The Ancient Town of Rye

Lately Chris & I have been trying to get away about every other weekend or so to places we can either get to easily on the train or that are within an hour or 2 drive from London.  Our last overnight brought us to Rye, which is about an hour train ride south of London.  Rye was once right on the coast, but violent storms centuries ago led to re-depositing of silt and reduction in tidal flow; the town now sits a couple of miles inland.

And is it ever ancient.  Everywhere you look is one building older than the next.  We didn't realize it when we booked, but scheduled in Rye the Saturday we arrived was an air show and 40's festival.  It was spritzing rain here and there, but by 4 pm the skies had cleared enough for the brilliant display of the Royal Air Force's Red Arrows.  Earlier that day they'd flown over Buckingham Palace for the finale of the Queen's Birthday Parade - we actually saw them last year too!  (See my Trooping of the Color blog from last June.)  We also had the treat before the jets flew of seeing the fabulous swing dance troop, the Lindy Hoppers, who perform wonderful Savoy-style classics with names such as "Shim Sham", "the Shag", and of course, the Jitterbug.  What fun to watch!  Earlier they'd had displays of WWII-era military and other vehicles; unfortunately they all disappeared while we were inside eating lunch and I didn't get any photos.

After the air display, and with the thought in mind that we have not been to the seaside at all in England, I really wanted to get to the beach overlooking the English Channel.  We were told that from Rye Harbor there was a walkway to the sea.  The nice lady at the Tourist Information office gave us the bus schedule to get to and from Rye Harbor from Rye, but also said we could walk if we wanted.  When we saw the sign that said "Rye Harbor 1&1/2 miles" and since by now the sun was shining we thought a good ole stretch of the legs sounded fine.  NOT.  The first half mile or so of the narrow road didn't have sidewalks, so we had to scoot to the shoulder whenever a car came by.  The rest of the walk - which seemed at least 3 miles - was, in a word, ugly.  No scenery to speak of; instead we passed storage facilities, factories, and a water treatment plant.  I did my best to convince Chris that once we reached our destination, waiting for us surely would be a picturesque harbor well worth the effort.  He never did believe me and good thing, as what awaited us was nothing worth even taking a picture of.  We did find the walkway to the beach and started to walk it, but quickly realized that making it all the way to the beach would mean missing the last bus back to Rye and we just couldn't justify making the walk back.  So a seaside scene still waits for us somewhere along the coast of England.

We did make it back to Rye by bus, then walked the town a bit more and had "a cuppa" at a nice little tea shop before  heading back to the hotel.  Have I yet mentioned the hotel?  Quite a place, the Mermaid Inn of Rye.  Thought to be built in about 1156 (then rebuilt in 1420, following the burning of the town by the French in the late 1300's), much of the authentic details and decor from that era remain.   During the 18th century, the Inn was a well known harbinger of smugglers who caroused and smoked their pipes and did unspeakable deeds, to be sure.  In 1982, Elizabeth, the Queen Mother stayed at the Mermaid  upon her installment as Warden of the Cinque Ports (of which Rye was a member.)  Alas, the room we stayed in was, I'm sure, far from any of the grandeur the Queen Mother probably experienced.  It really didn't seem to have been updated since the original plumbing and electricity were installed - and who knows when that was.  The bathroom and bedspread both looked to be circa 1970 - not a year known for it's forward thinking interior designs.  We did eat at the very lovely and atmospheric restaurant for dinner, but again, disappointingly, the service was very stuffy and the food, tho presented beautifully, was only mediocre.

All was not lost, tho' because the pub was pretty awesome.  From the hops hanging from the ceiling, to the fireplace that took up an entire wall, you could almost imagine the Highwaymen over the years who must surely have come knocking, knocking, knocking up to that old inn door.  Now is a good time to mention another tidbit about the Mermaid Inn and its history of harboring smugglers.  One of the most famous was a man named Christopher Syn, who was immortalized in the classic Wonderful World of Disney series, "The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh", which any baby boomer worth his or her salt will remember.  Click here!  The town of Rye sits in the wetland area of Wallend Marsh, part of the bigger Romney Marsh.

