Alcanar port re-visited

After lunch, following a busy morning on pastoral affairs, I drove to Les Cases d'Alcanar, the port and village linked with the mediaeval inland small town of Alcanar. Last time I was here I cycled from the house to Alcanar, and then back by a different route. I coud borrow a bike but am a little cautious about doing so as I need to be mindful of the vulnerability of my back. Since I've been wearing the new sandals I bought before leaving Fuengirola, I've had all sorts of lower back niggles as my legs adjust to shoe soles that aren't worn right down, but it is improving.

I strolled along the beach promenade and photographed yet again the remnants of civil war concrete gun installations overwhelmed by the sea. 

I want to compare them with photos taken last time I was here. I counted two dozen fishing boats out at sea. One was heading closer to shore than others, returning to Puerto d'Alcanar with its catch. 

I drove to the port and watched the unloading of the fish. Boxes of fish were taken straight from the quay into the small new market hall, top left in the picture below.

 

Here they were loaded on to a conveyor belt where they were automatically weighed and priced for dispatching. I understoond that the fish are auctioned, but was unaware of bidding going on. It may have been done electronically, since the price per box appeared on a screen, and a bill of sale automatically printed, and added to the box that was taken off and stacked ready for transport.

As I was returning to the car through a back street, I saw a shop sign which said 'Agrobotiga' and stopped to look. 

The proprietor had just locked up, but when he saw my interest he insisted on opening up and letting me in to look around. It was a grocery treasure house of local products. Bio wines and olive oil, rice from the Deltebre, cheeses, preserves etc. I had to buy something for the priviledge of looking around, and settled on a kilo of Montsia rice. The brand name is that of the beautiful rugged mountains which sit inland behind the Delta on the south side. He gave me two Clementines as I was leaving. I ate them standing on the prom looking out over the port as the sun sank behind the hills. Another lovely outing.

  

By pass imminent

This morning, I took the car into the garage once more for its annual equivalent of the MOT test, and then walked to El Portico to meet and chat with people. By lunch time the car was conveniently ready for collection, but I didn't get to go for a drive as I'd promised myself because I had emails to write. 

Later in the afternoon, I walked up the Barranco Barbiguera, the next barranco up, which has a narrow road right through to the N340. I reached there as the sun was setting, and stopped for a while to watch the procession of mighty juggernaughts travelling in both directions, so many of them, the pulse in this artery of the European economy.

Things are about to change around Vinaros. A new section of N340-A7 highway a by-pass running from the south side of Benicarlo to the North side of Vinaros after fits and starts in construction over years past is nearing completion. Even in winter the existing road is busy with through traffic much of the time, but in summer, with millions of holiday makers in this region it's a congestion nightmare. The new road will cut around twenty minutes journey time at peak traffic periods.

 

Late Afternoon at Vinaros Port

Today was a day for washing clothes and shopping, but I also found time to draft a sermon for next Sunday. Jobs done, I walked out wiht my camera, first up the Barranco Saldonar after which our urbanizacion is named. It must only very occasionally flow with water. It has containment walls on either side shielding the adjacent properties, and runs to a dead end in a huge bamboo thicket and an old fence. Work has been started on clearance, but for what purpose is unclear. Unlike the other barrancos on the Costa Norte, this one has no through road, metalled or otherwise connecting it to the N340, perhaps because there is a privately owned property beyond and no right of way. 

It wasn't very interesting or photogenic, so I continued walking down to the port in time to watch the day's fishing catch being landed. It was fascinating to see a variety of people, mostly elderly, friends or relatives of the trawler crews, passing through the safety barriers with little plastic buckets.

These were handed to someone on a boat to be doled out with a kilo of sardinas or boquerones, caught up in the trawl nets with larger saleable fish that were being boxed up for auction in the market hall. One man was fabvoured with three small merluza (hake), a good meal for someone.

The sun was getting close to the horizon, so I walked out on the harbour wall and took some sunset photos and enjoyed the golden warmth of a mild evening before returning for supper. A pleasant afternoon, all in all. Dozens of trawlers and smaller boats are berthed at Vinaros and land their catch there. On occasions at night or early morning I have noticed the distant background rumble of engine noise, and at first thought it was lorries up on the N340. Now, it occurs to me they are more likely to be the fishing fleet 10-15 kilometres off-shore.

 

 

 

Relaxing Sunday change

A leisurely late Sunday start this morning, now that there's one service to take in the morning and one in the evening. Ron and Jenny picked me up, so we could share the journey. As Aldea now has a by-pass, the journey was a lot quicker than I remember, so we were an hour early arriving, and had enough time for a coffee in the English run Station Bar, next to L'Ampolla railway station, before getting into gear.

We were late starting as there was a baptism following the parish Mass of the day, so the congregation sat together and chatted in one of the rooms next to the sacristy, until it was time to begin. There were fifteen of us, including Stephen, a visitor from Britain who'd been one of the first lay worship leaders to serve the chaplaincy in its early days. Ten years on, he's as fond of Spain as ever, and has made the walking pilgrimage to Compostella from several different starting points during his summer holiday.

