Little Tidbits

Due to the sudden change in plans last night combined with a bad internet connection we weren’t able to book our train tickets for today.  So, Byron got up very early (extremely unusual for him) and took care of it.

We checked out and grabbed some lunch at a cute little café that is so typical in Spain and France.  There don’t seem to be many chain restaurants here, though there are a few, including several American fast food chains (McDonald’s, KFC, and TGI Fridays for example).  However, for the most part there are tons of independent cafés that have their own personality.  This one had coffee, pastries, bread, quiche, and those simple sandwiches we blogged about earlier.  We enjoyed watching a parade of little old ladies coming in to buy their baguettes for dinner, along with a little something sweet to go with their espresso. 

Little cafe

Dunkin' what?

We have been debating a day trip to Valencia for paella (founded in Valencia) and some specific sights, but ultimately decided to just head straight to Madrid.  So, we boarded a high speed train and arrived early in the afternoon.

We found our hotel easily, where we were greeted with cold orange juice at check-in.  The hotel is very nice and again were thrilled to see a “real” shower head in the bathroom!  It is cooler here in Madrid, but still very pleasant.  We spent some time wandering about and getting acclimated to our new city.  We first visited Playa Mayor, which I remember fondly from my previous trip.  It was lovely, but not quite as majestic as I remember.  We stopped by a few stores and ended up in a little restaurant for seafood Paella!  It came in an individual pans with mussels, clams, prawns (complete with eyes and legs), and fish.  Byron had to peel the prawns for me, at least until the eyes and legs were removed : )  We grabbed a kiwi tart and some other so-so pastry and got back around 11.

Anyway, we wanted to take a moment to highlight some things that are “interesting” here:

All the beds we’ve had so far are actually two separate beds pushed together.  Sarah would love it – you can push them apart and jump back and forth!

Here’s a picture of the tiny coffee we mentioned earlier.  Note that Byron has NOT taken a drink from this coffee.  That’s all you get!

People frequently have tiny dogs that they take with them everywhere.  We’ve seen puppies tucked into jackets of motorcyclists, riding the subway, at the airport… it’s really funny.

All the toilets here have two buttons like this.  One button uses just a little water, whereas the other one causes a lot of water to be used.  So, use the button depending on need.

We love those fast trains!

One day in Barcelona

We said goodbye to Nice and to France today.  The airport is right on the beach, which seems like such a waste of prime real estate.  But it makes for a lovely arrival or departure!  The sea, the city, and the snowcapped Alps were all visible from our plane window as we took off.  What a fabulous goodbye from a lovely country.

We arrived in Barcelona and found a new challenge – neither one of us speaks the language.  Here they speak Catalan, which seems like a blend between Spanish and French.  All signage is in Catalan, and maybe followed by English and then Spanish.

When we arrived at our hotel we were excited to see a shower head mounted to the wall—a simple pleasure missing from all of our hotels so far.  Europeans favor a hand held shower head, so you have to use one hand to hold the shower head and one hand to wash or rinse.  It is a bit of a challenge.

Today was supposed to be our relaxing day.  Whoops.  We started easy, having a super yummy meal in a spot filled with locals on their break.  A few train connections later and we were blown away by La Sagrada Familia, a basilica designed by Gaudi.  I’m going to take a bit of time to describe it because we really loved it and it is so different from any other cathedral we have seen.  It was begun in 1883 and is not expected to be completed until somewhere between 2020 and 2040.  In an era when building quickly and efficiently is the standard it is refreshing to see the patience required to finish such an ambitious project.  We read that Gaudi intended that art should serve the church, so every detail is thoughtful and unique. 

The outside alone is impressive, even with all the sky cranes and various scaffolding present.  It has a gothic design, and some parts of the building look like they are quite old.  Some of them appear to be melting or decaying.  There are 7 towers already built with 11 more planned.  The Nativity Façade depicts the birth story and includes a beautiful green tree and traditional style sculptures.  The other side of the church displays the Passion Façade.  Its sculptures are very nontraditional, with powerful imagery and palpable despair.

The Nativity Facade (note the sky cranes!)

