Wildflowers in the mountains
I am of the ‘as one door closes, another one slams in your face’* school of pragmatism and so in business and in life, I usually plan for the worst outcome and then I’m not too disappointed when ‘it’ actually happens. Sometimes though, the stars just align and things occasionally go right. Here’s one of those occasions.
*that saying came from my Mum, who is as pragmatic as they come.
I had a business trip planned late last year that included a meeting in Barcelona and feeling rather proud of myself, as soon as I announced that at home, Mrs Jerry decided that as it was in school holidays and I had lots of air miles to be used, she was coming too. Jerry minor overheard and bagged himself a seat on the plane and Ms Jerry major, who was in the UK at University, also decided she was flying over to Spain and joining us. We found somewhere nice for the two newest ringins to stay while we were away and we were set to go, with my flight and a couple of days of hotel stay covered by the company.
Sure enough, with numerous flights, cars and hotels booked; around a month to go before the trip, I lost my job and I ended up feeling a bit silly. Luckily (for me), my flights were non refundable and so the company decided that I could keep them (a small win). There was no serious discussion about cancelling the whole thing as family in the UK had been alerted and they were all getting as excited as we were. A couple of weeks later, we embarked on a series of flights from Melbourne to Heathrow via Singapore and when we eventually got into Madrid, we found out what a fantastic city it is.
We stayed in a great little hotel right in the centre of Madrid, a short walk from the Palace, the Opera house and all of the best restaurants. I happened to be invited to a fun reunion with my former team from work at a very posh restaurant in the city. One of the many things I love about Spain and it was particularly evident that night, is their lack of measuring spirits when pouring. A sly raising of the eyebrows in the direction of the pourer is enough to see a glass well and truly topped off. It turned out that the kids were also quite delighted with this as later in the week as when a waiter automatically assumed that they would be having a drink as well, a moments inattention could (and did) see your 15 year old grinning behind a balloon glass of Monkey 47 gin.
Lunch…
I hadn’t quite realised just how much the Iberian pig was revered in Spain and every lunch spot and restaurant claimed that their own ‘especial’ Jamon was the best in town. I tried a couple and I can testify that as most of it probably comes from the same farms, it’s all very similar but very, very good. Looking up at the ceiling in one small place just off the main strip made me think of a blend between a meat ‘laundry’ and a scene in a horror movie.
The food was lovely and mostly very healthy, with lots of oily fish, prawns, fresh vegetables and of course, copious amounts of wine. I did however experience a moment of health related panic and mentally check my insurance cover, when one morning I glanced behind me and down before realising that I had enjoyed a magnificent beetroot goats cheese salad the day before. I consciously raised more than a few glasses in historic city squares to my dear late father in law Peter; who really did love Rioja.
On the other gastronomic hand, there were a number of diversions where deserts were concerned and whilst for the most part, I stuck with my boring but favourite vanilla ice cream, I made an exception at one of the most famous Churrerias in the city. I made several very early trips to this one at the end of my Jalk’s, returning to the hotel with bags of Churros and mugs of hot and almost pure liquid chocolate. Ohhh, it was so good.
We visited the Palace (one of several in fact) and whilst it was very impressive, when comparing it to somewhere like Windsor Castle or Buckingham Palace, I was struck by close up, how shabby it actually looked. I suspect that Spains socialist government have different priorities where spending is concerned and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, but just a coat of fresh paint and a couple of carpenters could have made a heck of a difference in a couple of weeks.
There are no photographs allowed in the Palace, which was a little disappointing and there are teams of eagle eyed security guards who are determined that there will be no selfies taken ‘in front of the throne’ and whilst they aren’t quite in the same league as the scary Babushkas who guard St Petersburg’s Hermitage museum (they have finely tuned extra sensory perception that detects the very intention of thinking how nice a picture of the Kolyvan vase would look on your wall), the stares from the female guards will reduce your self confidence to fly checking furtiveness with their stares in an instant.
In a lighter moment, whilst enjoying a long lunch at a restaurant near the opera house, we observed what may or may not have been street theatre or a candid camera skit taking place in front of our eyes. A not wholly unattractive lady with the longest legs and the shortest skirt paraded with her boyfriend around the square primping for photographs and doing “oops, I dropped my handkerchief” straight legged bends with her back to an appreciative audience (not me, of course).
My slightly shaking hands recorded this upon her retreat from the square
Barcelona came next and it was a very different city to Madrid. That’s not to say that it is a second tier city at all, just that it is well, different. We stayed in the student quarter which was busy, young and multicultural. Online, we found a bijou apartment that was advertised a having been ‘newly renovated’ and after booking, we received a note that our host ‘Juan’, was looking forward to meeting us at the train station. Of course, it turned out that ‘newly renovated’ might have meant in this decade and that our host was in fact, called Igor and the prison tattoos of St Basils Cathedral on his hand plus the initials “VOR” (thief, in Russian prison parlance), suggested a fairly interesting past. He was however, kind enough to help us up the stairs with our luggage, which was just as well, as the location should better have been be described as a ‘garret’ and I would likely have been in ICU from tumbling down and landing under our oversized suitcases.