After the service we lunched together in the Azara restaurant overlooking the beach. It wasn't warm enough to sit outside in the sun, but we had a lovely view of the sea. The restaurant was run by an Argentinian/Uruguayan couple, and specialised in charcoal grilled steak dishes. I settled for the lenguado instead. It was preceded by a salad with heaps of meillones (mussels) in a gallego sauce. Most enjoyable, and reasonably priced with wine included - fifteen euros.

Stephen and I travelled back together as he intended going to the Vinaros evening service to meet up with old friends as well. We arrived early at the Fishermen's chapel early. Half the congregation were already there, looking around appreciatively and chatting. There were twenty one of us in the end.

 The chapel acoustics are good for singing, and the liturgical space is very worship friendly. Everyone seemed to enjoy the experience, and there was lots of chatting after the service before people went out into the early evening darkness. A serene and relaxed atmosphere for worship later in the day certainly helped. I do hope that people will keep up their support for this experimental change, which runs for the next three months before review.

News from Fuengirola

I received an email from churchwarden Linda in the Costa del Sol to say that the 'preferred candidate' for the chaplaincy had visited and agreed to come. With all procedures satisfied, it means he'll be able to start at the beginning of Lent. I'm delighted. This is excellent for all those who have worked so hard there to maintain the church's lively ministry over the past year. The appointment will be announced in due course. Then, and not before I'll find out who's the fortunate guy. There's such a lot of variety and stimulus to ministry there. It's more populous with expats down there, and with the 25th anniversary of St Andrew's being celebrated in February it's that much busier than the Costa Azahar pastorate. Very much a full time job. I greatly enjoyed spending so much time there, helping them to do all they do best.

It's been a quiet Saturday, getting ready for Sunday, going for a stroll, observing the huge flocks of starlings that are such a feature of autumnal life here. Are they, have they been migrating from further north? I certainly don't recall seeing them in such numbers when I was here in the summer two years ago. The tree in the neighbouring garden was alive for several hours in the late afternoon with the sound of roosting starlings in conversation, then occasionally large numbers of them taking to the skies in a swirling dark cloud as busy as gnats. I captured a few moments with my DSLR camera, which give the impression, but aren't all that wonderful. Too many moving points to avoid confusing auto-focus.

    

A change of worship venue

This morning the small chaplaincy team of lay worship leaders came to the house to review the service schedule for the next couple of months and discuss related matters. It's not yet been confirmed who will follow me in January, so it's necessary to ensure the regular routine of worship is maintained. So few regulars will be around for the Christmas holiday week that it won't be possible to offer worship. How good it is that local Catholic clergy have expressed a willingness to welcome the few Anglicans who will be around and want to attend church, to join their congregations for Communion. 

After the meeting Paul and I drove into town to meet Michael and Fr Cristobel the Vinaros Parish Priest at the Capilla Virgen del Carmen (aka Fishermen's chapel) to have a look around and meet Maria the caretaker.

They showed us around a building recently refurbished after a break-in with vandalism last year. Now it's got brand new re-enforced steel doors and an ramped entrance.

Hymn books and furniture were burned in a bonfire, leaving a terrible mess. Now, its walls and ceiling are bright and clean with new flooring to replace the area fire damaged, new chairs, a new altar adorned with a ship's helm carving and a new lectern with an anchor carving, making it unmistakably a Capilla de los Marineros. 

Our Sunday service moves here this coming weekend. It'll be good for the congregation as there's an off road car park opposite, making it much more convenient a place to be than the town centre.

When we'd finished, Michael announced that we'd be calling at the garage on the way back, to pick up car, now repaired after recent misadventures. I was most grateful for this as it enabled me to do some heavy shopping later on in the afternoon.

Quite apart from listening to the Today programme over the internet on my phone when I get up in the morning, I make a point of listening to 'The Archers' in the evening. The drama has been ramped up recently with Brookfield Farm, the family home, up for sale with David and Ruth Archer planning to move up north for a fresh cattle farming start as the new by-pass road threatens to break up their family land held over the past sixty years. Several celebrity listeners are protesting at the threatened affront to the historic soap opera's plot. More drama tonight with Tony Archer being crushed and trampled by his prize bull, flown off to hospital for an emergency operation, threatened with a future in a wheelchair if surgery is unsuccessful. And all this on his mother Peggy's 90th birthday! It's quite something.

   

Christmas on the horizon

The Vinaros Christmas Fayre took place this morning at El Portico. I was amazed at how busy it was with people coming from Alcossebre and L'Ampolla as well as locally. It's a small place, and for much of the time it was packed with people buying gifts or enjoying festive refreshments. Over €800 was raised for church funds. Hard work for those organising, an impressive feat.

Jenny, the Lay Reader in training came down from Tortosa, permitting us to have a useful catch-up session ahead of tomorrow's meeting with the team of worship leaders. There's a lot to prepare for in coming weeks, with a new service schedule for everyone to get used to.

  

Delta revisit surprise

This morning I drove up to El Perello to visit 'Bona Fe' the church shop cum drop in centre, to meet a couple of the volunteers on duty, and catch up with what's been happening up there in the chaplaincy outpost in Catalunya. Afterwards I drove back to Vinaros by way of the Ebre delta. I've been looking forward to this for ages. Last time I was there two years ago, I watched the harvesting of the golden rice fields in early September. 