One of the scenes in the Passion Facade (the plaque underneath says Matthew 27:19)

The Passion Facade (the left side is covered with scaffolding)

The main doors under the Passion Facade containing the words of all four Gospels

Once inside, everything changes.  We read that it is supposed to be like a forest, so we were expecting something like the green tree we saw outside or the hundred acre wood.  Instead, it is like being in a forest.  The pillars are tree trunks and the ceiling is the canopy above.  The stonework inside is almost all near-white, giving it a luminous quality.  Furthermore, the sun casts its rays through the extensive stained glass onto the white palette inside the church, splashing color everywhere.  Much of the stained glass is not yet installed, but the effect is already impressive.  Visual stimulation aside, it was refreshing to see a cathedral that evoked a sense of hope and light, instead of the somber darkness of the others we have visited.

Light from the stained glass shining on the pillars

View of the canopy ceiling

The main altar, you can see some stained glass is not installed

Beth is admiring the huge pipes!

The back of the church, awaiting stained glass.  The doors at the bottom will say "Our Father" in all the world's languages when completed.

This staircase wrapped around an elevator ascending one of the towers

Next we headed over to La Rambla, a well-known pedestrian thoroughfare of Barcelona and home to the largest produce market in Europe.  It was full of vendors selling their wares: produce, cheese, and meat.  Check out the pictures to get a taste of what we saw.

Beth being a tree on La Rambla

It's so hard to find a butcher nowadays that leaves your goat's eyes in its head :)

Jamon Iberico, extremely popular and yummy

All sorts of fruits and veggies we have never seen before!

Don't you just hate it when you're riding horse sidesaddle while holding a ship above your head and your shirt falls off?

Little known fact: Barcelona produces all of the world's pigeons

Our next adventure was to find churros y chocolate; a favorite treat of Beth’s on her first trip to Spain in high school.  A churro is basically an oblong donut dusted in sugar that you drown in the accompanying vat of thick milk chocolate.  Satisfied regret and malaise soon follows.

Then our night took an unexpected turn.  We were on our way back to the hotel to rest and clean up in preparation for tapas when we stumbled across tickets to a futbol match between Barcelona and Paris.  It was a very important match, and people everywhere were wearing jerseys in anticipation.  This was something we’d wanted to do but when we checked several weeks ago no matches were planned.  To make a long story short, our good friend Ross convinced us that we were crazy not to seize this opportunity.

Surrounded by 100,000+ frenzied Spaniards and a few lonely Frenchman, we cheered on the home team, doing our best to join the Catalan chants.  When things didn’t go Barca’s way, we yelled at the refs and received approving looks from our neighbors.  When Barca scored, we shared high fives and hugs while jumping around like kids.  It was such a fun opportunity to experience this part of their culture.  The game ended in a 1-1 tie, which Barca needed to advance.

A panoramic view of the stadium...and happy Beth

Game On!

What a night!

After the game, we went back to our original plan and hunted down some tapas bars.  We found two that had local crowds and dove in.  We enjoyed typical dishes, like patatas bravas and jamon iberico.  While we were in Phoenix we met a man from Madrid who told us that our favorite Spanish wine, Rioja, is not the best that Spain has to offer, so we tried two new types of Spanish wines (Ribera del Deuro—not our favorite, but still good—and a Merlot from Los Penedes which we liked very much).

We left the packed restaurant at 1:00 AM and returned to our hotel after our “relaxing” day. 

Playground of the Wealthy

We didn't have a set agenda for today, so we started it off with a scavenger hunt.  Laundry detergent, deodorant, and toothpaste, in order of importance (the deodarant was for Beth).  The last two were easy finds, though very expensive (we saw prices up to 18 dollars for a stick of deodorant, for example).  However, we located a local store with reasonable prices.  We returned home to battle and curse at our washing machine, for which the controls had no semblance of meaning, order, or reason.  Eventually we got it started, but in the process of trying to get it unlocked as well as fully dry our clothes, we ended up running the same load 3 times!

Fortunately, our day did extend beyond laundry.  We did some shopping in old town, walked the Promenade de Anglais, had yet more quiche, and then caught a bus to a hilltop town called Eze about 20 minutes away.  What a neat little town!  It is a popular tourist destination as it is up in the clouds and has an amazing view of the Mediterranean and beach cities.  They have somehow managed to keep the town fairly quaint despite the touristy environment and uber rich locals (while waiting at the bus stop we saw a Rolls Royce, Audi R8, and several other high priced cars.  The middle class seemed to favor the Range Rovers).