Sunday started with a nice breakfast at the hotel (same stuffy service, tho') then a walk around in a bit of rain to do some shopping and visit the Rye Castle Museum and Ypres Tower, originally built as a fortress in 1249.  To be honest, exhibits at both of these places (to which you can buy an inexpensive joint ticket) are somewhat amateurish at best, with displays of folding particle board (like you might see at a school science fair) and facts typed on paper, laminated, and taped on the wall in some cases.  It all just felt a bit sad in a way, which was underscored when we inquired about purchasing some  pottery, for which Rye is known, and were told that most of the potters have gone out of business and their goods hard to come by.  We definitely got the sense that the tourism industry is Rye's bread and butter, and that the community - like many others - is dealing with underfunding in some important areas.

So despite a few glitches, I would completely recommend a day or overnight trip to Rye.  We enjoyed ourselves, and could almost smell the salty air... sigh.

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Kew

Kew Gardens are the Royal Botanic Gardens in London.  I've been meaning to visit, and as we recently had an above 80 degree day, we took advantage.

They are a lot like Longwood Gardens near Meg (outside of Philly) but a lot more acreage.  I really didn't caption the names of the plants for the most part - except for some of the heritage trees.  Some of them you will know, as I did; a lot you won't, as I didn't, but they were all lovely.  The Brits really do know how to turn a spade - the gardens here are outstanding!  The first botanic garden at Kew was established in 1759 and despite a down period during the 19th century, it's been "growing" ever since.

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Oxford & the Cotswolds

It was already nearly 2 weeks ago when Chris & I took advantage of the 3-day annual End of May Bank Holiday weekend (there's a mouthful) and took the train to Oxford, a stop that's been on the list since day One.  Once again, I was overwhelmed by the beauty of the place, both the amazing architecture of the ancient buildings and the impeccably kept gardens.  Oxford is of course the home of Oxford University, which is itself made up of over 30 different colleges.  Nearly everywhere you walk you are within yards of a campus, with varying names such as Trinity, Wadham, Nuffield, and the most famous, Christ Church.

We arrived in the rain to a very unpromising weather forecast but vowed to make the best of it.  Our hotel was probably the most unique of all of our stays so far - a former prison.  Originally part of the Oxford Castle, which dates back to 1071, the facility was actually a working prison up until 1996.  I read after the fact that executions did take place there in medieval times - kind of glad I didn't know that little snippet until after we were safely checked out.  The developers used the old elements of the jail wherever they could, but they stopped short of locking us in our rooms at night.  It was a rather cool place.

After checking in we ventured off in the rain to find our recommended lunch spot and had a nice meal overlooking the Oxford Canal.  We decided to take our time eating as we started to catch some hints of the sky brightening, and sure enough, by the time we were through the sun was making a valiant effort to shine through the clouds, and eventually it won as you'll see in the pictures.  We spent the rest of the afternoon strolling and just looking at all of the beautiful scenery around us.  After unpacking at the hotel, we later walked to a nice little French bistro for dinner.  On the walk back we encountered lots of students in sweatshirts and flip flops, drinking beer and having fun and it was clear that in the end, Oxford is after all very much a college town.

The next day we opted to stroll into town for breakfast at a cozy little cafe, then got down to some serious sightseeing.  First stop was the Botanic Gardens and they were gorgeous.  We got rained upon just a teensy bit a the start but were able to duck into the green houses; the rest of the visit was dry, and then the sun was back out (more or less) for the rest of the day.  Story of my British life!  Many - but not all - of the colleges in Oxford are open for touring so we picked just two to actually pay and go into.  The first was Magdalen College (for obvious reasons) (although the correct pronunciation is "Maudlin" - hmph) and the second was Christ Church, being the most well known.  Really, how could I visit Oxford and not take in the very sight of where scenes from the first few "Harry Potter" movies were filmed? Both campuses were beautiful and worth the few quid it cost us to get inside.

After some pub snacks we continued to walk around the city and literally happened into an alleyway that happened to hold The Chequers - a pub where Chris happened to discover his favorite English beer!  What are the odds of that?  (It's called Thornbridge Ashford, by the way.)  So we were diverted for a bit.  Then we set off for a river walk along the Thames and back to the hotel.  Dinner was tapas at a chain Spanish restaurant, but it was right next to the hotel and we were tired.  We had decided earlier in the day to poo-poo the dire weather forecast for Monday (we'd been happily misled so far) and booked a van tour of the Cotswolds which we looked forward to as we went to bed.

And of course we woke up to rain that didn't stop the entire day.

