Basic Tourist

Our first two days in Granada were spent marching up and down hills through an indecipherable tangle of narrow streets whose cobbles were made from a peculiarly slippery rock. 

We were chasing down a number of old courtyard houses, medieval bathhouses and baroque churches. Each one had to be arrived at within the rubric of their opening hours. 

Especially as we now both had coughs, it sometimes felt like hard work.

On the third day, we had a timed ticket to the Alhambra Palace, perhaps the main goal of our whole trip to Andalusia.

The Alhambra Palace turned out to be the ultimate tourist experience - beautifully maintained paths, capacious aseos (loos) clear maps and signposts.

The only initiative required is to hold one's ground as the guided parties stampede through, stabbing at their phone cameras. Their philosophy seems to be that any wonder of nature or architecture looks much better with THEM in front of it.

As the crowd departs, minutes later in a whirl of dust, one may snatch a few tranquil moments in each perfectly proportioned courtyard, listening to the ripple of the fountains.

We pottered all day on the well-marked paths, and I revelled in the effortlessness of being just your basic tourist.

Green Roof

 

At February half term, we have often visited Pascoe in Edinburgh. 

Equally often, we have been assailed by snow, sleet, icy winds, hail, freezing rain… you get the picture.

However, forgetful of these drawbacks and Nigel, Carenza and I went to meet Pascoe half way, in York.

Not only did Pascoe turn up, but also our old friends, heavy rain and icy winds.

We found ourselves very interested in any attraction which could boast a roof.

And then, unexpectedly, roofs became the focus of our visit.

At York Minster, we went on a spell-binding tour inside the massive conical roof of the chapter house, all built eight hundred years ago from green oak and pine, the beams braced against one another in an ingenious design so that as they shrank and twisted with time they would pull together into a stronger structure.  At the joints, symbols were carved, showing where the end of each timber should fit, like a gigantic flat-pack assembly project.  The pegs which held it all together were wooden too.  Outside this forest in the sky, there was even the lair of a peregrine falcon.

At the Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, more medieval wooden beams impressed us, and a labelled model of the roof timbers appealed to the nurd in me.

At the end of the weekend, I discovered I had taken more photos of the inside of wooden roofs than of my own children.

But then, it really was not photograph weather UNLESS we were under a roof.

Making the most of Dystopia

 The last person time I went into London, before the Winter Lockdowns, it had been to meet Annabel.

We had an interesting day and couldn’t wait to do it again.

Except Lockdown meant we had to!

We finally met again on Thursday.  Had we waited one more week, museums and galleries would have been open. One more week and the streets would have been more buzzy.

However, we would have missed a slightly surreal day drifting around the unpeopled City of London, and picking out its history.

Outside the Guild of Cutlers’ hall, we admired a beautifully executed frieze showing the art of cutlery making and were given free guide books by a (probably bored) custodian. 

A Norman Foster building was being refurbished and we tiptoed across a flower-bed in order to press our noses to the glass and examine the amazing green wall being installed in the atrium.  Seeing a man inside watching us, we thought we were about to get in trouble, but instead he let us in and told us all about it – turns out he was the project manager.

It was easy to find an outdoor table for lunch, and to take our time.

Even next week, people in the City will not be at leisure as they were on Thursday.  It will return gradually to frenzy. 

So I’m glad we took the opportunity to explore Dystopia.

I identified a possible Covid health risk here.

ITALY TRIP - Stupid, ignorant tourists

I guess I'm thinking a lot about the nature of tourism.

My friends trot out "Travel broadens the mind."

I think once upon a time, it did.
You had to ask for directions, take help where it was offered.  Accept hospitality from strangers.

But now tourism is a machine which moves the interloper through a series of well-established experiences as if they are gliding on rails.

People go on safari in Africa who have never attended an event at their local wildlife trust.
People stare at frescoes in churches who would never normally darken the doors of an art gallery.

I suppose I'd gotten snobby about all this.

But then I created the biggest tourist gaff of all.

In San Gimignano, we admired the tall towers and the Duomo.  Then we headed for the Convento di Sant' Agostino, looking forward to seeing the fifteenth century frescoes.

As we approached, some Japanese tourists turned back as if they had been refused entry.  Probably because the women were dressed in brief shorts and vest - not approved by the Catholic church.

So, smugly we entered, sat at the back and Nigel began reading from the guidebook.
Then Carenza said, "Why is that man kissing everybody?   He's not going to kiss me is he?  I don't want to kiss him."
I looked up.  A young Italian man was indeed hugging and kissing other people.

It reminded me of something.  Where had I seen behaviour like this recently?

Oh yeah.  My uncle's funeral.

I checked out the front of the church.
A coffin wreathed in flowers.
"Everybody - we're gate-crashing a funeral.  Leg it!"

We never did see the frescoes.
And we proved that, just like everybody else, we are ignorant tourists.

ITALY TRIP - Surprised by Pisa!

Pisa is a legendary tourist blackspot. 

I  had heard people say "Just get in, do the monuments and get out again."

So I was not surprised when, before we had even got halfway out the car, hawkers tried to sell us knock-off sunglasses.

Not surprised when the route towards the duomo and its leaning campanile, turned out to be a boulevard made narrow by tat stalls.

Not surprised when we saw a hundred tourists being photographed by hundreds more as they each posed as if holding up the Leaning Tower.

But what did surprise me - what actually drew a Wow! from me was the beauty of the great white and grey Romanesque duomo and its baptistry.

In an act of genius it was framed by an expanse of emerald green lawn. 

It was a place of solemn grace and even the surrounding tourist hype had not managed to make it tawdry.