In Which Team Pants Circumnavigates An Itinerary

Ole, Seville!

We are back to the United States. Currently we lounge in respective comforts at Soggy Acres, the name of my parent's property in North Carolina. We chose to break up our international travel with stops in Durham allowing us to adjust to time changes and process our journey. I believe we chose wisely. Plus, they have a hot tub.

Our last post found us in Granada, pleasantly enjoying the provincial hospitality of our expatriate friends' villa. From there we took the high speed train across the Andalusian plains towards Seville. Upon arrival we made haste to our pension, located in the heart of the old city. After checking in with an adorable and ancient senor who had the high voice of an old woman, we made our way to more foods and thence to the cathedral.

I must find a way to encapsulate the sights and sounds of our travels in a more efficient way than this, for to simply write full sentences and paragraphs skips over so many impressions we gathered. I believe the next post will be just that; a cavalcade of vignettes and impressions, peppered by photographs.

The cathedral surprised us, glimpsing over rooftops as we winded through the bottleneck streets at night. Its height watched us walk the cobblestones between the close walls. When we at last flowed out into the main plaza before it's grandeur we were welcomed by the sounds of a virtuosic classical guitarist. The instrument played off the ancient walls and the monuments. In a mist of natural reverberation and ghosts we strolled away and back again, unable to leave the aural enchantment. We bought his CD. http://www.torkematik.com

I think I could live here, but it would require some frequent visits to the Mediterranean coast, and most certainly to Morocco. Ever since reading Paul Bowles and falling in love with his prose in high school I have wished to travel to North Africa. It is the Moorish influences that attract me most to this part of Europe. I have little in common with Spanish machismo or the fiery passions germane to its natives. I prefer open spaces. I prefer contemplative vistas or complex and graceful architecture. I prefer more fresh vegetables. But to feel the power of this land's antiquity and the relaxing breath of el viento viejo, I yearn to stay.

The morning light is magical. Low, intense, gold and deep saffrons are splashed on everything making the surfaces glow and glimmer. Shadows are long and black. The air is cool, even damp. Breezes are mustered and bother along the streets like sleepless revelers. We take it in and breathe it out. I wish the whole day were morning.


But the days are long and morning only their start. We have learned to ride the ebb of the day's heat during the siesta and plan our days around it's surcease. Upon rising for the second time of the day we feel renewed and as though we have a second morning to explore. A fantastic pace that refreshes and slows our sense of time's passage.

Time is an illusion, siesta doubly so, to paraphrase Douglas Adams. We must press on. We depart Seville early early on a Monday morning. We return to Amsterdam.