We were sorry to only have had one night to spend in Toledo – especially after we learned about the special El Greco light show that was going to take place after our departure…. grrr. …
But leave we did and undertook the longest drive of the trip: 3 1/2 hours through pretty flat, dry land, mostly clay colored soil but miles and miles of olive groves as far as you could see. We figured out how to change the rental car display to English and plug in the iPod so we had hair band music for the drive (nothing wrong with a little Motley Crue driving south on the Autovia del Sur!) We only needed one stop at a very modern rest stop (with an entire floor devoted to the sale of different kinds of olive oil!) before making our way to the outskirts of the old city of Córdoba.
We found the hotel, checked in and parked (no mean feat in this place!) and then set out on the most important journey of the day: to the post office to try to mail home Frank’s sword. Well, let me say that the Correos de España doesn’t quite have the same “can do” approach as our own USPS because they took a great deal of time and quiet conversation among themselves to decide that there was no way we could mail it to the US from Spain. Ugh.
So after a lovely lunch (with chickpea and chorizo stew and several glasses of wine) we decided to not to deal with the weapon in this city but to enjoy ourselves instead. Of course, this was after Duncan the Fearless Translator tried valiently to carry on telephone negoatiations with a private shipping company that ended in frustration and a quick “Adios.”
We knew that we were too fatigued to truly appreciate the Mezaquita (the Cathedral-Mosque) so while we wandered around being awed at the outside of the building, we opted to save the visit to the inside for tomorrow. We didn’t have much else to entertain us, however, because most of the shops close between 2:30 and 6ish. So we visited a museum at the other side of the roman gate to the city. It was an interesting display of Islamic/Jewish/Christian harmony which gave a flavor for the multicultural history of the area but had the unfortunate implementation detail of unbelievably flowery language (“the soil then began to sing”) with bad pronunciations (unless there is a part of the English speaking world that pronounces “patio” with a long A).
As the thermometer outside the mezquita read 40 degrees celcius (look it up – it’s really hot!), we opted to head back to the hotel for naps and/or dips in the pool (Frank opted for the former, Gillian and I for the latter and Duncan obsessed over his upcoming visit to UVA to choose his classes.)
After a brief sojourn, we headed back out to the old part of the city to visit a restaurant that we had seen on our wanderings earlier that just so happened to be the most highly rated eatery in Córdoba on TripAdvisor – and with good reason. Luckily we were there early (9:15 pm!) and got a table for 4 at La Tranquera which outshined every other restaurant so far by a mile! The staff was cordial and good humored with Duncan’s slow Spanish. The food was amazing – I will never have a Spinach salad like this again unless there are other places that will smother it in Manchego cheese and Iberian ham – and the Rioja wine (at just 13 euro a bottle) was outstanding! The three gluten eaters ended with what appeared to be amazing chocolate-based deserts and the finale was 4 shots of Frangelico on the house. I’m not sure Gillian has recovered but she did take comfort in the street guitarists that chose to play right by our table. (Have I mentioned that most of our meals have been al fresco?)
We took a full two hours to enjoy the meal and the music and the bill was embarrassing for how much we enjoyed it. We then wandered back through lively city streets well after 11 pm and decided that we did, in fact, enjoy Spain very much.
Three things we noticed today:
- The thousands of acres of olive groves that we could see on our drive south looked much healthier than the couple of hundred acres of sunflowers we saw wilting in the sun.
- There is much more English being spoken in the streets here – and all with English accents.
- Far too many restaurants have pictures of dishes on their menus instead of words.
The Cannon Family's travel blog 