Oct 29, 2006

Granada

I was impressed how painless our trip to Granada was. We woke up and headed to the bus station much later than we had originally planned. Add to that the fact that we wandered around looking for the bus station for half an hour, we could have been in trouble.

However, we managed to find the station and buy tickets just minutes before the bus was leaving. After about an hour and a half we arrived in Granada. The significant attraction in Granada is the Alhambra, an old Moorish fortress similar to the Alcazaba of Málaga, but significantly grander. We had ordered tickets online, so the first order of business was to pick up the tickets.

The cab cost about 8 euro, to the entrance of the ticket office, which wasn't bad at all. We picked up our tickets. It was a bit after noon, but our tickets were not good until 2pm. They have a ticket scheme that allows you to enter either in the morning or afternoon. In addition there is another half-hour specified where your ticket allowed access to the inner palace. Ours was at 6:30pm. You could stay as long as you want, but it only takes so long to cover the grounds.

We walked back down to the base of the hill to look for lunch, where a thriving tourist business surrounded a town square open only to pedestrians, buses and taxicabs.

A couple of restaurants advertised paella, so I thought I'd give it a try. The other option were jamon and queso houses, but we had already had a lot of that. Tapas here were a good 3.50 euro or more, compared to the 1.50 euro back in Málaga. After wandering for a good while, we settled on a very crowded bar, which turned out to be a mistake since the restaurant in the back wasn't half as full. There were a pair of japanese girls, and a big (tour?) group in another room. We ordered the paella espcial con arroz negro (special paella with black rice). I had high hopes, since I noticed that a lot of paellas were made en masse, and individual servings were simply scooped out. The special paella here was made from scratch.

We waited for what seemed like an eternity, watching boring platters shuffle from the kitchen to the group in the back. Eventually our dish came our, a steaming black mess on a in a wide metal plate that reminded me of a pie pan.
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Now I have to admit that I'm not a paella expert, and that my expectations might not necessarily be authentic. So I'll explain my expectations first; my disappointment may not have been valid. I expect an exceptionally aromatic dish of rice, cooked to the perfect consistency where the grains start sticking together in clumps, but are still al dente enough to remain as clearly individual, chewy grains, with an assortment of tasty meats and seafood. The final touch is the crispy caramelized bottom, just greasy enough to pop of the bottom of the pan with the least bit of scraping.

Instead I got a platter of stewed rice in a greyish sauce that resembled watered down octopus ink (I'm not sure what to expect from black rice). The grains were al dente, but had not gotten to the point of sticking to one another. There was a tiny bit of liquid at the bottom of the bottom and no crispy goodness. There was mainly squid or cuttlefish in the dish, with a few less than fresh shrimp and a few mussels. It wasn't bland, but it wasn't very arromatic either. The one thing going for it was that the dish for two probably could have fed a third. The whole lunch cost 23 euro, which would have been enough for an all seafood (rather than mostly starch) lunch in a less touristy district.

After spending way too much time for lunch, we walked back up to the entrance. Jason got the electronic audio walking tour, which provided some interesting tidbits here and there. We spent about 2 hours wandering the Generalife (pronounced henaralifay) gardens, the castle of Carlos V, the excavated medina, a pottery museum, a rather small and spare cathedral, and the Alcazaba (the casbah, which is the central defensive structure, which is why it has the same name as tho one in Málaga).
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The gardens displayed some ingenious looking and beautiful irrigation streams in channels running along pathways and into fountains. As you walked along, there were tiny streams of water everywhere, dropping between the different terraced levels.
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After this we took a nap for about an hour on the stone courtyard in front of the Alcazaba, waiting for our turn at the Nasrid palaces. The palace of Carlos V had a huge circular central two story atrium that was reminiscent of Roman arcitecture.
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The hour gap we had was a bit long, but too short to go back down to town and back up. If we had planned better, we probably could have started later and used the hour to investigate the grand Catedral in the city center.

The most impressive bits of the Nasrid castle were the ornate carvings that covered practically all the walls. I couldn't imagine the number of hours of work required for the work. There were also wonderfully long ponds that covered the lengths of some decent sized courtyards.
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We had purchased bus tickets for 9pm before leaving the bus terminal in the morning. It gave us about half an hour to wander downtown before hailing a cab back to the bus station. Granada is certainly much livelier than Málaga, with more people wandering the streets, but I enjoyed the intimate feel and cheap food of Málaga better (though I'm sure there's better places to look in Granada.

We got back in Málaga around 10:30, and wandered on foot back over to the centro, the downtown area. We picked a random downtown bar and got two large beers and as many things which we hadn't tried before as possible.

