Thirty Minutes

Córdoba 10 February 2022

Driving from Granada to Córdoba (201kms) we cross the very fertile Andalusian plain.  The intensive use of the land is noticeable, with every possible square metre taken up with olive trees or huge fields of a green crop that could be sunflowers or canola.

Our hotel is right in the centre of the Old Town, directly opposite the wall of the Mosque-Cathedral.  We drive through pedestrian streets, but luckily they are wide! Once parked and checked in we go out for a walk.  It is about 5pm. The Calle de Fiori and a recipe for Salmorejo.

   

We decided to go to an exhibition of Andalusian horse riding, with flamenco.  No photos allowed of the event, sadly.  It is held in the Royal Stables, as the building next door is the Alcazar (palace) of Córdoba, the Royal Palace.  It was pretty good too, though I could have done without the flamenco!

   

We had dinner at a fabulous restaurant, then home for a sleep before our 4-hour tour at 10am!

We started the tour at the Roman Bridge.  Although this bridge has been extensively changed, it is called the Roman Bridge because the footings are of Roman workmanship.

We then went to the Alcazar de los Reyes Christianos, which was the palace of Ferdinand and Isabella in Córdoba.  It was here that they rejected Columbus' request for funds to look for another way to the East Indies (and it was in the Alhambra in Granada that they finally said OK).

It was originally a Visigoth fortress, then with later comstruction became the home of the Ummayad Emirate, which eventually became the Caliphate of Córdoba. It was established with large gardens, baths, and the largest library in the west. Watermills from the near large river, the Guadalquiver, brought water to the extensive gardens.  In 1236 Christian forces took Córdoba during the Reconquista (historically Córdoba represents an earlier part of Moorish Spain, with Seville next and Granada as the last of the Moorish kingdoms to survive).  It became the headquarters of the Spanish Inquisition under Isabel and Ferdinand in 1482, which converted much of it into torture and interrogation chambers. Boabdil, the last Moorish ruler of Granada, was held prisoner here until he agreed to make Granada a tributary state. Napoleon garrisoned his troops here in 1810, and in 1821 it became a prison.  A lot of history for one building!!!  The gardens are amazing!!!

The exterior

The walls of the main hall, now used for weddings, are covered in mosaics which were discovered at the nearby Plaza de la Corredera.

The Courtyard of the Women, named for this courtyard's use as the women's prison during the Inquisition.

Then to the gardens.  There are 3 main gardens here, the Higher garden

    

The pools of the Middle Garden

The pools of the Lower Garden, looking back towards the castle

The Promenade of Kings

Other gardens in the lower garden

     

Then we left the Alcazar for a tour of the Jewish Quarter.  It is pretty well peserved (though small) and is a UNESCO WOrld Heritage Site.  Some of the large houses of rich Jews have been turned into hotels, and you can peek through the doorways and see what is inside.  The Jews were established in Córdoba in Visigoth and Roman times. Originally this section of the city was separated by a wall from the rest of the city, and all the Jews lived here.  But after 1260 they began to move out into the city and lived in various parts of Cordoba. These Jews of Córdoba are known as Sephardic Jews, after the Jewish name for Spain - Sefarad.  They were finally expelled from Spain in 1492 after the Reconquista.

The statue above is of the Jewish philosopher and Astronomer Maimonides, born in 1135 or 1138.and it is good luck to rub his shoees, which is why they are so shiny.

Then we visited the Jewish Synagogue, very reminiscent of a Moorish mosque. It is one of only 3 remaining in Spain. It dates from 1315 and was converted into a church in 16thC.  The interior includes a gallery for women and plaster work with inscriptions from Hebrew Psalms. In the arch a chest with the Holy Scrolls of Law were kept, and the books of the Torah.

Then we went to the artisans court or souk, the earliest known example of an area given over to a market for artisan products, as the Jews were the great silver and gold smiths of Spain, as well as pottery, and leather, metal and wood work.  Each of the archways in the photo, both downstairs and up, contain workshops.

Look at the woven mats used as blinds!  You wet these in summer and then the air entering the house is cooled as it enters.  Ingenious!!  We saw these in so many places!

Then we went to the Mosque-Cathedral.  Also known as the Mezquite, The Great Mosque of Córdoba, and as the Cathedral of Our Lade of the Assumption. Begun in 785, and last date of work was 16thC as a cathedral. A UNESCO World Heritage Site. Worth coming to  Córdoba to see.

     

The Great Mosque was constructed in 785 on the orders of Abd ar-Rahman I when Córdoba was the capital of the Arab controlled Al-Andalus. It was expanded multiple times up to the late 10thC.  The mosque was converted to a cathedral in 1236 when the Castillians captured Córdoba during the Reconquista.  Not much happened until the 16thC when a Renaissance nave and transept were inserted into the centre of the building. The former minaret (958) was converted into a bell tower.

