge of the last few centuries is pretty solid.

Luckily, this was not Benjamin's fate, as it was so
many knights in the Reaper Rebellion.

In brief, the museum had a consistent narrative:  Catalunya has always been unique, with an independent language and culture (we were diverted by long discussions about what "culture" actually means, if anything), and it has managed to maintain its identity through the centuries despite the push and pull of wars and empires and religious crusades and sieges -- it absolutely deserves to be an independent state with its own government.  Since about 1980 it has enjoyed the most autonomy since about 1715.  

We ran out of gas by 4:30 and had to find something to eat.  If the crepe vendor right outside had offered anything but dessert fillings we would have stopped there.  But we found an acceptable restaurant to have tapas and ordered all the vegetarian options, for simplicity.  Later the boys looked up the ratings and it got a 3.5.  Pretty accurate. The padron peppers may have been the best thing (to them) and the bread with tomatoes was the worst (to me).

Walked back to the hotel for naps, and now we are debating whether we actually want to go back out tonight. I am voting for Benjamin heading to a supermarket for fruit and chocolate.  But everyone is just lying around with computers right now so there are no guarantees about dinner.  

Benjamin is hoping that we will stop comparing everything to places we have seen before.  I am sure that once we get out of this European city, Spain will begin to take on an identity of its own. That's tomorrow.

Barcelona

Of course you know that things don't go as planned when it comes to traveling by airplane.  Just a few days ago Dena had to switch airports at the very last minute after she got a text alerting her that her flight to Boston was canceled.  We didn't get a text but when we got to the airport we learned that the first leg was going to be delayed enough that we would miss the next one.  So they rebooked us through Paris instead of JFK, leaving about an hour and a half later than originally scheduled.  Benjamin's flight was all fine.  The three of us sat around at Dulles doing what we would have been doing at home anyway -- Jon made phone calls, Benjamin worked on his school stuff, I knitted.

Our flight was uneventful but crowded-feeling.  We got to Paris at 7:30 local time, walked a long way to the next gate, had some croissants for breakfast even though it was very much the middle of the night for us, and finally got a good but brief nap on the plane to Barcelona.

Somehow Jon and Benjamin had never managed to close the loop on how and where we were going to meet and each of them had a slightly incorrect idea about arrival times.  They are the ones who make sure to have functioning phones so that is why I am naming names here.  Jon and I got our baggage and went to wait for Benjamin in a place that seemed pretty visible.  We waited to hear from him.  Nothing.  We waited some more.  I found out how to get information on whether he was actually on the flight from Frankfort (yes).  I found out that the Barcelona airport doesn't page anyone unless they are very young or very old.  I even talked my way back into the baggage area to see if he was waiting there.  After two hours of no news (this is a familiar and not good feeling, trying to find Benjamin in airports), I told Jon to send messages in every possible form, telling Benj the address of the hotel and then we were leaving.  At that point we got a text saying he was waiting for us at the gate where he thought we would be arriving soon.  Sigh. At least he was getting work done while he waited for us in comfortable ignorance.

We took the Metro, changing trains multiple times and walking down and up long hallways that reminded me of the London Tube.  Finally we came up above ground to bright blue skies, in a foreign city at last. The subway stop is about 50 feet from the hotel, on the famous pedestrian street called La Rambla (or sometimes Les Rambles or Las Ramblas).  Immediately this part of town reminds me of Florence and Paris and Naples with its mix of decorative architecture, big churches, wide squares, and people-filled streets.  Benjamin pointed out that the signs are in Catalan, which looks like French and Spanish put together. 

Looking left from our room onto Les Ramblas ...

Our hotel is also familiar feeling -- the doorway at street level is unremarkable and when you step inside you have to go up stairs immediately since the hotel is actually on upper floors.  And the room is just barely big enough for four single beds, even though we don't actually need four.  But the view is lovely -- we are looking out over Les Ramblas with its European street lamps and balconies and hundreds of people walking up and down.  I asked Benjamin what percentage he thought might be tourists and he said half.

... and looking right. A great room location.

We didn't get around to lunch until almost 4:00, when lots of restaurants were closing for the afternoon.  We found some good options at the Boqueria -- a large covered market that is almost all prepared foods, although I am sure people buy fresh produce and fish there too. Then we just wandered around looking at the neighborhood for a while.  When Jon and Benjamin paused in one of those narrow side streets at a little museum about local motorcycles, I took the opportunity to go back to the hotel and have a nap.  

When they wake up from their naps, it will be time to go out for dinner at the time of evening that people expect to eat here.  Since we are in some undetermined time zone, we can pretend this is what we do too.   There are plenty of choices.

Back to Deep Snow Country

I spent the second day of the conference dutifully going to sessions, learning about growing ginger better and stuff like that.  Ran out of yarn in the middle of the morning and had to walk all the way back to the hotel room to get some more.

I have been trying to figure out why this conference was better than some, for me.  Maybe it was the knitting, maybe it was having Jon with me at meals, but it was also that I have things I need to know now that I am outside of my comfort zone, learning to grow vegetables in Loudoun.  Farming in Vienna poses few challenges for me, after all these years, but there are great gaps in my education when it comes to different soils and different environmental issues just 30 miles away.

Anyway, it was more interesting and I was comfortable there. So often I feel like I don't belong at a conference. Too many people, too much shmoozing, too many assumptions about my level of interest or level of experience or whatever.  I scarcely saw Ellen at all but various people reported that they knew who I was because she was using my name in all her sessions (she teaches a lot at these conferences, which is great for everyone because she is an excellent teacher).

My one contribution was that I facilitated an information session on CSAs.  They were searching for facilitators a few weeks ago and they asked if I would do it.   At the "crowd sourcing session," we had a lively conversation for 90 minutes, 30 farmers from all over the South sharing questions and answers.  Over the years I have found that I enjoy facilitating -- I don't have to be the expert or prepare a presentation, I just help the discussion flow.  It is fun for me, way better than getting up and speaking.

The big dinner at the end, with everyone in the same room, went better than usual.  Instead of holding us hostage waiting to be fed, they served dinner quickly and then started the speeches and presentations. They got all their ingredients from 25 Kentucky farms. It was impressive, in the dead of winter. We were hostages to the final drawing for the grand door prize: a walk-behind tractor.  We didn't win, but that's okay.

Jon and I were on the road by about 7:00 this morning -- a sunny, bright day, warming up fast.  We drove all day, through Kentucky and West Virginia and finally Virginia, listening to music, talking about things in the news, listening to odd podcasts, napping, eating nuts and dried mango and other car snack delicacies.  West Virginia may have been the most beautiful state on our trip. It is hard to be beautiful in the winter, but the snowy mountains and vistas and valleys and winding roads (of course, why take a big road when you can take a small one?) were striking, especially compared to the flatter, swampier areas in the South.

Back at home, lots of snow has melted but there is still a ways to go.  We went directly to the crushed hoop house to see the damage and decided that the only immediate task was to cut small holes in the plastic to let the water out as the snow melts.  Ah well.

And that ends the swoop through the South. No drama but many hours of excellent conversation and good visits.  The car did great and fuel was cheaper than ever before -- the best price was $1.57 in Mississippi.  Someone should raise that gas tax immediately.