But it was OK, because the tour was still lovely, despite the miserable weather!  I can only imagine how this "Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty" looks on a sunny day.  An "AONB" as it's called is an actual designation by the British Government of "a precious landscape whose distinctive character and natural beauty are so outstanding that it is in the nation's interest to safeguard them."  I just love how British that is!  So anyway, the Cotswolds are a designated AONB.  A well deserved designation for this region of southwest England, consisting of villages, hills and rolling pastures, a "cot" being a sheep enclosure, and a "wold" being a hill.  This place is full of both.


We were in a van with a very informed guide, John, and 2 couples from France who spoke little English (which was nice as we were more in the mood to sight-see than chit-chat.)  John drove us through picturesque villages with awesome names, like "Bourton-on-the-Water", "Stow-on-the-Wold", and "Moreton-in-Marsh"which coincidentally is the same village Dad & Darlene stayed in on their train tour.  The scenery was amazing, especially when we stopped at a few of the mentioned villages and toured a church, ate lunch or just strolled along the High Street.  I recently enrolled Chris & I in The National Trust, which has several properties in and around the Cotswolds.  I hope to get the chance to go back, perhaps on our own, perhaps on a better day weather-wise as it really was outstanding.


Then it was back to Oxford, back on the train, and back to London.  Another item crossed off the Ole' British Bucket List.


Pix in 2 separate albums:
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https://picasaweb.google.com/swronsky/Cotwolds?feat=directlink

Kent

Dad & Darlene arrived safely in London last week, and they may see more of the UK in the next month than we have seen in the last year.  We took it easy for the first few days and hung around Hampstead, then stayed in and watched the Royal Wedding on Friday, which was absolutely lovely and a brilliant day for the Brits!

We rented a car, and Saturday morning set out for Canterbury in Kent.  The weather was cool but sunny and Chris navigated the city streets amazingly well, considering he was not only driving a manual transmission, but driving on the completely wrong side of the road!  (Everyone here does it - it's something of a phenomenon.)  He was fantastic.  As was Canterbury.  I'm sure you're expecting some sort of history lesson here on Chaucer and his tales, but on that particular front... I got nothin'.  I'm serious.  Even after knowing we were going to be there, then having been there,  then coming back, I have no clearer idea now about who Chaucer was or why he chose Canterbury about which to write than I did before we went, although it is a charming little place.  And the Kent countryside is quite lovely.

The drive once we finally got on the motorway was very pleasant - getting out of the city itself took nearly an hour due to Saturday morning traffic.  Arriving in Canterbury, we were able to use a "park & ride" lot and took a shuttle bus into the city center which was quite convenient.  Canterbury has the look of a Shakespearean village with its Tudor-style buildings and narrow windy streets.  Its origins date back to the 6th century when St. Augustine founded an abbey there; its more recent attraction is the Canterbury Cathedral, the building of which was begun in 1070.  The cathedral is probably most famous for being the site of the controversial murder of Thomas Becket, the then-Archbishop of Canterbury, by the knights of King Henry II.  Thomas, apparently, was just too darn Catholic, and was eventually made a saint by Pope Alexander as a result of his martyrdom.  As we toured the cathedral, Dad became somewhat obsessed with the where's and how's of Becket's murder, and eventually tracked down Mr. Seares, probably the oldest docent of any cathedral in all of the UK.  Mr. Seares may have moved slowly (remember Tim Conway's 100-year old man on the Carol Burnett show?), but he knew his stuff and gave us all a detailed and informative accounting of the last moments of said Becket.  Turns out the guy was warned by the monks and could've made a run for it, but that would have made the afore-mentioned martyrdom somewhat hard to claim.

Before our tour of the cathedral, we ironically had our lunch at the delightful Thomas Becket pub.  Following the tour, we walked the medieval town streets a bit, then took the old folks to our reserved B&B outside of town to check in and let them take a nap.  Chris and I went back into town and (after getting just a tad lost) checked out the city wall and the quaint banks of the River Stour.  Later, we all had dinner together at the pub/restaurant  back at the inn; it was a busy night and although service was lacking, the food was surprisingly tasty, and we were entertained as we listened to the accounting of the Royal Wedding as read from the Daily Mail by the party at the next table.

The next day we departed for Maidstone and Leeds Castle.  The drive was really reminiscent of our trips around Ireland - narrow, windy roads and in some spots absolutely no shoulder - just a hedge or a stone wall with which the person in the front passenger seat feels she might easily become one with...  But again, Chris really did a great job driving.   Truly.