Two months later in the growing cycle, a large number of those fields are under water, and a select number of them that aren't have old rice plants in them, with green shoots growing out of them. I can't be certain of the reason for this. Either these fields are allowed to lie fallow and plants ploughed in later, or it's a kind of rice that regrows productively after being cut. Just thinking about this made me realise how little I know about agriculture and plant life.

I drove from Camarles to St Jaume de Envieja to cross over the Ebre on the bridge which replaced the old ferry crossings. It was constructed as a four lane dual carriageway, but unusually, the seaward side lanes are pedestrianised with a dozen benches where visitors can stop and picnic, or even subathe while enjoying the panoramic view down river from on high. 

I followed the road down river to the Isla de Buda, an island in the Delta which is part of the nature reserve, and reachable only by a floating bridge. The road continues to the beach. About a kilometre inland, is the Alfacada wildlife observation tower next to a restaurant. I stopped there and took a few photos to compare with those I took back in August two years ago. It's interesting how different the seasonal vegetation colours are.

Then, I set off in southward across the delta, aiming for the village of Deltebre, where I knew I could find a bar or restaurant for a snack lunch. Approaching Els Muntells, I noticed a modern cemetery surrounded by rice fields about half a kilometre from the edge of the village, and stopped to have a look. When I went to set off again, the car failed to start. Dead, outside the cemetery! There was no power, suggesting that the battery was disconnected or that a main fuse had blown. Two years ago the car had failed to start because a battery terminal had worked loose, but there was a new battery now and it was well secured so it seemed unlikely this was the source of the problem.

There was no alternative but to phone Michael and ask for help. Within half an hour he was on his way with a mechanico at his side, using sat-nav to reach a place he'd never been before. There wasn't much the mechanico could do, as an electrical connector in the steering column lock was the source of the problem. It was impossible to arrange a grua (tow truck) this late in the afternoon, so we had to leave the car with a note on the dashboard, to inform the Guardia Civile that the car had not been dumped but broken down waiting to be collected.

The irony in being stuck out in a place surrounded by rice fields, was the lack of wildlife, the odd egret and heron, and a few small birds, but nothing compared to some of the flooded fields I'd passed which had dozens of herons plus egrets large and small and ducks. Still, the sun shone and the wind didn't blow, so the open air wait for rescue wasn't arduous. The afternoon's photos are here.

  

Writing on the wall

Yesterday was quiet, highlighted only by a nice long phone chat with Julia in Divonne les Bains, and a visit to the garage. The spare part acquired was correct for the make of car, but not for the vehicle in question, as differences exist in the same model depending on age and location of manufacture within the European community. It would have fitted OK, but the terminals for the electrical connection in the unit weren't compatible. There was nothing about the part serial number to suggest anything different!

This morning I went down to 'El Portico' where members of the congregation were setting things up for Thursday's Christmas Fayre. Tomorrow will be a preparatory Christmas goodies cooking day, so that everything on the stalls will be as fresh as possible. Michael has arranged for us to meet Fr Cristobel the Parish Priest on Friday, to meet up and take a look around the Fishermen's Chapel. That'll challenge my Spanish, no less than communicating about the car with Manolo el mecanico.

I missed observing the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in remembrance of the fallen of the two world wars. I was doing a weekly food shop in Lidl's at the time, disconnected by retail necessities from more solemn considerations. How does conflict start? What goes wrong in communications, that leads  to violence? I came across this graffito this morning on the back wall of one of the fishermen's storage places behind the port distribution centre. The quote is from an eminent Valencian language scholar.

This can best be described as a morcel of cultural one up-manship, however you read it. Either it is reckoning Valencian language/dialect is like Catalunyan for infants. Or else 'Tots' in this regional context means 'All'. I keep on finding words of French origin. Both languages are quite similar in many respects. Here we're a couple of miles inside the border of Valencia with Catalunya, so this is assertive, whether written by an insider or an outsider. Valencia Generalitat is, in effect, bankrupt while Catalunya is Spain's economic powerhouse. Language snobbery whether in salons or street art, is as old as the hills. Sadly it doesn't always stop there.

   

  

Remembrance Sunday

I started to have second thoughts about my Sunday sermon on Saturday morning, realising that it would be better to shorten what I would preach at Vinaròs in the light of having the Act of Remembrance and traditional (lengthy) hymns expected for such a solemn occasion. As ever, shortening it took as much time again as writing the original, and it was late afternoon before got outdoors for a walk along the coastal path towards the town and back.  As I walked back up to the main road alongside the barranco I heard the sound of guitars being played. At first I thought it was coming from a garden where some children were playing. Then I saw two young men practising intensely on a park bench, sounding really good. A couple of touring bicycles laden with their baggage stood nearby. They must have kept their instruments in backpack cases while riding. An interesting take on musical adventures. 

