Hola!
Before I write about today, I need write about our dinner last night! We went out for tapas, and Robert did some research about places, and came up with Vinodiario. It was, quite literally, just 4 or 5 minutes from the hotel, across the street and between the Convent and the Monastery. We arrived just a few minutes after their opening time – 8 pm, to find what looked like Reserved signs on all of the tables!
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| Me at dinner! |
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| Amuse-Bouche |
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| Anchovies on the left! |
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| Pork on the left, chickpeas on the right |
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| Cheesecake on left; chocolate on right |
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| Outside the town walls with a "friend" |
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| Looking up at Nouveau Art Palace |
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| Art Palace front door |
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| Remains of Roman bridge! |
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| Our first verroco! |
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| Lovely river running through town |
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| Two more verroco for the collection! |
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| Our last verroco for the day |
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| Can you make out the etched horse? |
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| Interesting dolman |
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| University Door |
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| Casa de los Conchos |
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| Glass ceiling of museum |
What to do? Well, it turns out that the table we were given was already reserved – for 10:30 pm! So, figuring that we would be out in 2½ hours, we were seated! Lovely, modern place, with about 10 tables and a bar area, and it was serviced expertly by two men, who really worked their tails off. The main man worked expertly and fluently in multiple languages, explaining the menu and the wines, and making suggestions to all. The other man brought dishes and menus, drinks and food and cleared tables.
We started with a nice bottle of Rioja wine from the Duoro region, that came with a small amuse bouche of sliced hard cheese drizzles with olive oil and sprinkled with pepper. Great! Then came our first two dishes. As it turns out, with the exception of a very tiny anchovy that came on top of a tapa several weeks ago, Robert has not had any anchovies or sardines at all. (Neither have I, needless to say.) So, not wanting him to feel at all deprived, I suggested he order the anchovy appetizer, and I would get the brochette of mozzarella and cherry tomatoes in pesto. His anchovies – three of them – came spread on toasted bread with a tomato base and he said he enjoyed every bite. My brochette was excellent, although their pesto doesn’t have as much garlic as mine always does… Then came our second round. Our waiter suggested that we wait for each course, as their portion sizes were considerable, and it would be easier to judge how hungry we still were. In round two, I ordered chickpeas with apricots, dates and truffle and Robert had planned to order their red pepper salad. However, our waiter suggested that we do either a meat or fish with the chickpeas, so we acquiesced and got the sliced pork instead. He was right on, and we enjoyed both dishes very much. And, he was also right, in that we were pretty much full by then. However, Robert ordered the cheesecake (which was wonderful) and I ordered their black chocolate cake (not as good, strangely enough!). This came with two complimentary glasses of port – one a tawny, and the second, a white port, which I loved. So – turns out we really have learned to like port on this trip! Who knew?!
Getting ready to go out now for the day, and we’ve decided to stay around Salamanca today and do their Art Deco museum – no car needed. I’m very much looking forward to NOT driving up that staircase today. That can wait for tomorrow! Sunny and blue sky, but it’s supposed to be about 37 degrees at the moment, with a high of about 67. It is certainly not that warm outside!
Lots of love,
m
xxx
Back from a day’s vigorous sightseeing, and desperately needed a nap … so I took one! Feels SOgood, especially as I didn’t sleep particularly well last night.
Up this morning around the usual time, and ready to go out around 9:30-ish. Our first stop was to be the Arte Moderne/Art Deco museum, but that, we realized, unfortunately didn’t open until 11 am so we had some time to take a walk. From our lovely hotel, we turned right and headed down towards the River Tormes. There are the remains of the original Roman bridge, that has been periodically updated and renovated since then, sometimes for better and sometimes for worse. As it turns out, next to the bridge is something we had never even heard of before: A Verraco! The next couple of paragraphs are from that all-knowing source of information, Wikipedia.
The Spanish word verraco normally refers to boars, and the sculptures are sometimes called verracos de piedra (pigs of stone) to distinguish them from live animals. The stone verracosappear to represent not only pigs but also other animals. Some have been identified as bulls, and the village of El Oso, Ávila, named for "the Bear", has a verracowhich supposedly represents a bear. Their dates range from the mid-4th to 1st centuries BC.
Though they were perhaps not confined to a single usage, the
verracos were an essential part of the landscape of the
Vettones, one of the
Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula. It has generally been assumed, from their high visibility in their original open fields surroundings, that these sculptures had some protective religious significance, whether guarding the security of livestock or as funerary monuments (some of them bear Latin funerary inscriptions).”
So! Who were the Vettones, and why did they carve these animals made out of stone? Interesting! Our first verracois at the Salamancaside of the Roman bridge, and he is very cute.
The river winds through town and is really lovely.
There is blue sky and sunshine, but also a very cold wind blowing around town, which keeps at least me in my jacket zipped up with a scarf at my throat. As we turned the corner toward the bridge, we could see the stunning glass making up one of the walls of the Museo Art Nouveau Y Art Deco on the hill above us; phew, that is a really stunning building!
Of course, as Robert pointed out, the Museo would be on the top of the hill rather than the bottom. However, these is a nice gently sloping street heading upwards that worked out just fine. The Museo is located inside Casa Lis, which was originally a small private palace built at the beginning of the 20thcentury (1905). The merchant who built it was fascinated by Art Nouveau (New Art) and the main ceiling in the open gallery is truly wonderful. However, for whatever reason, NO photographs are allowed inside, which is just ridiculous! (Robert did manage to sneak one photo in the entryway, which hopefully we can append to the blog.) The collection spanned two floors, and was quite interesting. It was arranged thematically, with separate rooms for dolls, toys, vases, lamps, figurines, etc. There was a sample of work by Lalique, which included a jeweled dragonfly, as well as a real Fabrege egg! Quite a collection. They were also having a special exhibition of work by three Spanish artists: Dali, Picasso and Miró. Apparently, they were all friends and over time, influenced each other’s work.
From there, we decided to head to the Museo of Salamanca, as they are reported to have several different Verraco that we thought we’d like to see. Problem was, though, how to find the Museum itself! I think we ended up walking entirely around the museum buildings just trying to find the entryway, which was actually among the university buildings in that part of town. Salamanca’s university is very intertwined with the Cathedrals and other church buildings, and apparently offers quite a range of Spanish language classes, especially those for foreigners. Oh! One thing that I have forgotten to mention is that here in the North of Spain (and possibly for all of Spain itself) there is a real reduction in entry prices for those over the age of 65, regardless of country! In fact, in many instances, entry prices for us is free! Can’t beat that!
The Museohoused a very interesting collection, and we were able to see everything from local prehistory through to the Northern Spanish painters of the past century. And, we have now added three more verracoto our collection! We’re up to four pieces, but who’s counting?
From the Museo, we headed back toward the Plaza Mayor stopping so I could get a chocolate milkshake from McDonald’s. Small but good. We had hoped to take the little tourist train around town, but unfortunately, they had a private tour booked for 3 pm and their next available would be at 4 pm – at which time I was hoping to be asleep! So, we’ll skip the train for now.
Tomorrow we will get the car out of the hotel’s parking lot, and hopefully make it to Avila – where we may be able to add to our verraco collection! Are these monuments my next adventure?
Lots of love,
m
xxx
