Spain2003

CHAPTER II

"Which deals with our imaginative hero's first sally from home..."
Don Quixote

Say what you want about he Guggenheim and the Prado,
but the Museo del Jambon (Museum of Ham) is museum you can really sink your teeth into. (Sorry.)

So there was always a Don Quixote-esque subplot to this trip. As you may know, my goal is to get to all of the continents before I'm 50. Before this trip, I had only Africa and Antarctica to go.

The idea was to say I'd been to Africa, but not actually spend too much time there. So, I'd go to Spain, and take the day trip to Morocco.

I was sharing the idea with Sally, who foolishly said, "Hey, that sounds like fun!"

SALLY AND MATT GO TO SPAIN AND MOROCCO
May 2003

This is a statue of Don Quixote in Madrid. The guidebook said that the only interesting thing about the statue was the "humorous poses that tourists struck while hanging off of it." I did my best.

Why surely, you didn't think I was going to go to Spain and miss an opportunity for a Hemingway connection, did you?

Here's a bust of Papa outside the bullring in Pamplona...
and some idiot pretending to be running with the bulls.

Sally and I both loved Bilbao and the Museo Guggenheim. Here, Sally is
petting "Puppy", a 40-foot West Highland Terrier sculpted from blooming flowers, which guards the entrance to the museum.

Always one to crave attention, I've thrown myself on top of a statue of a dying Ignatius Loyola at this birthplace in the Basque region.

You can ask Sally to show you her poster from the bullfight, just don't ask her what she remembers about the fight. Here she is before the fight--in the great seats we had near the President's box at the bullring.

A word to the wise: If you take the bus trip to Toledo that includes lunch at a restaurant that looks like the one I'm standing in front of to the left... run.

They spilled the soup course in Sally's lap, the chicken was almost raw (which
probably explains why I
wasn't much interested
in eating for the next two
days.

We didn't stick around to
see what they might do for
dessert.

Here are photos of Sally in Tangiers (standing in front of a mosque) and on the way back to Algeciras, with Gibraltar in the background.

One of the most fun things we did on the trip was just to
hang out on the famed Ramblas in Barcelona. (Here it is
after a shower, with the statue of Christopher Columbus
in the background.) One Saturday evening, we were
sitting there minding our own business, when we were
set upon by a bachelor party from Zurich.

(By the way, if you're planning a bachelor party, there's no better place in the world to have it than on Las Ramblas. The most popular motif for such a party seems to be to dress the bride or groom as a cow and turn him or her loose to wander the street.)

So anyway, these six guys from Zurich made the groom shave his own legs and wear a sign around his neck, offering free leg shaves to women. The guys photographed him shaving each "customer", put the Polaroid in a book and let each lady sign her photo. Each lady also got a red heart-shaped balloon and the opportunity to cut a swatch out of the guy's shirt. Our hero, whose name was Denis, had to get twenty ladies to consent to this opportunity.
And he did. It took about two hours and a lot of "moral support" from Sally, me and three sales guys from Oregon, but he finally did i. It was hilarious.

TEN OTHER FUN THINGS WE DID ON THE TRIP:

1. Played bingo (Try it in a foreign language--like Basque.)
2. Watched the Eurovision Concert. (We rooted for Beth, the Spanish entry.
       We liked her because Sally had actually bought one of her CD's to listen
       to in the car--which we did--a lot.
3. Sipped green tea while a guy named Hassan tried to sell us rugs in Morocco.
4. Overtipped.
5. Went to see "Chicago"--in Spanish.
6.   Watched jewelry being made in Toledo, then bought some of it.
7. Ate tapas--but not nearly enough.
8. Spent a morning at the Prado--then drove to Granada (200 miles away) to
       see the Alhambra--then drove to Gibraltar. Sound easy? Try it sometime.
9. Performed our own impromptu Sardana (dance) in the Square in Barcelona
        when the "regulars' wimped out because it was raining.
10. On our last night in Spain, we went to see Rothio at the Palau de la Musica
        in Barcelona. Who is Rothio? I'm not sure. She's sort of a cross between
        Maria Callas and Edye Gorme. I guess she's the Madonna of the flamenco
        set, and we were privileged to be among her loyal fans who attended the
        concert, which was held a fabulous music hall which had been designed by
        the architect Gaudi.. (Here's a tip: If you're planning to attend a concert in
        Spain, buy the cheapest ticket. As soon as the lights go down, there's a
        mad rush for the better seats.)