Kath and Anto were performing 'Once in a Blue Moon' with their dance company in Newport today, so Rhiannon has been with Grandma. The weekend has been clouded for them by news that Anto's sister Viv's partner Paul has had a stroke and a heart attack, and is not expected to survive. I was glad of the opportunity to speak to them all on Skype in the evening as they stayed the night before returning home.

There were sixteen of us at the Vinaròs service. I was on my way to Alcocebre by 11.05 and arrived at 11.45, and so had just enough time to sort myself out and start the Act of Remembrance in sync with the UK ceremony at the national cenotaph in Whitehall, London. Although not quite enough time to get used to the liturgical space, as I knocked over a large pot plant, placed in front of the processional cross. I seem to remember doing the same thing when I was last here two years ago. 

There were fifty people present, although less than half took Communion, a sign of the times, I guess. Some had travelled from Peñíscola to join us, as no ceremony of Remembrance was held there this year. We'd prepared for twice as many communicants as we got, so consuming the left-overs had to be delayed until after the service. A couple of dozen people stayed a short while for a drink and a chat on the terrace outside the church afterwards. I was home cooking lunch just after half past two.

This is a significant day for Catalunya as the day of an opinion poll is taking place on the subject of independence from Spain, and the need for a referendum on this issue. Prime Minister Rajoy declared the referendum call illegal on the advice of the constitutional court, but can't prevent the opinion poll. This is a long standing contentious issue in Spain, but the recent referendum on Scottish independence, may encourage more people to say 'Why not?' 

To mark the occasion, at the end of the afternoon I went north on the coastal path, as far as Sol de Riu, and the barranco that marks the border between the Generalitats of Valencia and Catalunya. Hardly anyone about as the sun was setting just a few people out sea fishing from low cliffs or beach rocks. It's a two hour walk there and back. I was certainly dragging my feet, that last kilometre in the twilight.

   

Francophone visitors

Michael collected me and took me to his garage mechanic yesterday morning, to arrange a replacement wing mirror. We left the car, and he dropped me off at 'El Portico' the church centre close to the port, where I spent the morning chatting with people. He returned later unexpectedly to lock up, as nobody the had the necessary key. So I got a lift home as well, instead of a walk. 

As I was awaiting Michael to return to the garage for the second time in the day, two ladies of a certain age rang the doorbell, and asked if if spoke French. Well many French holidaymakers come to Vinaros, and there are resident expats as well, so this wasn't all that unusual. They were Jehovah's Witnesses. To my surprise, I conversed with them fluently in French for about half an hour before Michael arrived. One thing about being chaplain in Geneva for eight years was that I acquired the necessary vocabulary for theological discourse! And, it was nice to chat while I was waiting. We returned to the garage at the to find that there were going to be difficulties sourcing a spare mirror, so we should return manana a la manana. 

Before supper, I walked a little way along the coast path as the sun was setting in a cloudy sky, making spectacular show. It's very quiet now. Most of the holiday homes are shut up until New Year/Three Kings, if not until spring. The only bars and restaurants open are those serving local clientele.

This morning, another trip to the garage, again fruitless. It will take until Monday if not longer to obtain a new part, as there's no local Ford dealer in town. It's legal to drive without a right side mirror here, so I was able to take myself to Alcocebre to visit 'El Camino' the church drop in centre cum charity shop, to chat with people and get a briefing from Moira on Sunday's Act of Remembrance before the Eucharist. I learned that plans are afoot to re-locate to larger premises nearer San Cristobel church, which the Anglican congregation uses. This will provide space for small meetings, and storage space to support the cafe and charity shop side of things. Being without an incumbent chaplain is no bar to initiative to grow the church, and that's highly commendable.

Bad luck day

After such a trouble free insertion into my new post, today was somewhat disturbing. While cooking lunch I dropped a spice jar which smashed to smithereens making it impossible to recover any of the pimenton it had contained. Then later, when I went out for a drive, I broke a wing mirror, which upset me. While waiting for the Archers, I stepped outside the front door to get some fresh air and take a short stroll up the street, and locked myself out. The self locking door was similar to the one back in the Fuengirola house, so I had already cultivated the habit of keeping house keys in my trouser pocket and carried it over to this place. 

On this occasion, however, I fooled myself, by picking up a set of internal door keys and putting them in my pocket, mistaking them for the genuine article, after having placed the essential ones in a jacket pocket without realising. I had no jacket, wallet or phone on me, so couldn't summon help. I had then to walk a mile to churchwarden Michael's abode, unsure I'd be able to recall its exact location in the dark, let alone remember the address.

After doubling my journey by walking up and down a series of streets which turned out to be less than familiar, I found the right street and house, and gave Michael and Pamela a surprise visit. Fortunately Michael had spare keys, and after an hour's chat, thawing out from my exposure to evening chill, he took me home and let me in. Not the kind of evening in front of the telly that I'd envisaged! But all's well that ended well. I didn't have to hunt for a Guardia Civil patrol car and throw myself on their mercy in broken Spanish after all.

   

Settling in

I slept well, noticing the cacophany of barking dogs dispersed around this neighbourhood. It is a lot quieter here, out of holiday season. The sound of barking isn't quite as persistent as the background roar of traffic from the N340-A7 was back in Fuengirola. The same N340 passes through Vinaros, 800km further north, but it runs nearly a kilometre away from the house. It's audible as a distant rumble. The sea is 300m in the opposite direction, and when the wind is in the right direction you can hear it breaking on the pebbled shore. 