We started with some bacon on toothpicks, turns out they wrapped up something sweet, perhaps dates. These sat raw in the refridgerated display counter, but were deep fried up in a minute. Somehow Jason and I both ordered peppers and onions (peps y pepe), but one deep fried version, the other with olive oil and vinsger. We also had anchovies and morcilla frita, deep fried blood sausage, which, to my surprise, I actually liked. The girls who had taken the spot next to us at the bar ordered pinchitos de carne, which looked good, and were good when we tried it.

After dinner we wandered around. Since people have dinner after 9 we were expecting nightlife, but we just hadn't seen much so far. We wandered the streets looking for well dressed people to follow around, and at almost midnight, the taperias were closing but the lounges were still vacant. Eventually we saw a a stream of younger people heading down a street, which ended up at the Merced, a square we had been at earlier in the week for dinner. It was pretty lifeless on the last outing given th rain. This time howver, the entire square was packed with people drinking, either with booze from the bars aound the square or from their own private stock.
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There was no music, but the atmosphere was full of energy. People were generally quite friendly, with numerous people asking me to take their pictures after seeing me with my big backpack and camera. Unfortunately, we don't speak any Spanish, so conversations didn't go very far. Since the bus stopped at 11, we eventually made our way back out of the square and called a cab.

Oct 28, 2006

Málaga, Spain

Here's my second attmpt at blogging through Blackberry email, on the bus between Málaga and Granada. I'm not sure whether HTML flags will work here.

We've been in Málaga for a week, helping out at the Málaga Media Center. We had no idea what we would be doing before we left. We were in touch with the site director for some time. The problem was that he was actually the future site director, and had arrived less than a month before we did.

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We ended up with two tasks, to implement a shared calendar and to do a survey of their current network to determine the needs. The first was completed rather quickly; we recommended that they try Google Calendar, since it hadf pretty much everything they needed. The second took a little longer. Mapping out the network was relatively straightforward, so I spent a lot of time interviewing individuals to gain an understanding of their needs. In the process I also gained a great deal of insight into the work done at the center. I just finished writing up a report last night.

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The center is located in a neighbourhood called el Atabal, in Puerto del la Torres, a suburb of Málaga, about 20 minutes from the city core by bus. Most of the individuals working there live on the same hill, and the center owns a few apartments in the neighborhood as well. We were provided one of these guest apartments, which included a kitchen, for 11 euro per person a night. There's no internet access at the apartment. The DSL at the center is pretty speedy, but I haven't spent too much time on it. I did use it to upload my set of photos from Italy. While at the center I found much of my time was occupied, but we did finish most of the work by Thursday.

Friday was spent exploring the tourist attractions in Málaga. While it's not Barcelona, there's easily enough to entertain for a full day. We started out in the old city, of narrow winding pedestrian streets, small shops and sidewalk cafes and patios. Next was the Catedral (cathedral), which was quite grand and ornate, with numerous chapels/enclaves each decorated with its own art. From there we proceeded to the Alcazabar, a moorish palace with beautiful patterns of rainwater troughs running along the pathways, supplying numerous pools and fountains. Further (much further) up the hill was th Gibralfarro, a huge moorish fortress. The whole area was visible from the tops of its walls. The Mediterranean, hidden while in the city, could be seen all along the southern horizon.

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We took the wrong road out of the Gibralfarro, and ended up taking a long walk around the mountain, through some unfamiliar but magnificently wealthy looking neighbourhoods. We ended up at the beach, which is empty at this time of the year. The wind was howling in from the sea, whipping the waves into roaring and crashing against the beach.

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We made our way back to the city center for dinner. Jason needed to make a call to arrange his new business, so we headed back early.

So far this week we've been sampling the local foods and we've had a pretty good coverage of andalusian cuisine. On the most part english is not broadly spoken, on numerous occasion we've ordered random suggested items not knowing what they were.

Potatoes, olives, deep fried seafood, cold soups and salads with aioli are popular. Cured ham and cheeses appear a lot, and are more expensive. Meals have ranged from 5 to 10 euro per person, including a beer or wine. Sangria isn't popular here as it is in Barcelona. The equivalent drink is tinto verrano, sweetened red wine with tonic.

The tapas we've had include:
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- meatballs, either deep fried, with gravy, or tomato sauce, served with fries
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- pulpa fritos, deep fried morsels of octopus (much like the msg chicken at taiwanese bubble tea places, the fresh octopus is most excellent)
- boquaronnes fritos, deep fried small sardines
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- calamaritos fritos, deep fried baby squid
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- deep fried tiny fish (bak fan yu?)
- boiled scallop (on the shell)
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- gambas fritos, deep fried shrimp
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- pinchito de langostinos, prawn skewer
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- stuffed baked potato, with corn, olives, beets, tuna, breadsticks and garlic aioli
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- crespa con bacon, spicy sausage patty burger with ham
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- giant clam, served raw with lemon wedges
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- jamon iberico, a local cured ham, found all over, with varying quality
- queso manchego, a relatively hard aged cheese
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- porra, a cold, thick tomato soup served with jamon serrano
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- deep fried potatoes with cane syrup
- deep fried omlette with cod fish and cane syrup
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- street vendor salted almonds
- salmon baked in shrimp chowder sauce
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- pan seared snapped fillets
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- tiny, flavourful clams
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- blanco e negro, ice cream with coffee granita
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- churros con chocolate, unsweetened fritters with a cup of dipping chocolate
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- various salads, most with a creamy aioli dressing

