Sevilla

the next morning, we found the way back to an opened bus station. upon check out of our hotel near the port, the same group of spaniards we saw the night before playing cards smoking, drinking, looking haggard, were still at it. we waited at the station, paced, perused the various pork flavored goods at the mini mart at the station and soon we were on board the bus and en route to seville.
(ham flavored ruffles...)


we reunited with the bentleys in their hometown in the heart of andalusia. it was marvelous to see them again and being in the presence of people so familiar was quite the welcome change to what we found south of spain. we settled into their beautiful apartment and walked about the streets of seville (and was awe struck at the beauty of their street signage. the lettering was amazing. heres only a brief peek into the dozens of photos i took (much to the annoyance of those who were walking with me) of these beauts).



then, we took in the sunset over the guadalquivir, bought some roasted chestnuts and retired to our loft in the bentley household.

(jordan)



our time in seville was truncated by the invasive extra day we spent in morocco, but what we lacked in time we indeed made up for in ground covered and sights seen. we began the first full day in seville as any (or all) good days should start, with churros dipped in chocolate.


we ran through about three double orders of this fried goodness and then made our way to the massive Catedral de Santa María de la Sede . breathtaking in its magnitude and beauty, we took our time examining the organ, altar, graves, orange grove and walking up the thirty five ramps (instead of stairs) that lead you into the bell tower at the top of the giralda.

(walking the ramps)

(almost there)

(the top...)

(...looking down)

(crocodiles in the courtyard)

(holy bones)

(part of the organ. couldnt capture its girth in one photo)

(sleepin)

(baby clouds)

(stompin babies)

(the altar, by Pierre Dancart. also quite imposing and impossible to capture via photograph. so incredibly detailed and huge. i could have stared at it for hours and not seen everything)

(cristobol colon)

(this is supposedly the resting place of parts of christopher colombus. there has been some debate as to the validity of the claim of his remains. i dont know what to think)

(bathroom assertion)

southern spain and northern morocco were quite striking in their multi cultural/religious histories that intertwine and the architectural/societal impact that history has had and continues to have today. the cathedral in seville is a shining example of this mash up of very strong religious and cultural ties. the giralda began life as a minaret. there were many islamic accents throughout the structure, including the orange grove mentioned above, that was intitially used in the pre worship rites of muslims.

(spanish and arabic collision. the textual equivalent of the cathedral)

(in the grove)



after the cathedral we returned to the bentley estate for tortillas, spanish tortillas. i make the distinction because spanish tortillas are quite distinct from the mexican version that ive known and loved (and still do). this version is akin to the frittata. potatoes and eggs co mingle, smashed up and fried with some onions.



jordan had the flipping technique for the tortilla down to a science. he graciously gave me one and i took about one and a half of this starchy goodness. the culture of spain has not escaped the bentleys, and so when siesta hit, we would wander about, hang out on the roof or join in the siestivities. after the tortilla feed, the bentleys had to get ready for thanksgiving. we parted ways, melissa and i having our sights set on paella as a suitable substitute for the thanksgiving we were missing out on. we made a large circle in search of said paella, and ended up at a restaurant about a block away from the betleys. our thanksgiving paella feed was a bit anticlimactic as paying ten euros for a pre made microwave paella kit should be. we retired back to the apartment, watched a documentary on leonard cohen, and called it a night.

our last day in seville held the most in depth look about the city, walking most of its entirety with jordan at the helm. we learned spanish history, strolled about la plaza espana and surrounding parks and indulged in tapas (or, rip you offas. really, though, its a beautiful and delicious tradition of sampling many many foods really late at night, sippin on red wine and orange fanta) and ended our last night in seville watching flamenco. this gem in the heart of andalucia was quite charming, indeed, and we were bummed the next morning saying our goodbyes to our hosts and their beautiful adopted home.

al-Maġrib (pt. two)

not knowing what time the sun would come up, but really wanting to watch it do thus from the roof of the hostel, we awoke a good couple of hours too early. the light eventually crept over the mountains and into the valleys.

(early)


(morning)


(eyes)

chefchaouen is not the biggest of towns and this first full day provided ample time to see and explore the many blue-hued closes. in the morning light, with just a few people walking about, proved to be the best time for exploring. the afternoon to late afternoon crowds were overwhelming and exhausting.

(blues)




(and hues)



(spice ceiling)


(bee eh)


(arret!)


(serenaded)


(blessed by a toureg)


(tiles)


(tea. all day)

the search for tapes and handcrafted goods and knowledge wore on (with good results. just feast your eyes on cheb).

we eventually met back up with our canadian cohorts inadvertently and shared in the joy of mint tea, cultural centers/mosques and wandering the small blue lanes late into the night.


the next morning we arose again with the sun and resolve to hike deep into the mountains high above chefchaouen. the morning, though, we secured our seats on buses north (melissa and i) and south (the canadians, deeper into morocco), added one more to our group in the form of a world (seriously, everywhere) travelling young australian, had more mint tea and then began walking up hill. the mountains were full of goat herders, firewood gatherers, lurkers, hash peddlers and some of the most pristine hiking that ive had. the vague goal was to reach a more remote mountain town, but a good eight miles up a steady punishing incline was enough for us to opt out of the extra five miles it would have taken to reach said town. happy with our summit, the hike down didnt seem nearly as punishing and was made even less so with the sunset views we were afforded as we descended back into chefchaouen.