I walked into town to visit 'El Portico' the local church drop-in centre, and catch up with the crew looking after it on one of its two open days during this week. I also needed to do some some food shopping. The fridge was generously stocked for my arrival, but I needed fresh vegetables, so a trip to the Mercadona was necessary. 

On the way home, I was struck by the presence of several large flocks of starlings, wheeling around, roosting in pine trees and chattering among themselves. On the Costa del Sol, there were hordes of swifts and swallows, always in the air or roosting on power cables, and small families of noisy parakeets inhabiting palm trees. Here it's starlings that make their presence felt.

After lunch I drove out to the Carrefour hypermarket in search of a few items I'd not succeeded in remembering in the morning, just to familiarise myself once more with getting around the town. I also went out looking for the Fishermens' Chapel, aka Nuestra Senora del Carmen, the patroness of fisher folk, but failed to find it, with insufficient information about where it was. It's been used in the past for occasional services, and recently the parish priest has offered the chaplaincy an opportunity for regular use. This means that for an experimental period, services will relocate there from 'Portico', and will take place at six in the evening. It'll mean the chaplain doesn't have to rush off to another assignment at the end of a service and can spend more time getting to know church members. It's a great initiative

By train from Fuengirola to Vinaros

Out of bed at six this morning, and buying my Cercania ticket at five to seven. The one minute past seven train didn't arrive - it's the Todos Santos bank holiday, and that means a Sunday timetable. The twenty past seven took me to Malaga Maria Zambrano station just after eight, with lots of time to check in for the AVE train to Cordoba, the second leg of my journey. Once we were under way, a steward came through checking people were seated where they should be. Because of the way the indicator at the train door switches alternately from showing the carriage number from left to right, travellers can get confused and take their seats in the wrong place. It didn't stop there. The steward's printout sheet told him I was bound for Vinaros, and he asked me to confirm this.

When we arrived at Cordoba there was another steward waiting on the platform for those who were changing from the AVE bound for Barcelona direct at high speed, to the TALGO Mediterraneo train, taking the slower route over the high plains down to Valencia, and then along the coast, stopping at Vinaros just after half past five on its way to Tortosa, Tarragona and finally Barcelona, my route to the airport when I leave for home. It was a wonderful journey through remarkable countryside, rolling plains full of olive trees, vineyards in autumnal dress, pine forests, stark grey mountains, such a variety of differently coloured soils, reminiscent of unfamiliar named colours in a childhood paint box. Seven and a half hours travelling from Cordoba to Vinaros. Such a pleasure.

Churchwarden Paul met me at the station, and took me to his home near Peniscola, where his wife Beryl gave me my first square meal of the day - shepherds pie followed by apple pie and custard. It went down very well. We reached the chaplain's house just after eight, familiar from my first long locum here two years ago, which I blogged under the title 'Spanish Sojourn', perhaps thinking I'd never return. Here I am having so far spent half of this year in Spain, with another seven weeks of duties before returning for Christmas. What a privilege at my time of life!

All Saints' weekend

Although yesterday was All Saints' day, the chaplaincy annual memorial Service for the Departed took place at six in the evening, attended by eighteen people. After the service, I drove to Malaga airport to pick up Fr Hywel, whose plane left 20 mins late but arrived on time. There was lots for us to talk about so he could feel adequately briefed to get started on Monday. In the morning I prepared a chorizo and vegetable stew for supper so that we could eat straight away and make the most of the rest of the evening. We got to bed around midnight. 

With Hywel from Cardiff came my replacement Blackberry Q10. I got it started OK, but it still wouldn't lock on to any network automatically. Mindful of trouble I had last time, I put it away and reported this back to Ashley, who promised to chase up BT mobile and make sure the SIM card had been registered to work with the new phone. Nothing will happen before Monday, that's for sure.

We were up and out of the house by 8.30 and on our way to Benalmadena for the first Eucharist of the day, giving Hywel an early opportunity to meet and greet people, and for me to take my leave of them. After the later Eucharist at Los Boliches, there was a delightful bring and share lunch attended by a couple of dozen people, a time for me to say my goodbyes. After the service, LInda presented me with a beautiful carved olive wood pestle and mortar, a work of art in its own right, but a proper size for use in the kitchen for making alioli, or hummous. A real practical treasure to remind me of here.

Then I took Hywel out by car to show him the way to Calahonda and the route to the two inland centres of worship. When we got to Alhaurin there was a service of prayer for the dead being held in the chapel, inevitably on this Todos Santos weekend, today being the Dia de Muerte. Unfortunately there was also a Requiem service scheduled here this morning at eleven, despite the fact that our Anglican service is regularly in the diary for ten thirty. No consultation, no checking by those responsible at the ajuntamiento, for the diary is controlled by the civil administration, and as with local government all over the world, the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. It happens occasionally when there are Sunday funerals too.

