Reputation is a precious and delicate little thing.Since the late fifties Spain has been the Mecca for sun seeking vitamin D starved Brits.
Admittedly the couple of weeks in Benidorm or Magaluff when drink sodden bodies lie in an alcoholic coma for the hours of daylight festering from the abuses of the night are not the best advertisements for the healing power of sunlight. When the revellers finally stagger their way to the airport, red raw and harbouring god knows what additional microbes, leaving a trail of peeled skin behind them their memories of the ameliorating effect of their annual vacation may be a little difficult to distinguish from the physical pain that overindulgence brings. Their vision of the sun may be more in its guise as Destroyer rather than Healer!
But for those of us who reach for the sun with the slippery help of lotions, balms, salves and unguents while wearing hats, t-shirts and sporting healthy respect, the (affordable) sun for a grey country is found in Spain.
It will therefore come as a shock to hear that the first purchases (apart from meals out) that the Pauls made in Spain were of two umbrellas. These were bought in the pouring rain in the ramblas market in Tarragona after we had gazed with an indifference bordering on contempt on the sea side rain soaked Roman amphitheatre.
I only hope that the reputation of Spain does not suffer in the retelling of the shameful purchases when the travellers return to Wales!
The dreaded cry to any host of, “What else is there to do in this place!” gave an added piquancy to the brimming resentment that had built up with each new toll station we had to go through on the motorway from Castelldefels.
When in doubt: eat. We followed this dictum and eventually discovered a neat little restaurant on the edge of the main square which advertised an appetising menu del dia. I would have described how we all steamed slightly as the accumulated moisture on our persons gradually dissipated in the homely warmth of the restaurant – but we were sitting near the door. Each new couple who arrived had a length discussion about whether to eat with one partner in the open doorway communicating with the other while allowing stray rain and a cold damp draft to ensure our personal humidity stayed high.
The meal, however, was excellent and fortified we sallied forth and soon found ourselves facing an Obvious Wall of Antiquity.
As our interest was in inverse proportion to precipitation, and as the rain had abated its fury we (I) indicated that, after our epic and expensive journey we should at least show willing and cast a cursory glance at what Tarragona is famous for.
It was a good thing that we did.
Our first advantage was finding a loquacious, English speaking guard/curator who engaged us in conversation and shocked us by not only knowing of the existence of Caerleon, but also of wanting to visit it! His experience of British cities had been confined to Nottingham – a city I remember for the personal vindictiveness of its one way system. After our conversation with him it was incumbent upon us to purchase tickets for the rest of whatever it was we were on the edge of.
Tarragona was the major Roman settlement and administrative district for the whole of Spain and the jumbles of rubble we were looking at was once an extraordinary, three terrace scheme of buildings which included local and regional administrative buildings, a circus and the previously viewed amphitheatre.
The Roman ruins had been vandalized, or rather, utilized since medieval times and it was fascinating to see a line of an excavated wall broken by a modern road, but the line of the wall continued exactly in the medieval building opposite. Our first contact said that the buildings surrounding the site all had elements of Roman stonework in them, some of them incorporating Roman arches up to their third storeys!
The vast extent of the site would mean that much of Medieval Tarragona would have to be demolished to reveal the Roman original and, except in a piecemeal fashion, this is not going to happen. Some buildings have had plaster removed so that the Roman stone work has been revealed, but any more invasive archaeology will have real social consequences!
From an exhausting climb to the top of one building you are able to get a bird’s eye overview of the extent of the original Roman plan. From its proximity to the sea (though I imagine that the coast has moved somewhat since Roman times) the view from the sea of the three stepped terraces reaching to the highest point in the city must have been remarkable.
It was, therefore, something of a relief to find that our journey (accompanied on the way back by tropical force rain) had been worth the effort.
I only hope that Barcelona today lives up to its international hype and retains the interest of my ADHD compatriots!
When in doubt: eat. We followed this dictum and eventually discovered a neat little restaurant on the edge of the main square which advertised an appetising menu del dia. I would have described how we all steamed slightly as the accumulated moisture on our persons gradually dissipated in the homely warmth of the restaurant – but we were sitting near the door. Each new couple who arrived had a length discussion about whether to eat with one partner in the open doorway communicating with the other while allowing stray rain and a cold damp draft to ensure our personal humidity stayed high.
The meal, however, was excellent and fortified we sallied forth and soon found ourselves facing an Obvious Wall of Antiquity.
As our interest was in inverse proportion to precipitation, and as the rain had abated its fury we (I) indicated that, after our epic and expensive journey we should at least show willing and cast a cursory glance at what Tarragona is famous for.It was a good thing that we did.
Our first advantage was finding a loquacious, English speaking guard/curator who engaged us in conversation and shocked us by not only knowing of the existence of Caerleon, but also of wanting to visit it! His experience of British cities had been confined to Nottingham – a city I remember for the personal vindictiveness of its one way system. After our conversation with him it was incumbent upon us to purchase tickets for the rest of whatever it was we were on the edge of.
Tarragona was the major Roman settlement and administrative district for the whole of Spain and the jumbles of rubble we were looking at was once an extraordinary, three terrace scheme of buildings which included local and regional administrative buildings, a circus and the previously viewed amphitheatre.
The Roman ruins had been vandalized, or rather, utilized since medieval times and it was fascinating to see a line of an excavated wall broken by a modern road, but the line of the wall continued exactly in the medieval building opposite. Our first contact said that the buildings surrounding the site all had elements of Roman stonework in them, some of them incorporating Roman arches up to their third storeys!
The vast extent of the site would mean that much of Medieval Tarragona would have to be demolished to reveal the Roman original and, except in a piecemeal fashion, this is not going to happen. Some buildings have had plaster removed so that the Roman stone work has been revealed, but any more invasive archaeology will have real social consequences!
From an exhausting climb to the top of one building you are able to get a bird’s eye overview of the extent of the original Roman plan. From its proximity to the sea (though I imagine that the coast has moved somewhat since Roman times) the view from the sea of the three stepped terraces reaching to the highest point in the city must have been remarkable.
It was, therefore, something of a relief to find that our journey (accompanied on the way back by tropical force rain) had been worth the effort.
I only hope that Barcelona today lives up to its international hype and retains the interest of my ADHD compatriots!
Roll on the Ramblas!
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