You enter the walls and are in an orange grove.  Formerly, this was full of wells and channels of water for performing the ablutions before entering the Mosque. The covered arches on the right wold have been open archways, perhaps covered by a cloth, because the mosque was an open place of worship, and also contained schools and areas for discussing the Koran.  The arches were blocked up by Christians as their religion is a private and personal one (so said our guide).

When you go inside, the guide lets you free for 10 minutes to absorb the wonder and take photos.  You need it: this is the most amazing place I've ever seen.

This is what I see on my right

and on my left

The remains of the Visigoth church have been located under the current building, with a mosaic floor (this is subject to fierce debate by scholars as to whether it was the original church or just part of a set of ecclesiastical buildings).

Here is a map of the mosque showing the additions by later Emirs:

(By Azahara22(Revised by R Prazeres) - Wiki Commons: Plano de la Mezquita de Córdoba.jpg, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=97530555)

So we started off in the oldest part of the mosque.  An interesting fact before you read what Wikipedia has to say, is that the mosque does not face towards Mecca, but rather to Damascus.

Wikipedia: "The Great Mosque was built in the context of the new Umayyad Emirate in Al-Andalus which Abd ar-Rahman I founded in 756. Abd ar-Rahman was a fugitive and one of the last remaining members of the Umayyad royal family which had previously ruled the first hereditary caliphate based in Damascus, Syria. This Umayyad Caliphate was overthrown during the Abbasid Revolution in 750 and the ruling family were nearly all killed or executed in the process. Abd ar-Rahman survived by fleeing to North Africa and, after securing political and military support, took control of the Muslim administration in the Iberian Peninsula from its governor, Yusuf ibn Abd al-Rahman al-Fihri. Cordoba was already the capital of the Muslim province and Abd ar-Rahman continued to use it as the capital of his independent emirate.

Construction of the mosque began in 785 (169 AH) and finished in 786 (170 AH). This relatively short period of construction may have been aided by the reuse of existing Roman and Visigothic materials in the area, especially columns and capitals. Syrian (Umayyad), Visigothic, and Roman influences have been noted in the building's design, but the architect is not known."

Examples of mismatched columns - different capitals, different footongs, different colours:

     

This is the second and third extensions of the mosque, the extensions under Abd ar-Rahman II and al_Hakam II.  Now the columns match in colour and capitals:

More from Wikipedia:

"Abd ar Rahman III's son and successor, Al-Hakam II, was a cultured man who was involved in his father's architectural projects. During his own reign, starting in 961, he further expanded the mosque's prayer hall. The hall was extended 45 meters to the south by adding 12 more bays (arches), again repeating the double-tiered arches of the original design.  This expansion is responsible for some of the mosque's most significant architectural flourishes and innovations."

"At the beginning of al-Hakam's extension, the central "nave" of the mosque was highlighted with an elaborate ribbed dome (now part of the Capilla da Villaviciosa). More famously, a rectangular maqsura area around the mosque's new mihrab was distinguished by a set of unique interlacing multifoil arches."

"The rectangular area within this, in front of the mihrab, was covered by three more decorative ribbed domes. The domes and the new mihrab niche were finished in 965, and an inscription records the names of four of its craftsmen. "

"Soon after this date both the middle dome of the maqsura and the wall surfaces around the mihrab were covered in rich Byzantine-influenced gold mosaics. According to traditional accounts like that of Ibn 'Idhari, Al-Hakam II had written to the Byzantine emperor (initially Nikephoros II Phokas) in Constantinople requesting that he send him expert mosaicists for the task. The emperor consented and sent him a master craftsman along with about 1600 kg of mosaic tesserae as a gift. The mosaicist trained some of the caliph's own craftsmen, who eventually became skilled enough to do the work on their own. The work was finished by this team in late 970 or early 971."

     
     

Wikipedia: "The mosque's last significant expansion under Muslim rule was ordered by Al-Mansur (Almanzor), the autocratic vizier of Caliph Hisham II, in 987–988. Rather than extending the mosque further south, which would have been impossible due to the proximity of the riverbank, Al-Mansur had the mosque extended laterally towards the east, extending both the courtyard and the prayer hall by 47.76 meters and adding eight naves to the mosque. Once again, the same design of double-tiered arches was replicated in the new construction. The capitals produced for the hundreds of new columns, however, have a simpler and less detailed design that may reflect the hurry in which they were produced." and you can see the shoddiness of the work here in the faded red and white of the arches:

One last good view of the mosque..

Conversion to a Cathedral.  For some reason the christian kings decided to build a cathedral INSIDE the mosque.