After our outing, we walked the length of Los Boliches as the sun was setting, and called at the parish church of Our Lady and St Faith which was crowded for an evening Requiem mass. We stopped at Granier for coffee and chocolate cake before returning for supper, and the rigours of getting everything packed and ready to go early tomorrow. Handover done, mission accomplished!

Ascent to Istan

Having spent a good deal of yesterday and this morning cleaning the house and preparing for the arrival of Fr Hywel tomorrow evening, I felt it was time for one last outing with a camera. So, I drove down the N-340 to Marbella, then turned inland to ascend to the hill village of Istan, which stands at 600m at the top of a valley in the biosphere park of the Sierra de las Nieves, about 15km above the conurbation. For about 8km below the village the steep sided valley has been transformed by a dam into a huge lake, providing a major water supply for the region. 

Vehicle access to the lake is officially restricted but large numbers of people visit for family outings, or else for bird watching. Without a guide, to help find a proper parking place, and avoid getting lost on the multitude of forest trails in the surrounding environment, I decided to give the nature walk a miss on this occasion, and drove all the way up  to the beautifully maintained village, perched on a high ridge, overshadowed by gaunt grey peaks of 2,500m. Forestry, horticulture and now eco-tourism have enabled this place to thrive and even grow in recent decades, so there are plenty of new buildings in the traditional Andalusian 'white village' style, that blend in nicely. You can see my photos here.

On my first stay in Fuengirola, I drove along the high road from Coin to Marbella to discover Monda, and the remotely located Refugio de Juanar with its spectacular views out across the sea from 900m. I noticed there a walker's trail signpost showing Istan as the next destination, 10km away. That's stayed on my to-do list ever since, but there's been no opportunity of company to share it with with. Very glad to have seen Istan, however.

Well, there's been a modest amount of Hallowe'en hype in the shops, even our local Granier pasteleria had a few fake cobwebs hung over its wall lights. So incongruous in such a bright clean eaterie. There were no kids out in the dark trick or treating, that I noticed in our urbanizacion however, and yes there are a few families living in the neighbourhood, or visiting at weekends with young children. 

El Faro Playa

I celebrated the midweek Eucharist and chatted with people at the Coffe Morning afterwards for the last time this morning. An unusually large number of people came, many of them returning visitors, so the place buzzed with lively chatter. I wonder if last weekend's flower festival might also have motivated some to make a return visit. By way of contrast, the number for the Eucharist only half a dozen, having been ten for several weeks running.

I has some work to do for CBS after lunch, then late afternoon drove to El Faro Playa to meet Bill for a drink and a chat, only the beach restaurant was closed. I arrived early to walk on the beach with a camera in hand, as this promotory and neighbouring beaches is renowned as a landing point for birds on the migration path. 

 

The beach was empty of humans, with the occasional pigeon and a just a family of Turnstones browsing on the foreshore. Their colouration is close to that of the sand, so that they are not easy to spot at first, let alone take a decent photograph. They seem unconcerned by close human contact. I was no more than ten metres away when I took this picture.

General Torrijos, who attempted a coup d'etat to overthrow a cruel and unpopular king in 1831, landed with a small band of followers at this place to start a short lived campaign that ended with his death. There's a commemorative plaque close to a stream running into the sea across the beach here.

This would be a pleasant beach to hang out on, if it weren't for the close proximity of the N-340 highway just above and behind where I took this photo from. Traffic noise, both day and night is a constant feature of life along such an urbanised coastal strip. Yet, it's still amazingly rich in bird and other wildlife, though it's not often apparent when I'm out and about with a camera.

I met up with Bill at the appointed hour and we went instead to a restaurant in El Faro urbanizacion further inland, mercifully well away from traffic noise, quiet enough to relax and talk.

  

Back street surprise

This morning I walked to the open air market on the recinto feriale, using a backstreet route, slightly shorter, for a change. I'd driven but not walked this way before, and at a slower pace, discovered a small park tucked away behind the houses. El Parque Pulgarcito, is its name. It means Tom Thumb Park. As well as childrens' swings and climbing frames, it is home to a charming bronze sculpture of the little man sitting on top of a pile of books.

The uppermost edge of the park is bounded by the garden wall of an exotic looking building in the Andalusian moorish style, clad in coloured mosaic. It resembles a mosque with its dome topped by a crescent moon. It's grand mansion of a local businessman with a painting and decorating company.

It's a truly remarkable sight, set in a quiet back street. The house is called 'Alhambra' and was built in 1993. I particularly like the mosaic covered pavilion in its courtyard, for dining al fresco.

For once I'd come out without a camera, as I was on a mission to find myself a new pair of sandals in the market, which I did, at two thirds of the price I paid for a very similar pair this time last year, just before I left for my first spell of duty in Colsta del Sol East Chaplaincy. Anyway, I returned later in the day to take the above photographs, during my afternoon paseo down to the beach. The sun was by that time fairly low in the sky, and I arrived in the vicinity of the harbour mouth in time to watch half a dozen or more fishing vessels depart, escorted by hosts of expectant seagulls.