(firewood gathered)

(the town from above)

(goat herder)

(the crew)



(the parc)

happy with the balance of city and nature life we kept while in chefchaouen, we retired after yet more mint tea and delicious tajine to the pension for one more night of snore patterns.

the next day, tea and waiting. we met yet more world travellers, this time in the form of an amazing brazilian couple that has been living in italy for awhile now. so incredibly intelligent and funny, they made the ride up to tangier quite managable. compared to the passage down, the ride north and then back across the straight of gibraltar was as easy as it could get. while getting back to spain was fairly easy, and communicating with people a bit more managable, the fun didnt stop as we missed the last bus up to seville and had to spend the night in algeciras.
(twinkly lights of tangier, further and further away)

al-Maġrib (pt. one)

missing out on ireland redirected our path towards various areas of england that we had both never been to, and loved intensely (this youve been made aware of). from the big smokey couch of brighton, our path was influenced toward something we had all but given up on. after barcelona, we did indeed make our way to the african continent. we woke early in our hostel on la rambla and made our way down to catch a taxi to the airport. our driver seemed extra sluggish, perhaps annoyed by my three-year old spanish. exclamations of "rápido, señor! estamos muy tarde por el avión!" seemingly only made the man go slower (literally stopping a few times as we cruised la rambla, to tell me to put on my already fastened seatbelt, among other insanities). whatever the cause (a ticking meter on the cabbies dash is the most probable one i can think of), matters not for soon we boarded our plane to malaga. a few bus rides after landing in malaga, we were deposited in the port city of algeciras, one of two points in southern spain to catch the ferry to morocco from. we planned on going to the other point (tarifa), but as we discussed waiting for three hours to catch the bus to tarifa (which is only about 25 miles from algeciras) somebody heard us and implored us to just take the ferry from algeciras. following the advice of a stranger, we walked the few blocks from the bus station to the port. greeting us at the port were the first of dozens of "helpful" souls that we encountered as we guess-worked our way to mama africa. these gentlemen herded us toward their friends ferry-ticketing business. we were sold tickets, some euros more than we should have, for a ferry that boarded twenty minutes before we even entered said establishment. while our tickets were being processed for the first time, two other hurried/frantic looking tourists (one of which was carrying a surf board)entered the establishment and we exchanged greetings and soon, goodbyes. as we were returning to the ticket office, we ran into the gentlemen we met earlier and found that they, too, had been hustled. alas, we explained our situation to the ticket vendor, and were given new tickets for the same route (or so we thought). running back to the port, i looked at our new tickets and saw that our destination had been changed. we found our way through security and met up with twice mentioned gentlemen for a third time. these gents (doug and nate from here on out) so happened to be headed where we were headed, albeit through a different port on the other side of the straight of gibraltar (we caught them at the very beginning of an insanely ambitious trek of the length of continental africa. they hail from vancouver and wanted to escape the expenses and insanity of a city hosting the olympics. i hope they are doing well, wherever they are now).

(leaving spain, to go to spain)


(the rock of gibraltar)

(nate and darth)

(nate, douglas and melissa)

(spanish castle in morocco)

we landed in ceuta and somehow found the bus to the border (yes, ceuta is a spanish city on the african continent), all the while doug drawing attention/giggles/stares, toting his surf board through the streets and onto the buses of ceuta. the border between ceuta and the rest of morocco consists of a dirt lot enclosed by a chain link fence that we went on foot through, while people swarmed us exclaiming "my friend! my friend!" trying to get us to buy this, take a ride in their taxi, etc. this atmosphere did not produce in us a sense of trust, but official-ish looking people (laminated business cards hanging on lanyards from their necks)got us through customs (which included getting scanned for swine flu) and yelled at the junkies offering us rides in their taxis to get away. we eventually accepted a taxi offer from one of the laminated-lanyard fellows. his friend would drive us straight to chefchaouen for a good twenty euros a piece. all accounts settled and ready to drive off, another of the lanyard men delayed us in asking for a tip. douglas (surf board) finally relinquished a hefty amount of euros in the man's direction and we were off.

(just over the border, colors flying proud)

(cramming douglas' board into the trunk)

if only for thirty minutes. we pulled into the first town we came to, stopped at the side of the road and our driver starting demanding "passports! passports!" eventually douglas wandered off, with passport in hand, with the driver leading the way. eventually, to our relief, the two returned to the vehicle and we were officially on the way.



every single town we passed on the three and a half hour drive our cabbie would exclaim loudly and then start giggling, thus making us giggle in response (it was our main way of communicating with him, this giggling, for he didnt speak french or spanish or english and we didnt speak arabic or berber). we passed massive sheep and goat sales (sheep getting wrangled and man-handled into cramped trunks) and gorgeous mountains and valleys with the setting sun playing off of them. after climbing into the mountains where chefchaouen resides (chaouen! chaouen! he exclaimed in between giggles), our cabbie dropped us off at the city center. we were unmercifully hounded all the way to our hostel by prospective tour guides. we made it to our pension and settled in to an epic three course meal at a nearby restaurant and then found sleep in the rhythms of doug's gargantuan snoring patterns.
(hefty meal, hefty day, canadians)