View from the top of Eze

The next bus took us to the tiny nation of Monaco.  Home to about 5,000 residents, it was truly a treat for the eyes.  While descending down into the town, we saw decadent high rises, the marina packed with yachts that rival small cruise ships (sorry I snapped no good pics), and of course the famous casino.  Since we didn't have a lot of time to mill around, we basically spent our time around the casino.  They are hosting the Rolex Tennis Masters tournament in a few days, so the area was appropriately decorated, and the casino was hosting a large black tie reception.  Thus, we were pleasantly surprised when they allowed us in, despite our jeans.  We didn't see any tennis pros or famous people, but I'm sure some were there.

I don't have any photos inside as they prohibit cameras, but it was really something else.  Pure opulence -- gold leaf everywhere, priceless artwork, huge chandeliers, and a crystal bar.  It is definitely a casino for the world's wealthiest.  Still, it surprised me that that it was a much more pleasant gambling experience than I have ever had.  The slot machines were spread out and had comfortable chairs, the noise level was very modest, and perhaps most surprisingly -- NO SMOKE. 

People here smoke all over the place so to not smoke in a casino just blew us away.  We played the Star Wars slot machine, but the force was not with us and we left after an hour of entertainment, a cosmopolitan for Beth, and a Johnny Walker on the rocks for me.  I'm sorry I have no pics, but below are a few of the pictures I was able to take out front.

The casino

HUGE tulips in the casino gardens

Casino at night

One of the Ferraris in front of the casino

Hard to see the hood ornament, but this is a Rolls Royce.  We saw three today.

Another Ferrari.  Yawn.

After a brief fiasco at the train station in Monaco, we made it back to Nice, grabbed a sandwich at "Pinnochio" and hit the hay early 'cause we were exhausted.  Regarding our fiasco, here's a tip: some ticket machines don't take credit cards without a microchip, and some don't take bills.  The evil machines fall into both categories.

Tomorrow (Wednesday morning) we catch a plane to Barcelona.  As some of you know, I've been studying French a little bit over the past few months, and it has been very handy.  Beth has been asking lots of questions, speaking a little French here and there, and accidentally sprinkling in some Spanish to some confused looking French folk  :).  I am really looking forward to handing the speaking reigns back to Beth!

A Nice day

This morning we got up very early (5:30) to head for the Bordeaux airport.  Our flight didn't depart until nine, but at the encouragement of our chateau owner, Catherine, we left quite early as traffic in Bordeaux is bad on Monday mornings and the airport was a 45 minute drive through the city.  We ended up with a fair amount of time at the airport, where we sipped a coffee as we waited.

This reminds me, the coffees here are TINY.  They don't really have a concept of a coffee like we have at home, but rather everything is an "espresso" and resemble the ones we have in the U.S.  You can order a "cafe american" but I've yet to see one more than four or five ounces at most.  So you have to take microscopic sips if you want any coffee to last more than ten minutes.

At any rate, the flight to Nice via EasyJet, and only took an hour.  There weren't any jetways so we boarded using a staircase, which was new to me.  The concept of this airline that is growing very popular in Europe is to make an airline more like train travel -- frequent routes, always on time, cheaper than trains, and no hassle like we're used to with airline travel.  It was a positive experience for us.

One of two staircases we used to get on.

At any rate, once we got to Nice we caught the bus to the city center and found our apartment with no problems.  It is in a fantastic location, only a couple minutes' walk from "old town" and the Promenade de Anglais.  It's got a kitchen, a separate bedroom, balcony overlooking an outdoor plaza and cafe, and perhaps most importantly a washing machine!  We weren't in dire need of clothes yet, but things were going to get dicey by the end of the week.

We took a brief nap and then walked around, looking at goods and just exploring the town.  When we got to the famous Promenade de Anglais, I discovered (Beth already knew) that the beach is not a typical one -- it is very rocky, but the rocks are all incredibly smooth.  The view is incredible, so we sat and enjoyed the sunset and the waves crashing on the shoreline.

Most are on foot, bike, or vespa in "old town" Nice.

She's still having a good time.

 

 After the sun went down, we grabbed some seafood.  We've been looking for fondue, but found out today that is "winter food" and would not be able to find it.  So, I ordered mussels, but I think the waiter misunderstood and thought I said "all" the mussels.  Look at what he brought.  I've never seen anything like it.  I managed to eat all of them, but could barely walk home. 

My camera next to the bowl is about 4 inches tall, to give you an idea of scale.  It must have been at least a hundred mussels.  But, they don't have a face, so it's okay, right sis?!  :)

We were going to go dancing, but it sounds like the clubs in Nice, though extremely popular, aren't open on weeknights this time of year  :(  So, we brought a bottle of wine back to our room and called it a night.