By Américo Toledano - Wiki Commons: Floor plan of Mosque of Córdoba.svg, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=97251912

Here is a video of the cathedral within the mosque.  You can just see the main alter towards the end of the video, the golden thing.

There's a fantastic choir section, carved by a master craftsman over 26 years, in mahogany

Each one of the stalls is unique, with different carvings

and above the seats are carvings of all the saints of Córdoba - I think there are 47 of them - and how they were martyred. This fellow was hanged, see the body on a tree behind him, and the other one was decapitated.

     

The bell tower exit

We then had an indifferent lunch of local specialties and left beautiful Córdoba for Seville!

 

Granada 7 - 9 February 2022

Long drive today off to Granada.  We crossed the border into Spain with no border checks for Covid, or Covid passports or anything.  The police were conspicuous in their absence.  The other side of the highway, otoh, had GNR (Portuguese local police) lined up across the highway, although they were waving cars through.  (Portugal requires a negative Laboratory RAT test or a PCR test to enter.)

There is an enormous bridge to cross into Spain, as the river is the actual border for several hundred kms.  Once across, it is easy to tell the difference -Spain is a much wealthier country.  In Portugal, there are farms but there is a lot of land previously cleared for farming (perhaps decades ago) that is now empty of the orange groves and olives we see throughout the Algarve.  On the contrary, in Spain we see every inch of arable land being farmed.  Olives and oranges again, and sunflowers and canola (I think) as we get closer to Seville and the very fertile plains of Andalusia.

We see rows and rows of olives planted up the foothills of this area, a very intensive use of the land. 

In Portugal, the roadside petrol stops have cafes, as they do in France.  But in Spain there is a proper restaurant/cafe in a separate building, serving a proper 3 course daily menu.  We stopped at one of these for a sandwich then later on for petrol, to break up the journey of 506kms.

Worryingly, the hotel in Granada (Smartsuites Albaicin) has sent us instructions to get to the hotel car park, and warning us not to trust the GPS except possibly Google maps.  Emily printed these instructions out for us before we left so we could study up on them.  We fell at the first hurdle.  The instructions say to cross the G30 and then take it into Granada.  We cannot find the G30 on Google maps.  We keep driving on whatever A road we are on, then eventually about 15kms past Granada we do a (sort of) U turn and go back the way we came.  We recognise a bump on the map and take that turn and although it is called the A44 it becomes the G30. Woohoo, we are in Granada!!!  Now to find the hotel!

Well, it was a nightmare of tiny tiny tiny streets and buses coming at us on streets that are almost too narrow for the bus (luckily we were able to pull into a side street to let the bus past). And also luckily, there was almost no traffic.  As we approached the hotel a man came and asked us if we were looking for the hotel car park and led us to it. Phew!!!

We checked in to our 2-story suite (!!!!)

(that's the stairs going up to our bedroom and bathroom on the upper left). Lovely and spacious too. This is the view of the internal courtyard.

We are staying in the Albaicin, one of the oldest parts of Granada.  The streets are narrow with tiny laneways and hidden villas.  A really nice area to stay in.  We had a walk around, as the receptionist gave us a map to orient ourselves.  Granada has lots of 'miradors' which are places with great views of the city.  There is one next to the hotel with a great view of the lower town.

(On this terrace we will have breakfast tomorrow in 7C and no sun!!!!!)

We walked to a great mirador called San Nicolas. It is a well known spot to see the sunset, and has a good view of the Alhambra. It was crowded with young locals and tourists along the walls, but I managed to get a coupla photos.. Snow on the Sierra Nevada mountains!!

We then went on a huge walk, down to the river at the base of the Alhambra and the shops and cafes in the Plaza Nueva, which we would come to know well over the next 2 days.  Peeking into courtyards and looking at houses...

Our hotel receptionist had mentioned a taverna where the wine was great and there were awesome free snacks with a drink, but it opened at 8.30. We headed there, but arrived at 8 and there was no apparent action, so we went to the bar next door, Rosario Varela. It was full of locals and young people, but they allowed us in and we had 2 small rolls with savoury chicken mince and a drink each.  It was such a great place, very eclectic and fun!!  But we headed back into town and went to a really abysmal tourist place and ordered lots of food, luckily, because we ate hardly any of it!! The best was the small boquerones, small fried sardines where you eat the whole lot. Then up the steep stairs to the Albaicin (8 mins) and off to bed!

The next morning we ate the breakfast on the freezing terrace and went down into town to see the Cathedral. Photos only of the outside, as you are not permitted to take photos inside.  The cathedral holds the royal chapel, which is really all you can see for your money.  Isabella and Ferdinand are buried here (he is the monarch of the Reconquista, when Christian Spain overthrew Moorish Spain), along with Philip and Joanna I. Underneath the huge marble sarcaphogi of the monarchs there is a crypt, where the real bodies are buried.  A huge altarpiece also.  