Just have a look at the view down the stairs from our doorway.
A couple of days later, having survived the altitude upstairs, the noise of the non stop partying going on downstairs and the nauseating vertigo from looking down the stair well, we moved out and returned the hire car. We only discovered later that all of our credit cards had been skimmed following a great lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe in the main square, but oh well, you live and learn and before we knew it, we were on the train south, past Alicante and towards the coastal town of Denia.
Denia is an old fishing village with something of a piratical air. Of course, new money and Russian accents have arrived in town and there are now a few flash restaurants and some very nice boats in the Marina. You can still find plenty of the old town if you look and it’s really worth a wander round. A good friend had very kindly leant us his apartment for the first few days, which was on the outskirts of town in the foothills of the mountains. Being out of season, the complex was quiet and the very nice apartment became the base of operations for our beach and city forays, which did unfortunately mean driving home, so the long lunches had to be more or less dry, but that wasn’t too much of a problem as I was often pretty exhausted after a day on the beach and a couple of drinks would have seen me face down in my paella.
The next phase of the holiday was moving down the hill into the town of Denia properly and into one of, if not the best, hotel in town. The photograph below was the reception area of the very posh La Posada del Mar; the hotel we splashed out on for the last couple of nights. I loved the floor and it reminded me of the terracotta floor that we had in our first house in Queensland, although we had chickened out of having the intricate patterns for more sedate feature tiles.
Once again, I dragged myself out for several early morning jalks whilst there and as no-one else would get up, I explored the old town alone. I was glad to see that there’s nothing of the Benidorm or Torremolinos ‘egg and chips’ culture here and it’s a real town, where real Spanish people live. Clearly, there are quite a few retirees who also live here and during the day, tan themselves into their graves whilst lathered in Ambre Solaire. There’s also a reasonable, but not overly pretty beach. One evening, we caught up with a lovely old friend met during our time living in Malaysia and we all had dinner (and more gin) on the seafront at the pretty town of Xavier. I had a chance to practice my sketchy Spanish on the locals who smiled and politely nodded, usually bringing me what I had asked for but no doubt shaking their heads at my efforts after I’d gone, but it was fun and it impressed the kids, even if they didn’t know what I sounded like to a native ear. Of major note in the town of Denia is the fort on top of a small hill overlooking everything and it’s a great place to see the surrounding area. It was built by the Arabs who ruled the area between the 8th and the 13th centuries and they did a good job.
One morning the glassy looking sea was too much to bear and we rented a speed boat for half a day. After working through the paperwork (in Spanish) and signing all of our worldly goods away, we motored slowly out of the harbour past the mega yachts with all their ‘toys’ parked ostentatiously on their hydraulically lifted back decks. I saw more than one Russian Federation flag fluttering from the back decks of the Panamanian registered vodka palaces and I idly wondered how much salt you’d have to mine to be able to afford one of those.
We were limited on the extent of our exploration by the fear of breaking down at sea and our desiccated bodies being found months later by fishermen, but there was a three kilometre stretch of the national park that was very much worth exploring, so we risked it. We all took turns at the wheel of the boat and as our eldest daughter took multiple selfies for the ‘gram’ we sped along. I mused at the many ways that I could end up losing our security deposit on the boat and be prevented from returning home by the local representatives of the Bratva. I chose to keep those dark thoughts to myself though, as everyone was having far too much fun.
We snorkelled in a crystal clear bay at the end of the park and followed dinner plate sized jellyfish as they pulsated through extended families of sardines. The seagrass on the bottom also hid the bodies, but not the waving antennae of small but delicious looking Langostino, but of course you can’t legally catch them, it being a national park. It didn’t stop one local chipping away at Mejillones clinging to the stony walls and although I tut tutted, I was secretly thinking how nice they would taste with garlic and white wine.
One of the many bays along the coast.
Running out of time on our rental, we dragged ourselves back in the boat and sped back at a decent rate to the harbour, already planning our next meal. The return of the small vessel was thankfully painless and we wandered back to our hire car and thence to the Jamaica Inn, on the waterfront of the old town for another relaxed dinner.
Our eventual exit from Spain and return to Australia was relatively painless and the suggestion that we return another time was unanimously agreed. It had been our first family holiday (even if we weren’t all there together) for a few years and despite that I had to do some job hunting after Christmas, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.