Leeds Castle was worth the trip mainly because of its gorgeous setting.  It bills itself as "the loveliest castle in the world"; I'm not sure if that's necessarily true.  The grounds were indeed breathtaking and really lovely; the castle itself was impressive, but arguably not the most impressive I've seen so far.  Originally a wooden fortress dating to the 9th century, it has served as the home of Henry VIII's first queen, Catherine of Aragon, the country seat  of Lord Culpepper, colonial governor of Virginia (my home state) and more recently the showplace of Lady Baillie, and American heiress who purchased the castle in 1926 and entertained the likes of Douglas Fairbanks, Charlie Chaplin and Errol Flynn.  The castle today shows as an homage to many of its various pasts, and is an enjoyable tour.   We ended our visit with a look around the aviary - Lady Baillie apparently had a real thing for birds - where we saw a peacock have an inquisitive encounter with a toucan, then had an ice cream cone and headed on our way back to London.

Just in the time (a full week) its taken me to write this blog, Dad & Darlene have visited Bath, Moreton-in-Marsh, Oxford, and Aylesbury.  They hope to head off to Dublin this week for a tour of the Emerald Isle.  We've enjoyed being their "home stop" on their whirlwind visit to the UK.

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Here I sit in the waiting room at Dulles Airport, awaiting my flight back "home" to London, after a lovely visit back "home" in the US.   Which one really is home?  Well, my comfy pillow and my husband and youngest son await me in London, although my 2 oldest sons, the rest of my family, and my photo albums are in the US.  So which is it?  While in the US, it was great to be back in our awesome house in Vestal, NY - but I don't feel at all attached to that community.  Kyle & I drove to NJ for a few days, where I felt right at home, although I don't have a house there.  I have many wonderful friends in the US, but have made some wonderful friends in London.  And we have some friends that live beyond both of those locations.  While in my "hometown" of Liverpool, NY, I stayed with my sister Maria and of course visited with family at the old homestead on Berrywood Road, but my childhood bedroom is now my stepmom's cool state-of-the-art sewing room.  And is Liverpool really my "hometown" anyway, when I was born at Ft. Belvoir, VA, and lived in 3 other  places before my dad retired and moved us to Liverpool when I was all of 8 years old?  I spent time with a friend of 34 years (gulp - yes, Nancy - that's 3-4 years) during my visit, and also time with newer friends of only 7 years.

What is it that makes a place home?

Lots of things.  Berrywood Road is my home because it's the place where I witnessed my mom ace "Jeopardy" and my dad nearly blow a gasket laughing at Archie Bunker, and smelled their fried onions cooking on Saturday night steak night (theirs, not ours), and fought with my sisters, and listened to Elton John on my red transistor radio, and talked to Chris on the phone for hours - after 11 pm of course - when he was away at college.  Michael was born when we lived there.  Ithaca, NY, is my home because it's the first place our young family lived on its own - moldy cinderblock walls, Campbells Soup and all.  Virginia will always feel like home as I've lived there longer than any other place - albeit not all at one time; Eric & Kyle were born there, and we purchased our first house there.  It's where both Mike & Eric live now and where I still have good pals.  Even Brookfield, Connecticut feels like home; even tho' we were only there for 2 years, it was our biggest challenge in many different ways and at the same time a great community to live in.  Medford, New Jersey is where 2 of the boys graduated high school, where we lost our 2 beloved pets, and where I struck out on my own and established a "career" of sorts completely separate from the needs of my 4 guys.  The house in Vestal is where my Christmas decorations are; our flat in Hampstead is where I keep the Pyrex baking dishes that I've had since my wedding shower.

Before our first move away from Virginia, my neighbor and dear friend Enid gave me a hook with a sign that read "Home is where you hang your hat."  At the moment, the place I hang my hat is 20 Pavilion Court in London, England.  But I suppose what truly defines "home" are the memories and experiences from all of the places, however many or few, where your hat has hung.  Having so many darn hat hooks has not always been the easiest of lifestyles, but in the end, I am blessed to have had so many wonderful places to call home.