Then it was time to catch the little C32 bus and head up the hill to the Alhambra, and our 3 hour tour!

As you can see, it's a huge place, and I took a huge number of photos (which is why you are getting a proper post instead of an Insta one).

We were a party of 11 plus the guide, who was fantastic. We started at the Generalife, the summer palace of the Nasrid dynasty, who ruled Granada for xxx years.  It was built in 13th C and the gardens date from that time, although there have been many modification.  But there was a good description written in 1524 and modern gardeners have  been able to reconstruct part of the gardens in the same style.  But other parts have been changed and original parts re-buried.  Lately there has been an attempt to make the gardens as they would have been in Moorish times.

         
          
     

One of the most beautiful things about these palaces is the water and irrigation channels.  This keeps the palaces cool, and provides a lovely sound. The Sierra Nevada mountains are behind Granada (good skiing!) and the Moors brought the water down to the Alhambra and the Generalife gardens by a series of channels.

The palace of the Generalife (The Architect's Garden, but archaic translation) is also beautiful.

     
     
     
     

After this, we walked back through the gardens to the Alhambra itself.  In the time of the Nasrid princes this journey was down into the river valley then back up the hill to the summer palace, but for us it is all on the same level now.

The Alhambra (lit. the Red Palace) was begun in 1238 by Muhammad I ibn al-Ahmar, the first Nasrid emir and founder of the Emirate of Granada. At this time, the Almohad rule in Spain was collapsing, with the capture by Castile of Cordoba in 1236 and Seville in 1238.  The Emirate of Granada was established at this time and remained until the Reconquista of 1492, when all Spain became Christian.  After the Reconquista, the Alhambra became the royal palace of Isabel I (of Castile) and Ferdinand II (of Aragon) (buried in Granada Cathedral). The last Nasrid sultan, Muhammad XII, surrendered the city without the Alhambra being attacked. In 1526 Charles V, who was also the Holy Roman Emperor, commissioned a new palace adjacent to the Nasrid palaces (locals are still complaining, because it was done in such poor taste!!).  Napoleon partially destroyed the site in retaliation for the Spanish, but it was European and North American Romantics who re-discovered it and brought it to international attention. It is now a UNESCO World Heritage site. 

During the Nasrid rule, the Alhambra was separate from the city below and contained all that Muslim life required - hammams, shops, Friday mosque, roads, houses, artisan workshops, a tannery and a sophisticated water supply.  It contained 6 major palaces and the Alcazaba fortress, plus the palaces of royal hangers-on and petty princes. 

As we enter the first part of the Alhambra, we see the ruins of the shops and houses of the trades and crafts people who would have lived here, and had shops and markets on the roads leading to the main palaces, as well as the ruins of other palaces.  There is still archeological work going on here.

From this street we came into a modern plaza. The first place we visited was the hammam, the bath house. 

      

Here is the palace of Charles V, who never came here and this palace was never completed, but he destroyed much of the Nasrid winter palace to buld this... 

          

The internal stone used is a local agglomerate, as Granada doesn't have marble. It is really quite unusual.  The exterior is typical of the period, 1530ish.

Next we went to the Alcazaba, though the Gate of Wine. This is the oldest building in the Alhambra and was a fortress, possibly built in 9thC.  The Emirs lived here while the Alhambra was being built. After this, it became a military fortress.

The fortress

It housed several hundred soldiers, and has great views over the city and up to Sacromonte.

Now we came to the Nasrid Palaces.  The first one we enter is the Mexuar Palace, built under Mohammad V of Granada.  This has undergone so many changes it is diffcult to know what it originally looked like. Most of the plasterwork is reconstruction.

though there is a lovely private room for the sultan, the Oratory...

we then move into the Comares Palace, built by Mohammad V. The patio between the Mexuar and the Comares palaces

The Gilded Room of the Comares Palace, so called because of the gilded ceiling

The Court of the Myrtles, named after the bushes that used to line the pond

Another view showing the Comares Tower, the highest structure in the Alhambra. And perfectly reflected in the pond...

This room is known as the Hall of the Boat because of the shape of the ceiling, but this was actually 'baraka' or blessing, but was corrupted into 'barca' - boat.

This is the Hall of the Ambassadors, where the throne room actually was

I took so many photos, but here is a small version of the detail of this lovely hall

From here we went to the Palace of the Lions.  This is the most photographed of all the Nasrid Palaces, for obvious reasons.  Many many photos!!!  These were the private quarters of the Royal Family. There are many rooms leading off the Patio of the Lions, and I'll try to show each one.  Each of these 12 lions has a different face and characteristics.

