Coimbra University

Up at the end of the main drag, you turn right, pass the big mercado, and then 
take the funicular up to the upper old city and the university; here's a view of 
the funicular

In university neighborhoods, outside a publica, that is, a frat house; the Cheneys 
and William Bennett expended considerable energy wondering "why they hate us"; 
jeez, I hope it's not really McDonald's...

The old new cathedral

English spoken here

Much of the university was built during the decades-long 
Salazar regime (Franco's pal), so much of the architecture 
and adornment is national/romantic or social/realist or

whatever/whatever

Inside the old university courtyard, the great hall and clock tower; it was originally 
the royal palace; Portugal was won back from the Moors a bit ahead of Spain, and 
the capital was here until Lisbon was re-conquered

The university's old library, the Biblioteca, which houses many thousands of 
rare old manuscripts

A clandestine shot inside the library

More beautiful old tile work, this in a stairway of the grand hall (no pix inside)

Coimbra, Portugal

From Vigo, we crossed a bridge and found ourselves in another new, to us, country, Portugal; also a new language, superficially like Spanish; anyhow, our first stop was the beautiful university town of Coimbra, where we stayed two nights at the excellent municipal campground and road the bus back and forth into town.

Ground-zero in Coimbra, a very hilly city of half a million 

(in the larger environs)

Very hilly

The Santa Cruz church (I forgot to use the

fat guy filter)

Tiles everywhere in Portugal, their speciality, and best in

the churches

Interior of the church

Organ; note the out-facing trumpets, an

Iberian pecularity

More incredible tile work

The altar, and steps leading to heaven

And next door, formerly part of the church,

the very famous Santa Cruz cafe, where we

later had pastels and coffee

Interior of the cafe

The women's room, Vicki confessed, is the former confessional

Spanish Mussels

In Ireland, Scandinavia, the UK, then France, I had nearly given up on mussels. 
They were so tiny, I felt like I was engaging in mussel-infanticide, maybe 
endangering the species. Yes, perhaps the New Zealand greenies have spoiled 
me. But, on the north coast of Spain, we ran into some monster-mussels, 
absolutely  rivaling the largest Kiwi mussels. This black puppy measured 3 and 
3/4 inches and was plumply luscious.

From our campsite in Vigo--we finally turned south and it immediately grew 
warmer--the Vigo castle; actually, it was one of the stranger aires we have parked 
in, a water tap and a designated autocaravana parking place; but it was enough

Santiago de Compostuela

It was not the right time of year to see pilgrims, but we did

see plenty of signs, hostels, gift shoppes, scallop shells

(St. Iago=St. Jacques, as in Coquille St. Jacques), etc.

On the outskirts of Santiago, Sunday afternoon, a giant

market

Galicia is the Celtic part

of Spain; really

The ultra-baroque west facade of the Cathedral of Santiago

de Compostuela ("stuela"--the stars allegedly led the

shepherd to the hidden grave of St. James)

In the cathedral gift shoppe--lots of scallop shells, hiking

staffs, hats (like Gandalf's), brown robes; the pilgrimage,

properly done, requires a full costume

St. James was known at the Matamoros--the Moor killer--

alleged to have assisted the reconquista in forty different

battles, as far away as Peru in the 16th century (Moors?

really?), sometimes killing 60,000 Moors at a battle;

after turning both cheeks, one presumes

Inside the not-altogether impressive cathedral,

the choir and altar and such, with the giant

swinging incense burner (pilgrims didn't bathe

all that often)

Electric candles to burn, a euro each; eco-responsible...

St. Jimmy's bones; or someone's

Cathderal clock tower

"A wandering minstrel, I..."

We parked next to this sign, out in the university

neighborhoods, and walked, uphill, to the old city and the

cathedral, for which I think we should be awarded at least

a little time off in Purgatory; we left very quietly, too

St. Jimmy of the Compost-Pile--I won't go far into matters of despicable ecclesiastical fraud--the Camino de Santiago was one of the 2 or 3 great pilgrim routes of the middle ages; the subject of the very first travel guide even. St. James was Jesus' cousin, who preached in Spain after The Crucifiction, returned to Palestine, got beheaded, and then had his bones shipped to Spain to be buried secretly, only to be found in the 8th century, just in time for the reconquista. (As the travel writer Richard Ford said, if you can believe a Galilean preached in Spain in the first century, you shouldn't have too much trouble believing any of the rest of it.) For doing the pilgrimage, you got half-time off in Purgatory.The trail had been forgotten pretty much in modern times, but, a few decades ago, some enterprising persons managed to piece it back together, and it has become a respectable cultural/eco-tourism trek, some 500 miles of it, from various directions. Another UNECSO site, I believe. We weaved back and forth across the trail countless times in our westward drive, and, upon finally reaching Santiago, visited the famous cathedral.

Ever Westward Along The Coast

We continued our drive west, past Ferrol, to near La Coruna, an aire called, 
I think, St. Piedre del Vismar; more construction; we were impressed

More infrastructure; the weather was such that we actually saw little of the 
famous Picos de Europe, the Peaks of Europe, but what we did see was 
impressive

More beautiful coastline

Lunch by the cove/bay at Ferrol

Overlooking Ferrol

At the aire near La Coruna

Pretty typical aire for this area

Still snacking well...

Santillana West

Tourist attraction we skipped; we spent a couple days in

Santillana del Mar, visiting Altamira, awaiting the DHL

delivery, exploring; Jean-Paul Sartre wrote that Santillana

del Mar was the most beautiful village in Spain; I'd disagree,

but then I have not seen them all

Part of the Colegium in Santillana, 12th century

Our first bull...these billboard things are all over Spain,

originally part of an advertising campaign ("Eat Beef or Die"),

but now part of the countryside and national identity

The DHL package, with my new improved international

drivers license (thank you, Rebecca), finally arrived at 2PM

Friday, so we decamped and headed west along the coast,

getting as far as an aire at Playa de Santa Maria del Mar;

this was part of the view

The beach itself, typical of the coastline along here

Backtracking...San Sebastian to Santillana del Mar

Things got a bit out of order...here are some pix from the road between San 
Sebastian and Santillana del Mar, via Guernica. The problem we had getting 
LPG--with an emptying tank and freezing weather--distracted us from 
stopping at the Guggenheim in Bilbao. Oh well, next time; above, the north

coast, utterly spectacular, snowy mountains on the left, beautiful cliffs and 
beaches on the right

Approaching the small town of Llanes (I think)

As I said, snowy mountains on the left; by this time, we had scrapped our 
notions of driving to Madrid (across these mountains), but rather to await 
our DHL package in Santillana and then cling to the warmer coast, all the 
way west to Santiago de Compostuela

The Basque north coast is Spain's heavy industry belt, and 
here we saw gigantic plants, warehouses, infrastructure

construction rivaling what we saw in China a year ago; this 
is the beginning of what I think is the largest (by acreage)

building I have ever seen

Other end of the same building, a mile or so down the road

Bridges and other infrastructure going up everywhere

Largest quarry I have ever seen (well except maybe Carrara)

When the driving gets too unnerving, Vicki occasionally picks up the camera 
to distract herself; most of the pix are unusable blurs, but I think this one has 
artistic merit

We Interrupt This Blog...

The last few weeks we have been in wifi-challenged Portugal and now back in similarly-challenged Spain. There's simply been no place or time or connection to blog. We spent Christmas in Lisbon and then New Year's in Madrid, where we are presently. Hopefully, today, at a McDonald's near the Royal Palace, I'll be able to begin catching up on the last few weeks. They have been eventful. Stay tuned.

Oh, and Happy New Year to all!