Wed 11.May.2022
Lanzarote and Barcelona
Lanzarote does have actual towns.
Today we'll see two of them.
Arrecife
The island's capital town is an easy bus ride from Costa Teguise.
Bus?!? No such thing here. It is called a guagua (WAH-wah),
named for the sound of the horns on an earlier generation of busses.
Digression on guagua
The same word means "bus" in Cuba, and for the same reason. In the Quechua
language in Peru, it means "baby", again for the same reason!
A line of pigeons, and an ex 14-foot whale, near the harborside
cafe district.
Tiny Beach Town
Caleta de Famara
on the west coast of Lanzarote.
A classic small beach town - sandy streets and all. Home to an (apparently)
popular surfing beach.
A chiringuito is a beach-bar/cafe.
Mainland Cosmopolis
Barcelona - arguably Spain's most cosmopolitan city...
... and none too shabby for sign spotting.
Neighborhood street fair day in the Sants district.
I've been making Sants my base lately. More relaxed and budget-friendly than
the heart of tourist-town. Also adjacent to the main train station.
And connected to everyplace else by Barcelona's fine public transit network.
Fountainside at the Plaça de Catalunya.
The famous Catalan belligerence toward Madrid, and mainstream Spain. Popular
cliche attributes this to Franco's fascist legacy. I wonder though ... Valencia
experienced Franco too, and their language is almost indistinguishable from
Catalan, but they haven't anything like the chip on the shoulder that Catalunya
is famous for. Something more subtle must be at work here, and I make no claim
to understand - let alone explain - it.
Evening light at a pond and park, between Sants Station and residential tower
blocks.