The Hall of the Mocarabes (destroyed by the explosion of a powder magazine in 1590), so this is a replica. The hall ceiling would have been the beautiful stalactite work that you will see in a later photograp - this is called mocarabe in Spanish.

The Hall of the Abencerrajes, a princely family supposedly all beheaded there at a feast, because, supposedly, one of them had slept with the sultan's wife.  Here you can see some of the stalactite ceilings.

more detail....

The Hall of The Kings, so called because of the beautiful painted ceiling. It was also called the Justice Hall from 18thC. Another stalactite ceiling.

More detail, a short video... the crowd at the end are looking out the 2 windows onto the internal garden.  Between the Hall of the Kings and the garden windows is the Hall of the Two Sisters, but it is being renovated.

Daraxa's Mirador and the view into the Partal Garden

          

Exhausted after our 3 hour tour (and I bet you are too!) we walked down into the town and had a late snack and a glass of wine at Diamante, a fabulous chain of bars in Granada serving fried seafood.  Really yummm!!

Back to the hotel for a rest, then some shopping, and back to Rosario Varela for a last great meal!

    

        

Lovely walk through the night streets, cobblestones shining in the street lights, to the C32 bus stop and a last trip on this little bus to our hotel in the Albaicin. 

The next morning, after another breakfast on the freezing terrace, we walked up to see the Palacio Dar al-Horra, the residence of Alixa, wife of Sultan Mohammad XI, and the mother of Boabdil, the last sultan of Granada, aka Mohammad X.

   

Lovely views from the observation tower!!  Then back down into town to see the Arab Baths from 11thC, although there is some doubt about that.  Very impressive they are, with cold, warm and hot rooms constructed with recycled Visigoth, Roman and Califate elements.  They survived destruction by the Christians because they were hidden inside a house. The Christians thought that these communal bath houses were dens of iniquity, even though men and women went on different days and times.

     

Next we visited the Casa Horo de Oro, a bit further down the street from the hammas.  This is a 15thC house, constructed around a rectangular patio with a central reservoir. Parts of the house are Nasrid and are preserved.

   

One thing they do in Granada is use the local stones to decorate the pavements.  These stones come from the nearby rivers and ravines, and it is thought this type of decoration has been practised in Granada since Neolithic times, and certainly through Roman and Nasrid times.  White stones come from the River Darro and black ones from the River Gentil, at the church of San Francisco in Granada.

   

     

I didn't want to leave this lovely city.  But we did, navigated our way out of the tiny streets, and headed for Cordoba!!!

 

Day 13 - Gubbio and Perugia

Big day today, we are going to Gubbio and Perugia!! On the bus at 8.30!!

First stop Gubbio.  What a beautiful and ancient town this is, sort of built on a hill, and with a grand palace and large piazza dominating the view, to impress the enemies.

The building in front is a fabric stretching hall, the only one of its kind in Italy. 17thC.

Our first stop was to a church, St Francis and the wolf. A wolf is supposed to have been interred in the altar, but offical inspection reveals it was a bandit, also known as wolves.

Next we went up the hill to the Palazzo dei Consuli, a ducal palace and now a museum, holding the 7 Iguvine tablets, bronze tablets that constitute the largest surviving text in the Umbrian Language. 

One of the most interesting things about this town is the presence of the 'door of the dead', a small door near the main door, which was supposed to be where anyone who had died within the house was carried out.  Apparently this is not true, but the real purpose of these doors is not known.  Another supposition is that they were used when someone unknown came calling at night - because they are slightly higher than street level they gave the homeowner an advantage.

There is a cablecar in Gubbio that takes you to the top of the mountain, and from where you get a fantastic view of the city.  Not your usual cable car - this is a metal cage that holds 2!!

It really is a lovely town, of narrow lanes and grey stone.

and of course the lovely castle!

One other iinteresting piece of history befor we leave Gubbio - it was a town that supported the Guelph side in the guelph/ghiberlline wars.  You can tell this because in a town that supports the Guelphs, the parapets have 2 horns on them instead of one (Ghibellines).  In most of the past posts you can see the 2-horned parapets, as so far I haven't been in a town that supported the Ghibellines. Since this castle was built in 1332, it pre-dates the Gueloh/Ghibelline contest.  Recanati has the 2-horned parapets too!!

On to Perugia!!

What a lovely city this is!  We parked in the bus station way outside the city, but Perugia has a minimetro, an automated small railway that picks people up from the parking stations and takes them into town!

We went straight to the main square, the Piazza 4 Novembre. But there was a medieval spectacle happening in Perugia, so everywhere we looked there were people in costume.

More on this later.  First we walked throgh the piazza and past the beautiful Fontana Maggiore, mde in 1277 by the Pisano brothers.