Oct 25, 2006

Italy Retrospective

Friday
So I managed to bide my time at Heathrow, and my baggage made it through the flight intact, albeit a bit less new looking than it started out. I felt like one of the youngest people on a flight of retirees; I managed to sit beside a chatty, retired British couple, which meant I didn't manage much sleep on this leg of the flight either. The conversation was notably less salacious then the two (rather unattractive) Vegas party girls I sat near on the previous flight.

The Napoli airport is a rather dingy affair; there wasn't much going on there. I spent about an hour and a half wandering around the airport, waiting for the other three people with whom I was sharing a cab. It only took about 10 minutes to see the airport, the rest of the time was spent wandering aimlessly. Eventually their flight arrived, but the driver that was supposed to meet us was nowhere to be found. We waited around for a bit, then called. He showed up sometime after, almost an hour late.

The drive from Napoli to Ravello wasn't too bad. It took about an hour and a half, some over the motorway, and the rest through narrow roads weaving up the mountain. The sunset over the Bay of Naples was visible through the tinted windows of the van; it was gorgeous. It was the only sunset I caught, as Ravello was on the other side of the mountain, and the weather was uncooperative for the next few days.

The cab dropped us off at the entrance of Ravello. The streets of the tiny hillside town are strictly pedestrian; cars can go as far as a tunnel just before the town square, at the bottom of the hill. The Villa Cimbrone (Villa Chim-bron-neh), the hotel for the wedding, and where most of the guests were staying, were on the far side of town. They send porters down for the luggage, but with no sign of the porter when we arrived, we decided to have dinner instead. There were a couple of restaurants there, we picked one at random, the Restaurant Garden.

The restaurant had a covered patio, overlooking the Bay of Sorrento, with gas heat lamps. There were two other couples when we arrived at 8pm or so. The sun had already set, so it felt considerably later than that. Eventually, the tables filled up, dining times are much later in Italy (and Spain) than California. The food was pretty decent, I was pleased with the pick. I ordered figs and prosciutto, and a pasta with clams. The prosciutto was only so so, the figs, which came peeled, were delicious, the clams were incredibly tasty. Others had ordered calamary (way overcooked), an aubergine gnocchi (incredibly fluffy), and a pasta with impressive shrimp.
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It turns out that Hotel Graal, where I was staying, was just beside the restaurant (did I mention Ravello was tiny?). For 95 euro, I thought it was a pretty good deal. The extremely friendly receptionist identified me by name as I stepped through the door, took my passport, and sent the porter to my room with my luggage (I came back to retrieve my passport later). The room was small, but the view from the spacious balcony was exceptional. The unit had a Carrier aircon/heater. Although I was able to turn it on, I wasn't able to figure out how to get either the aircon or heat working. I eventually gave up on the unit halfway in the night when it kept triggering the circuit breaker and was constantly turning itself on and off.
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Through most of the trip I found myself feeling dehydrated. By Friday night, I had been up at least 24 hours, and was starting to feel unwell. I suspect it was something in the typhoid/polio/tetanus/diptheria/percussis/flu shots on Wednesday. I managed a shower before I conked out completely.
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Saturday
I had thought the blinds were rather thick, but a crack was enough for me to wake up to the blinding morning sun into the corner of the room.
After snapping a few shots of the view, I headed down to the restaurant, where two American families and an old Brit couple were already having breakfast. There were a selection of cereals, fruits, cold pastries, cheese and salami, and breads and local commercial marmalades (orange, lemon, grapfruit, and combined citrus). By 10am I was out of the hotel with my camera. I scouted out Ravello and made my way to the Villa Cimbrone. I wandered the villa and the grounds a bit, but not recognizing any of the tourists (the villa has an entrance fee, but I got in for free claiming that I was there for a wedding), I left and decided to head down the stairs to Amalfi, a bigger town on the coast, at the bottom of the hill.
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While the walk looked far, it ended up being further than I had thought. The narrow stairs led to a path that went between small terraced plots of fruits and vegetables that lined the mountain, and little houses that were accessible only by foot. There were plenty of small yapping dogs as I passed through the trail; luckilly most stayed behind small fences. They had me worried since I hadn't had my rabies shot. The trail eventually hit the road (the narrow, curvy one), and I walked the rest of the way worrying about cars and busses rather than dogs. I had once thought I'd come to Europe when I'm old, but there's plenty of places to hike on the Amalfi coast.
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Down by Amalfi, the water was a luxurious blue. I walked into the town square, lined with shops selling gelato and limoncello. I saw one of the groom's friends sitting on the patio of a gelateria, and joined him. He introduced me to a number of other people who were also there for the wedding. Amalfi's, although still being small, was considerably bigger and had many more tourists than Ravello. We spent a couple of hours walking around, which was enough to cover the area around the town square, although I probably could have sat around with a good book for the rest of the day. The rest of the group decided to break for lunch, but not being very hungry, I picked up some pastries (sfogliatelle with lemon cream and a fancy biscotti) and joined them.
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One of them had rented a car, so I hitched a ride back up. It was around 2:30pm and I was already feeling pretty tired, which pretty much confirmed that I was down with something. Clouds were rolling in during the drive up the hill. I had time for a short break, just enough time to get all my camera gear together and dig out my raincoat before having to shower and change and walk over to the villa for the 4:30pm wedding. On the way up, it had started raining. I walked a brisk pace up the hill, and although I hadn't gotten too wet from the rain, I was starting to sweat under my jacket. The wedding was originally planned for the gardens, but given the inclement weather, it was moved to a location called the "crypt", a verandah of sorts underneath the villa, with vaulted ceilings, but also and open wall facing the bay.
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The ceremony itself was rather short, but just long enough for the rain to stop so that the couple and guests could go back out to the garden for photos. Somehow the timing ended up just right; as the bride and groom finished with their photos and joined everyone else for cocktails inside, the rain started to pick up again. It rained throughout the dinner, and by the time people started to leave, it was a downpour. I was rather glad I had managed to bring my raincoat for the walk back out, although the villa did provide umbrellas for guests. It might have been a reason for staying at the villa itself, but probably not worth the 250 euro difference in price.