A Year in the Life

26 March, 2010: Wheels on the ground at Heathrow.  Exhausted!  Daffodils in bloom.  Shopping for the entire flat at John Lewis.  Easter at Cristina & Wycliffe's.  First night in flat:  dog barking.  Kyle: "you have got to be kidding me!"  Cigar smell lingers.  "What do you mean you don't deliver groceries?"  Air shipment arrives; suits stuffed in cabinets. "What do you mean I don't have enough credit to get a mobile phone?" British Museum.  Kenwood House.  Linguine with cockles just doesn't cut it.  Weekend in Wissendine with the Wilsons.  Seriously - Kyle and I were not lost in Hampstead Heath!  Greenwich.  Colin Farrell?  SCOTLAND!!  Fitness walks.  National Gallery. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth - pinching myself.  Windsor Castle - awesome; Royal Ascot - freezing!  "What do you mean I still don't have enough credit to get a mobile phone?" British lamb is scrumptious. 4th of July with the American Ambassador & Bianca Jagger.  Cristina & Wycliffe's lovely wedding.  Mike visits!  Golf at the Belfry.  PARIS!!  David Hyde Pierce.  Maria visits!  Jersey Boys.  Chris sees Andrew in Oz. Anniversary at the Ritz.  Back to US.  Les Mis.  Brussels!  The Wallace Collection. STONEHENGE!  Thanksgiving in Prague with Matt.  1st snow in London.  Flights resume at Heathrow. Michael & Sarah & Eric & Lauren.  BRUGES!  Westvleteren #12. Christmas!  Fabulous Bath.  Bearable winter.  SPAIN!!  Daffodils in bloom. 26 March, 2011.  Yeah?  So what's next?

La Lluvia en España...

... not only stayed on the plain, but it stayed away from us altogether.  Our trip to the southern region of Andalucia in Spain was unforgettable - one of our best trips ever.  We'd originally been planning an excursion to somewhere hot & sunny for February - Egypt or Jordan perhaps.  However, political events in  the area gave us pause and we decided to play it safe and head to the Canary Islands, a Spanish owned volcano-created chain of islands off the coast of North Africa.   Then, the later our trip kept getting pushed back due to schedule conflicts, the more I thought that the south of mainland Spain might just be warm enough.  Many Brits travel to Spain for their  holidays so I had lots of advice and recommendations, and we decided to take our unpredictable-springtime-weather chances and go for it.

We're so glad we did!

We flew from London to Malaga (mah-lah-gah) (I learned quickly that the correct pronunciation is important if you don't want your British friends making fun of you), then rented a car - they drive on the right there - and headed to Marbella (mahr-bye-uh) and our first hotel.  (I've decided to skip the details of not being able to put the address into the GPS and going first to the wrong hotel.)  It was rainy and late so we decided to stay put and have a bottle of wine and some tapas in the hotel bar.  This was the only appearance of the "r" word on the entire trip.   I was a bit discouraged the next morning when I looked out over our balcony to the outdoor walkers below and saw many wearing hats & gloves.  But by the time we finished our fantastic breakfast and got showered and dressed, the sun was more dominant than the clouds and out we went to explore the old town area of the city - "Casco Antiguo".  It was lovely.  Marbella is a coastal city and our hotel was right on the Mediterranean Sea, so we were able to get our ocean-fix as well.  Of all places we went to an Italian restaurant for dinner that was highly recommended and it was good.

The next day we mistakenly left my coat behind in the lobby as we checked out - the good news was that I didn't need it the rest of the trip!  We left Marbella and headed for Seville, planning to make a stop on the way to a town called Ronda at the suggestion of a friend in London.  Ronda is also said to be the home of bullfighting, and who can resist that distinction?  After winding our way up the mountain road (brought the Lucy classic "The Long Long Trailer" to mind), we did go to the "Plaza del Toros" and saw the bullring and the Bullfighting museum and found both worthwhile stops.  What we weren't expecting, however, was the absolutely breathtaking views and vistas we encountered in Ronda.  The town is perched on a cliff, split by a  330-ft. deep gorge called El Tajo ("the cut").   The resulting scenery is, in a word, spectacular.  We truly had to tear ourselves away from the views in order to make it to Seville (seh-vee-uh) by dark.  And we did.

Seville is the capital of Andalucia and is a beautiful place.  Our hotel was in an area of wind-y city streets, barely the width of the car we drove.  The hotel itself was a former palace and had retained most of its original structure and decor, but the room was quite contemporary and comfy.  After a busy day (not only sightseeing, but Chris was called on some work issues dealing with the crisis in Japan and the LM employees & families living there) we decided again to stay at the hotel for dinner - which was truly the only letdown of the entire trip.  The food was, shall we say, lacking.  Our Napoleon waiter was wonderful and charming, but the dinner was disappointing to say the least, and poor Chris was forced to eat a well-done steak - those of you who know him know what a sacrilege this was.  But we rallied!