We then walked through some of the oldest part of the town 

where buildings run into each other and parts of one intersect with parts of others, to the old acquaduct, now a walking path

We kept on walking, past the original Etruscan walls

to the Etruscan Arch

The water in this fountain is delightfully clear and cool on this very hot day!!

Back to the main square again, and the Palazzo del Priori

This is only the end of the rectangular building, but in here is the Sala dei Notari.

whose walls and ceilings are highly decorated

and now back to the medieval festival.  There are 5 distinct areas of the city, belonging to different saints/lords/colours whatever. These are the sun yelloe and white), feathers (red, black and white), crossed keys (black and yellow), elephant and castle (green and white), blue chain (blue and black).  Their flags are hanging on the wall of the Palazzo dei Priori (which incidentally holds one of the most outstanding provincial collections of art), but today is full of people in costume.

 

 

More costumed folks

The next thing that happened was that these fantastically costumed people took off to the other side of the square and began to throw flags to music!!!

It was just amazing!!

Then everyone came out of the building and went down to another square, the piazza Giacomo Matteotti, and set themselves up in teams for a tug of war.  The aim was to move the 'castle tower' towards the winning side.

Here is a video..

Yay!! The blue team won!!

Home to Recanati and of course the fiesta for San Vito was still in full swing! Even more people than had been here on Friday!!!!

Day 12 - Camerano, Recanati

After school today and a lunch break I went on an optional excursion to Camerano. The first stop was to a vineyard owned by the Silvano Strologo family.  They produce Rosso Cornero wine using Montelpulciano grapes, and were awarded a DOCG certificate for one of their wines in 2004.  Rosso Cornero is a wine region on the hills along the coast between Ancona and Sirolo.  One of my favourite wines ever, Cacciatore dei Sogni, is a Rosso Cornero and comes from this area, and I have found it here in Recanati!

We were taken iinto the maturation room and saw the steel tanks for the initial fermentation, then into the next room where the wine is stored in carriques of french oak.  This is soooo fascinating and informative when it's all in Italian! 

Then we had a wine tasting.  We were seated at tales of 10, and plates of mortadella, salami, cheese and bread were brought out.  This feast continued while we tasted 5 of their wines.  The best was the reserve aged Rosso Cornero, but I didn't buy any.

Then we got back on the bus and went into the town of Camerano. Camerano's interesting thing is that it has miles of tunnels and grottos under the city.  Most are under private houses and thus unavailable, but a lot of it is under streets and publicly owned land and buildings, so these are open to the public, guided tours only.  We divided into 2 groups and set off.  Italian guided tour though!

It was absolutely fascinating!  No wonder you need a guide, as there are miles of tunnels twisting around.  Here's the map....

We started in the yellow area at the bottom and went to the first green spoke.  The history is that no-one knnows exactly how old the tunnels are, but the belief is thousands of years, and that they were first used by early tribes for living then safety.  As buidings grew, the areas were used as storage, and by the 1refuges 8thC the large houses above were using gthem as refuges for people holding anti-government/church sentiments.  The tunnels did not connect by then as they show on the map, as each family walled off the bit that belonged to them.  One of the families was a significant member of a revolutionary group and the held secret meetings in these rooms.  There's also a couple of churches down here.

This is a stairway leadng to a private house, and is the usual way that the families would access their section of the tunnels

In this section a walkway has been built arund this central column.  The floor slopes slightly up from left to right the whole way around, so that water seeping through the rocks could be collected easily and used by the family.

They think that a some time a chamber near here was used as prison cells, as there is only one entrance/exit. On the map this is the bit that looks like a kids drawing of a man.  The central column is the empty bit in the head. 

We walked along to the end of the tunnel system, probably where it is a lighter brown at the bottom of the map on the left.  There is another circular area where water was collected, and the gates from the house where they would come down and collect it.  Also wine was stored here, as it is quite cool, like the Frassassi caves.

We then went back a differe t way, up lots of stairs, and came out on the street. We walked through the square and to what is left of a very old church that has been incorporated into the local council chambers. We wnet into the building and down into the remains of an even older church.  The sign says:
"... make it possible to compare it with other ancient hypogeums in the Mediterranean area and above all with the hermitage of the St Basilio monks. A bas relief Greek cross on the vault confirms this."

and there are fossilised shells in the roof from the days when this area was covered by the sea.  I hadn't expected anything like this, and was completely enthralled!

We returned to Recanati about 9, and I was still so full from the plates of 'produci tipici della regione' that I wandered around the tow, which was FULL of people that had come in for the festival of San Vito. Stalls everywhere selling the strangest things - vacuum cleaners and window washers and fridge magnets and lots and lots of food stalls with long queues.  Sweets and fairy floss and huge balloons, saucepans and indoor furniture, handbags and toys. Very colourful and noisy!