Town Stuck in Time

Today (Sunday) we spent the day in St. Emilion, a small village about a half hour east of Bordeaux.  Since we didn't rent a car, we traveled back and forth between our chateau on foot, which took about 25 minutes one way.  It never seemed that long though, as it was a very pleasant walk through the vineyards.

The day started off so wonderfully.  The B&B owner made the most wonderful breakfast for us this morning.  She made a fire in the fireplace (it is still VERY cold here, by their standards), and we had fresh croissants, homemade jams, and were treated like royalty.

Yummy breakfast

After breakfast, we spent most of our day just walking around town, talking to local vendors and sampling wine.  Unfortunately we discovered that it is ridiculously expensive to ship it back home (about $220-260 per case, depending on who you talked to), so we opted out, given that is more than we would typically spend on the wine itself!  However, for those buying bottles priced the hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars, the shipping would be more tolerable.  Not that "those people" would care about a measly 220 dollars in the first place.

For dinner we ate at a small restaurant that was built into a cave.  So, we literally ate inside a cave, which was unique.  At any rate, not too much to say today except that we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly, and wanted to share some pictures with you.

Very charming village

The church tower is the focal point of the town

Beth posing with the tulips outside the city walls

Sunset on our walk home.

Elizabeth's Stately Retreat

NOTE: two posts again today 'cause we had to catch up!

This morning we packed up and said, "Au Revoir" to Paris.  We caught a morning train to Libourne, a small town just outside of Bordeaux.  It was clear immediately that we had arrived in small town France.  To get a taxi we had to call individual taxi drivers.  Byron had to face the ultimate test, talking on the phone in a foreign language.  He did very well!  However, none of the drivers were available.  The address we had for our B&B was close to the train station so we decided to walk.  Once there we realized that we had the address for the office.  The owner of the Chateau offered to come pick us up, what a sweetheart!

The Chateau is perfect, beautiful and charming.  Our room is quite spacious and lovely.  Catherine, the owner, showed us a little path through the vineyards that we could take to town.  The walk was about 25 minutes, weaving between vineyards, stone walls, and numerous chateaus.  What we found was a village frozen in time since the monk named Emilion founded it in the 8th century.  Stone walls, and cobblestone roads, houses packed tightly together and shops dating back hundreds of years.  St. Emilion is beautiful, and the people here are welcoming and proud of their heritage.  Unlike Paris, we have only encountered two people here that speak any English.  Catherine had told us about a macaroon shop where they have used the same recipe for 400 years.  We experienced for ourselves why they haven't changed the recipe.  Yum!

Our room!

From a different angle

The view from our room

Weird room key.  Which way does the magnetic strip go?

St. Emilion

We headed back to the chateau for our wine tasting and tour that Catherine had offered us earlier.  We got to the see the vineyards, the tank room, the barrels full of wine and a museum with wine artifacts including a 200 year old wine bottle.  Some fun facts we learned:

• One grapevine yields about one bottle
• The oak barrels are burned on the inside after built and can significantly affect the wine taste
• The oak barrels are used for 4 years before they are discarded.  When asked what they do with them, Catherine said she wasn't sure.  Byron suggested that they are sent to California wineries, which she seemed to really enjoy (the French are a "little" proud of their wine)  :)
• The color of the wine deepens over time and can indicate if a wine is ready to drink, best viewed when shining light through the glass onto a piece of white paper.  
• St. Emilion wines are not fully ready to drink until aged for 5 years.  So, if you see someone drinking a 2010 at a restaurant tomorrow, feel free to turn your nose up at them.
• The vines at this vineyard are about 50 years old!

We sampled two bottles of wine, a 2008 from a neighboring vineyard and a 2003 from this one (Franc-Pourret).  The latter had a smokey flavor, and smelled incredible! 

Fun view, but the oak and wine scents in this room were amazing.

Nice jugs (Beth is rolling her eyes)

Wine tasting room/museum

After the tasting we went to a little restaurant that Catherine had suggested.  We ordered a scallop and white asparagus appetizer, along with a monk fish and prawn main course.  However, the first thing that showed up was a microscopic bowl of foamy asparagus soup, which any "Friends" fan will know as an "amuse bouche."  It was amusing.  We capped off our meal with a cheese plate and chocolate cake dessert.  BTW, one of the cheeses was called "comte" (we think) that we recommend it for anyone that likes Manchego.  Then we retired to our room where we had another glass of wine and promptly fell asleep.  What a day!  Je m'amuse!