I couldn't help noticing, when I returned to Calle Virgen del Carmen, that during the late afternoon the task of pruning the algorrobo (carob) trees along the avenue was at last complete, and all the cuttings taken away. It's taken eight days, and the end nearest the house was most in need of a trim. All summer, new grown branches had bent right over into the roadway and footpath, posing a minor hazard for walkers and motorists alike. These were the last to be removed, defying common sense. 

A dozen or so dead tree trunks, lining the motorway embankment edge were also uprooted and cut up, during the week, leaving just the handful of trees that flourished in place. 

They'd all evidently been planted when the motorway was driven through this part of town, perhaps ten-fifteen years ago, to help disperse road noise. If they weren't grown from saplings but transplanted fully grown, soil drainage at the embankment edge may have left them with insufficient water to thrive long term. The townscape is less forbidding without the dead trees. Road noise will remain a problem perpetually.

 

Post Cordoba reflections

Sunday morning, Bible Sunday, was my last visit to Calahonda to celebrate the Eucharist. Having gone to bed early, to optimise the advantage of the clocks going back an hour, I woke up well before the alarm, and even left the house twenty minutes early. Once I'd parked the car outside the church I realised that I had enough time to take a stroll down to the sea shore. It means crossing the N340 road bridge and heading through a street with a series of beach front exclusive residences, until I found a narrow lane alongside a stream which took me down to the water's edge. I was rewarded with a fleeting glimpse of a yellow wagtail, and a view of the sun over the waters, a little higher than usual at this time of morning. 

After a moment of quiet and a little Chi Gung exercise on the sand, I returned to the church, and entered at the usual time, to get ready for the service with a congregation of just over thirty. After taking my leave of those unlikely to come to next Sunday's 'bring 'n share' lunch at St Andrews, I drove back to Los Boliches where there was a congregation of forty five surrounded by the flower festival exhibits from the previous two days, still looking good. It was a successful venture, attracting around seventy visitors and receiving nearly four hundred euros in donations.

Apart from food shopping, and a brief visit to the church office in the afternoon the only thing I did all day was write up the Cordoba trip, which involved researching historical detail I'd deliberately avoided looking up before I went. As with other sacred sites in Spain, if not across Europe, a Roman temple site had been built over in the fifth century by Christians, in this case Visigothic invaders from Germany, then taken over by muslims, then re-taken by Christians. Such sites were strategic places in the power politics of each age, and religion a major dimension of this. But what of now?

Cordoba's mosque/cathedral is a UN World Heritage Site, in a European Community country, a venue for international tourism, a manifestation of 20th century globalisation of culture and its consumption. World trade has become an accepted if sometimes contentious feature of human existence. The work of the United Nations and all its specialised agencies, just like the European Community can be regarded as an interim step on a long agonising journey towards unified world governance. This goal is resisted by many who remain stuck with their ethnocentric political and economic self interest. If globalising impulses really did bring peace, prosperity, justice and security to all earth's citizens, it would signal an evolutionary step change for humankind. As long as the world remains so deeply divided between rich and poor, the powerful and the powerless, however, such reconciling enterprises are no more than glimpses of a distant utopia beyond reach.

I wonder if threats to places and things accorded World Heritage status from climate change, pollution, environmental damage, population explosion, or war will be enough of an extra stimulus to world citizens to make a difference in the challenge facing this generation to deal with so many critical issues facing our future?

Cordoba visit

I took the Cercania train to the Maria Zambrano Station this morning to travel on the 11.05 AVE high speed train to Cordoba. It was a lovely experience. The carriages are spacious, the seats comfortable, and I had a window place in both directions, though taking photographs at 120mph was a challenge. Once the train has gone through the mountains up behind the Guadalhorce Valley, it travels across a wide gently rolling plain, fringed with distant hills. Now it's autumn, the arable crops are harvested and this exposes different colours of soil, dark red, black, yellow, chalky white, along a train route which also overlooks citrous and olive groves as far as the eye can see, and only the occasional white village adorning an escarpment. It's a reminder of how big Spain is and how dispersed its settlements.

Cordoba station is a modern building, such as befits the new era of rail trasportation on the main line from Malaga to Madrid. Connections can be made here to travel to west Sevilla, and north east to Barcelona. This is where I'll have to change trains next Monday for my seven hour journey to Vinaros, on the TALGO Mediterraneo. So, I checked out the platform change required, so that I can mentlly rehearse the journey in the week ahead. 

The walk down to the mediaeval town centre took me down an avenue with a wide strip of park and garden in between the roadways took me half an hour. The western section of the ancient town wall and gateways survives, and encloses an area of narrow rambling streets full of bars, restaurants and tourist shops, crowded with visitors. I made my way directly to the Cathedral, former mosque, which has attracted UN World Heritge status for its unque beauty and architecture. The huge courtyard is dominated by a huge high bell tower now hung with church bells, built around the core that was once the mosque minaret.

 There was a 120 yard queue of people waiting to enter, having paid eight euros first for the privelege at a courtyard ticket booth. I only waited 10-15 minutes to get in, and there was lots to photograph meanwhile. There were hundreds of people from all over the world inside, some in organised groups with a guide, families, couples, individuals, most with cameras like me, taking pictures.