Day 11 - Recanati (13/6)

Slow day today. A free morning then lessons in the afternoon. I had some drinks in the square with some of the students.  Tomorrow a festival begins.  It is for St Vito, the patron saint of the town.  Tonight there was a procession of priests in long brown robes, the sort worn by the saint,  followed by a troop of young people clothed in white, then the saint and many townspeople. There were fireworks later (which I missed but which were apparently very good).

I have a small video but I don't know how to insert it.....

Day 10 - Villa Bounaccorsi, continued

I realised I hadn't finished talkinng about the Villa Buonaccorsi, so here's an additional post.

After we went through the house, we went into the gardens.  These are maintained beautifully.

And of course, since it is on a hill, the beautiful views of the surounding countryside.

After we had explored the garden we went to dinner.  The tables were set up beside the garden, so we ate outside.  There was music, singing by all the students from an italian song book, drinking games from the teachers, lots and lots of dancing and free flowing wine!  It was a terrific fun night, but I only have videos of the evening and I don't know how to embed them!

 

Day 10 - Recanati, Villa Buonaccorsi

This morning we finished school at the break and the teacher took us to the Museum of Emigration.  It was extremely interesting, even though I could not understand the guide.  Luckily there were stories on the walls which I could read.  Italy has had a lot of emigration, mostly to the US and South America, though after WW2 Australia and Canada became destinations. This museum has collected stories, photos, all sorts of memorabilia that the emigres sent home. It was fascinating.

Upstairs they have 2 paintings by another favourite son of Recanati, the renaissance painter Lorenzo Lotto.  These are actually lovely.

The Anunciation

(sorry, a bit blurry).  Mary's eyes really do see you wherever you are in the room.  It's a lovely painting. 

After this, and a lunch at the local cafe, Cafe13 which does a good deal with cheap meals for students we had a break.  At 5.30 we got dressed in out sort-of-best and went to a dinner and dancing night at Villa Buonaccorsi.  It is about 20km away, on the top of a hill, and old palazzo which has been let go to ruin but with magnificent gardens that are available for weddings and parties.  Randi (Norwegian) and Ryogi (Japanese), who have been at the school before, said it was an event not to be missed, so most of the school went.

The descendents of the final countess stripped the house of everything excet the wallpaper and sold it, as there was no money left in the estate.  I am not sure who wons the house now, but the gardens are still kept up beautifully, perhaps with the money from events. This was the summer home of the family Buonaccorsi, whose Palazzo is in Macerata.

The family crest is a crowned cat, which features in many of the painted ceilings and walls

All the floors are stunning, each one with different tiles. 

Day 9 - Recanati, Grotte di Frasassi

After school this morning and lunch we caught the bus to the Grotte di Frasassi  It's about 85km away, so we got there about 4.  We had a cold drink, as it was over 33C, and at 5 our party of about 40 went into the Grotto (there were other parties of students).  We had been advised to bring a coat, as it is always 14C in the caves, so quite a temperature difference!

Our guide led us through a long tunnel, about 200m.  The temperature was cool, but the humidity was 95%. The caves are AMAZING! The first cave we went into, the Ancona Abyss, is 180m long, 120m wide and 200m high and could contain the Milan Cathedral!  The rock formations are just unbelievable, so thick and deep, when you consider that stalactites/stalagmites form at about 35mm a year!  New caves are always being discovered, and so far they have discovered over 30km of caves.  The fast (75 minutes) guided tour takes in 1.6km of caves.  Starting in the Ancona Abyss we see stalactites, stalagmites, shawl formations and others whose names I don't know.

but these are huge, at least 8 metres high and 3 or 4 around. Everywhere you look there are formations, it is just staggering.

We went into 7 caves altogether, connected by walkways and paths though these amazing formations.  One cave is called the Cave of the Candles, because the whole cave is just full of connected stalac-things.  Then we came to the lake...

To give you some idea of the scale, here is the walking path and some students

It was breathtaking, and if you are ever in this part of Italy you should not miss these caves, the largest in Europe.

 

Day 8 - Recanati and Porto Recanati

Monday, and we have school later this afternoon, from 2.30 to 6.30.  School has advised us to go to the market at Macerata, the nearest large town.  However, we went to the wrong bus stop and missed the one to Macerata.  Instead, Daniella and some Argentinian women she has met here and I all went to Port Reconati, as that was where the bus was going.

We had a geat time.  They are all lovely women, and they insisted we speak italian as the one language we have in common.  We had coffee and cakes at a beachside cafe,  then walked through the town. The sea was really calm and I wished I'd brought my costume. But I got a new sim card as the Australian one is pretty bad out here in the country.

We went back and had afternoon school. After school some of us went to the Piazza L for aperol spritz and snacks, then home.  We have a test on Friday so need to start studying.