We toured the Seville Cathedral (amazing!) and royal palace (Reales Alcázare) the next day, and happened upon O'Flaherty's Irish Pub just outside of the cathedral (talk about sacrilege), so it being St. Patrick's Day, and myself being nearly completely Irish (blarney is the word you're looking for), we of course had to stop for a pint o'Guinness... and a green Heineken for me.  Yes, we've seen many cathedrals - just about every city in Europe has one - and as I've said before, they each have their own impressive distinctions; Seville's was no exception.  For example, it houses the tomb of Christopher Columbus.  Chris-to-pher-Col-um-bus for crying out loud.  And it was beautiful.  As were the gardens of the Reales Alcázare (btw, pronounced "al-cahth-uh").  In fact, these gardens were one of the highlights of the trip for me.  I almost could not stop taking pictures, as you'll see in the photo album.  Following our tours, we found the guidebook-recommended restaurant for tapas, where I tried the first of my two "mystery meals".  "Mystery" because the menus were completely in Spanish and the waitress/waiter spoke little English, so their explanation of the item sounded, well, like they were speaking in a foreign language.  I figured, hey - I ate ant eggs in Mexico City and liked them.  What's the worst that can happen?  In both cases, I was pleasantly surprised.

Back to the hotel for a needed siesta, then on to "Tablao el Arenal" for an authentic flamenco (or as Chris says, flamingo) show.  And what a show!  I will not claim to know a thing about flamenco and its origins, but I can say that it involves clapping of the hands, stomping of the feet, excellent guitar skills, singing that in some cases sounds like moans of pain, and a great deal of emotion and interpretation.  We really enjoyed it... but was not terribly disappointed when it ended.  What followed was a frustrating 30 minutes trying to find the restaurant that the concierge had made a reservation at for us; I must inject here that so far our experience in the UK & Europe has been that even if and when there is an actual street name, people don't use it when giving directions.  They simply say things like "Just go left up this road then across the square and down the alley and you will see it.  You will definitely see it!"  So then when we don't see it, and have to go back to where we asked directions and they look incredulous and say, "You didn't see it?!"  we feel incredibly estúpido.  C'est la vie.  We finally did see it and had a fine dinner.

The next morning was another simple but memorable interlude - breakfast of "york y queso" at what the concierge called "just an ugly bar on the corner - but the food is good."  It was a real working class, family-owned and operated corner eatery with pictures of Saints covering the walls and puerco legs hanging from the ceiling and no one spoke English aside from us and we still made do and it was great.  And then we left for our final - and perhaps favorite? - destination, Granada.  Ah, Granada.  I think what helps to make our stay there so memorable was the blue, blue sky.  Literally not a cloud in the 48 hours we were there.  This is why so many Brits love to travel there.  As we drove down the highway on our way there, I was struggling to get photos out the car window of the amazing views of the snow-capped Sierra Nevada mountains; little did I know that this would be the view from the hotel balcony.  The city of Granada lies in a valley which our hotel overlooked.  Also overlooking the city is the spectacular Alhambra Palace, built by the Moors from the 13th to 15th centuries, taken over by the Christians around 1500 and declared a national monument in 1870.  It's also an official UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Alhambra is a city within itself, containing remarkable gardens, chapels, bath houses, armories, palaces (yes - plural), and more of those breathtaking views I keep speaking of.  We were also fortunate both nights there to eat at restaurants in the Albaicin region of the city which itself overlooks the Alhambra.  Our first night in fact was the best dining experience of the whole trip - the concierge back in Seville had made the reservation for us at Restaurante las Estrellas del Mirodor de San Nicolas and she must have pulled some strings, as we were seated at probably the most sought after table in the entire city of Granada.  Chris fell in love with the Rioja (Viña Ardanza Rioja Reserva 2001), the service was wonderful, and the food fabulous.  Much of southern Spain has a strong Muslim/Islamic influence, and Granada is where we noticed it the most.  Granada was also the hilliest place we visited and we got a good workout just walking around the city for two days.

I'm not going to say that my expectations before our trip were low; I was a bit concerned about the weather, and that this might not be the veg-out and just relax vacation that I knew Chris needed.   As usual, my worries were for naught.  The weather couldn't have been better, and although we hardly vegged-out, we had a fabulous time in an amazingly beautiful place.  And our first hotel had a spa so Chris got a relaxing massage in as well.  We hope to get to Italy later this year which is one of the trips I've been most looking forward to - our Andalucia experience will I'm sure hold up to anything Italia will throw at us.


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We just could not stop taking pictures!!  Hope you enjoy them.