Sunday
I had originally planned on returning to Napoli on Sunday with the same group I had came with, and then make my way to Pompei or otherwise entertain myself for the day before heading for Milan in the evening. As things happened to go, someone else had booked a car for Pompei, while his travelling companion actually preferred to head stright to Napoli. We easily swapped and I joined the car that went for the tour of Pompei. We took the scenic route along the coast to the Roman ruins, passing through Salerno and a few other small coastal towns along the way. As a kid, I had read the National Geographic articles featuring the mumified remains of the buried city, frozen in its dying throes. I didn't realize that was just one element, and the main draw was the city itself. Our driver arranged a tour for us (115 euro, not including the 11 euro per person entry fee). Divided 3 ways, it seemed like a lot to pay just to get an old guy to walk around for you for two hours and talk about how great the Romans were. He only covered the area close to the forum; afterwards we wandered the rest of the ruins ourselves. I couldn't help but get the feeling that this was one of those tourist towns where tourists get ripped off. From Pompei, we had to spend quite some time in traffic, as the main motorway to Napoli had been flooded from the rain the night before. When we arrived in Naples, we spent some time wandering around the city square. I didn't actually have time to check out the palace (will have to save that for next time).
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The driver dropped the other two wedding guests off at their hotel in Naples, and took me to the airport. I spent some time wandering around, looking for a courier to send my formal attire back home, but came up empty, meaning I would have to check my backpack again, since EasyJet only allowed for 1 carry on item. I had my biscotti (which had sat in my bag till now), as well as a prosciutto and provolone panini purchased at the airport, for dinner. I couldn't help but notice that a lot of Italians were having Burger King instead. Many passengers however, were carrying little styrofoam boxes of mozzerella di bufula.
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It was almost 11pm when I arrived in Milan via EasyJet. I had originally booked the flight to Milan, since the Milan-Malaga flight was only 30 euro with all the taxes included. What I figured afterwards was that the airport was actually quite far from the city core (70km). There's a reasonably priced train connecting the airport to the city, but it would not start early enough for us to catch our early flight to Malaga. I tried booking a hotel closer to the airport, the UNA Hotel Malpensa (Malpensa being the name of the airport). Arriving at Malpensa however, I realised that the cab fare was still 45 euro to the hotel. In retrospect it might have been more worthwhile just to stay in the city center, and live with the incrementally higher cab fare. It wasn't much of a loss though, since I was still feeling pretty sick, I didn't really have much desire to explore, just to go to bed. Luckily the hotel was quite nice, with modern decor in its oversized rooms and excellent beds.
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Things to love about Napoli/Amalfi Coast:
- perfect temperatures (at least, in October)
- the amazing vista
- incredibly friendly people (it is tourist country, after all)
- seafood
- mozzerella di bufula
- tall skinny girls in tall skinny jeans tucked into tall skinny boots with tall skinny heels :)