Day 7 - Recanati

Today a lot of the students went off to Florence. The bus left at 5am, so I had decided not to go.  It was going to be 35 in Flrence, lots of tourists, 4 hours there on the bus and 4 hours back.  So.....

Slept in, went to a friend's house and used her waching machine, then hung about while it dried.  On my way back to the apartment I met Sylvia, who has an apartment next door to me, so we stopped in for lunch at the closest restaurant and had a very very nice meal indeed. It was about 4pm when we got home, so after a rest I went down to Piazza Leopardi and met up with Marcella and we had a couple of drinks, then home.  No need to eat again when the free snacks are like this!!!

This is a good time to tell you about the town, the students and my apartment.

In one of the earlier posts I posted a map of the town.  I'm at the residential end of town, where Casa Leopardi is.  All the shops and bars are at the other end of town, so it's a walk for me to get anywhere.  Piazza Leopardi is about halfway, in the middle of town.  The school is slightly on my side of Piaza Leopardi. It's apparently 2km to walk from one side of town to the other, and its a 6km circumference walk.  So I am certainly doiing my 10,000 steps per day!!  

Recanati is a very clean, rather bourgeois town, as I've said before.  The centro storico,which is within the walls and is where I live, the whole area that I am talking about, has narrow lanes and the buildings are about 3 stories high.  Outside the walls the buildings are modern.  This is where the supermarket is, a 12 miniute walk down the hill and then another 12 minute walk, with shopping, back up. There is as little supermarket within the walls, at the other end of town, and there are delis with fresh bread and yoghurt and cold meat etc for daily living. There is one near me, about 400m away.

On onee side of the little square I live in is Casa Leopardi, a fabulous 16thC palace of the Leopardi family.  On the ohter short side of the rectangle is achurch, and I'm still rying to work out the pattern of the bells, which luckily don't start until 7.30 in the morning, and end about the same time in the evening.  I am on the other side of the rectangle, opposite Casa Leopardi, and the 4th side has asmall restauant that seems to keep the strangest hours, and a couple of streets out of town.  The square, Piazza Sabato del Villagio, is a favourite spot for young people meeting at night, so despite the heat in the apartment I have to close the windows tight in order to get to sleep.  

I am in an old apartment with a stingy owner.  Everything is very basic, but the bed is comfortable and the fridge works etc etc.  I hate the shower, which I have to turn on about 3 minutes before I want to get in for the water to heat up.  It's a continual effort to turn up/down the hot and up/down the cold to avoid freezing or burning.  Also, the showr is so small that I have to wash my  hair standing in one position and turning the shower head to the wall, as there's almost no room for me and the taps in the same space. Sigh.

My kitchen is very strange too.  Daniella, my left hand neighbour, and Sylvia on my right, have kitchen areas that are tiny but manageable, Daniella even has a table in hers!.  My kitchen is in the hallway, so it has a sink and a tiny burner, and that is all that fits in the bench space.  I use the top of my fridge to dry the dishes and also to prepare my cooking, as there is no other space at all.  My bathroom is a large room off the kitchen, and my quite large bedroom has the only table in the apartment, seating 2. I have terra cotta tiled floor throughout, no iron, no vacuum cleaner, no fan, but a mop and broom. So very basic.  I have had to buy almost everything, as there was absolutely nothing but a couple of plates, some cutlery, a frypan and a saucepan here. A fan would be great, as there's only one window, and the apartment gets very hot.  I am on the 1st floor, where there are 3 apartments.  There's also one on the ground floor, but we don't know who lives there - maybe the landlord!!

My class - there are 16 of us in my class, B1, which is Intermediate. There are 2 american girls and me who are native english speakers, a japanese boy and a norwegian woman, and 3 mexicans, 3 argentinians, 4 brasilians and 1 columbian. Sounds like the 12 days of Christmas!!  This is the 2nd month for the columbian and the 3rd for the japanese boy, who has an internship in an Italian engineering company starting next month.  Everyone speaks great italian - I think the spanish speakers have an advantage! The brasilians also seem pretty fluent. The japanese biy is very good too.  The norwegian woman, Randi, seems to sruggle, though this is her 3rd year at the school. Luckily for me she loves to talk in English so we are spending some time together outside class.  Danialla my next door neighbour is also on my class - she is Argentinian.  Also Marcella, the Argentinian woman I met earlier.  There is trouble in pardise, however, as no-one likes Marcella and she has caused trouble with the teachers. She is vry negative and interrupts all the time because she does not pay attention and knows very little grammar.  Her spoken italian is very good, however. But it is becoming very difficult as people ignore her and then complain to me about her, and she complains to me about them.  Sigh.  People will not go to dinner or drinks if she is there, so it is a nasty situation. 

Enough now,I am about to go to the laundry!! Yay, the exciting life of a student!!