The building started its life in the late fifth century as church of the Visigoths, Germanic colonisers of Spain after the fall of the Roman Empire, who adhered initially to Arian Christianity, but hereabouts converted to the orthodox Latin Christianity. The first church, dedicated to St Vincent was built on the site of a Roman temple of Janus. After the muslim conquest of Spain, the building was shared between them, then replaced and extended, reaching its present dimensions in 987, at 180 x 13 metres it is one of the largest islamic prayer halls ever built in the world. Following the fall of the city to Christian forces in 1236, the mosque was converted for use as a church with the addition of several chapels. In 1523, the central section of the mosque was gutted. A renaissance choir and sanctuary was raised to give it the full dignity of a cathedral for the diocese of Cordoba, an architectural imposition commented upon unfavourably at the time.

The simple beauty of the islamic prayer hall with its nineteen naves, each 130 metres long, is impressive. It uses many high value kinds of stone in its columns, and similar designs of arch construction from different periods of expansion with characteristic chequered arches, made of red brick and white limestone. Many costly kinds of stone are used in the supporting columns. Some of them were originally part of the temple of Janus.

On this first visit, I didn't delve into the building's history. I wanted to form an impression of the whole. I took many pictures and watched the crowds of people ebb and flow for an hour of walking around. 1.5 million visitors a year, they reckon, not counting people who come here to worship. In the south east corner chapel, a wedding was going on. It's still an active diocesan place of worship out of visitor hours.. How that's managed in reality is hard to imagine. There are dozens of chapels set into the walls of the building, and some altars in some of the naves. When, if ever they are used, is an open question. I couldn't find a Sacrament chapel - too many places to look. Nor a place to light a candle. The highly ornate south facing mihrab, focal point of muslim prayer, is impressive and seems to invite those who gather before it to gaze quietly.

In many ways, the extensive aisles of columns and hosts of visitors milling around reminded me of an unusual palace, a house of culture rather than a place of worship sacred to two faiths. There were several areas where historical artifacts were displayed in museum cabinets, and one nave on the east side contained a contemporary guide to prominent saints, related to their statues, in a kind of secular catechesis. 

The only shared focuses of activity, taking photos and consuming great historic culture, are both quite subjective in their way. Visitors were subdued, well behaved enough for the security guards to have little to do. Apart from its extraordinary beauty and general quietness, there was no much of what I would regard as a numinous or spiritual atmosphere to the place. Perhaps it's different when it's largely empty, or during a time of worship, than introduces a common focus and intent to the place, fulfilling its purpose. The most visible concession to modernity is the presence of TV screens in the vicinity of the renaissance choir and sanctuary, each discreetly covered with a red dust cover. Does being able to see what's going on at the altar make that much difference.

Afterwards, I walked down to the edge of the old town, where the Guadalquivir river flows, and made my way along its promenade to the place where there's a river bridge from Roman times, with a fortified tower at the far side and a triumphal arch from Renaissance times on the town side, next to a modern Visitor Centre that preserves sections of the old Roman town walls beneath it. Just one street away are the southern and western walls of the mosque. 

I then made my way through side streets into the 'Judia', the Jewish quarter, made famous by the lives and teachings of Jewish phlosophers Mamionides and Averroes. There's a small fourteenth century synagogue here. Under muslim rule there was a place, a strictly regulated place, for Christians and Jews to live alongside. After the reconquista of 1492, the Jews were expelled and the synagogue was turned into a chapel. Thankfully this building is now under the care of the ajuntamiento and has been restored. 

It's decorated with fine patterns and Hebrew scripture quotations carved out of stone. Some of it has suffered the ravages of time, though not all, and the collective mind applied as been able to make all texts identifiable for the benfit of those who visit now. I found this small cube of a simply room, empty of all furnishings save for its carved walls, breathed spiritual atmosphere. I stood and said the 'shemah' (in English) to honour the centuries of gifted thinkers and workers in a community whose origins may be hidden in pre-Christian Jewish disapora.

Across the street from the synagogue is a house which has been converted into a museum of Sephardi Judaism, that rich uniquely Spanish cultural expression of Hebrew religion. I didn't have enough time to take the guided tour, with my train timetable in mind, but chatted with the guide for a few moments before leaving. There was a lovely hospitable spirit about this place, and as I stepped out into the street I found myself moved to tears, touched by something deep down that I was hardly conscious of. What it is I don't know, but here I felt more like a pilgrim than I did in the holiest shrine of the kingdom of al-Andalus.

On my walk back to the station I discovered a huge nineteenth century greenhouse type building of iron and glass in the park garden between the road carriageways. The Mercado Victoria seems to have been some kind of public meeting place in times past, but has been renovated and converted into a market place of small bars and gourmet restaurants celebrating Andalusian food, a very classy undertaking. Not enough time to stop and partake. I was even to busy absorbing the enviornment to stop for lunch, only a beer, at a place with a live guitarist entertaining open air diners.

The train journeys went smoothly, and a was back at home by seven, pondering on all I'd seen and reviewing the photos taken, juggling with two cameras to see which would perform best in the unusual lighting conditions prevailing inside the mosque cathedral. A memorable day. I'm determined to return for longer next time. More photos of the day are to be found here