Our host was a sixty-something year old Englishwoman (well, Welsh, actually) who was a two time widow and a long-term (24 years) resident of Spain. When I wrote to her, she told me that her location in a small mountain range about 40 minutes away from Salamanca would be a perfect place for us to consider for relocation. We were very eager to go to this part of Spain as Michiel's dad was very enthusiastic about Salamanca and we knew that we would be able to have some great outings. We did, in fact, have terrific outings. Since it's been such a long time since our last posting, I'll make this one short and allow the photos to do most of the talking.
Included in this posting are photos of Salamanca and Candelario, a small, "white village" in the hills of the Sierra de Bejar range, which was a 50 minute hike from our Bed and Breakfast. We hiked there at least 3 times as we were really enchanted with the look and feel of the village. We even attended a re-creation of a traditional wedding, complete with procession from the groom's house, to the groom's parent's house to the bride's house and finally to the church for the ceremony. At each stop, the wedding party (and the tourists) were treated to aguardiente (otherwise known as moonshine or firewater) and almond cookies. They needed the fortification as their costumes were made from black felt, velvet and fur and it was probably at least 90 degrees F (32 C).
We were so enchanted with the town that we enquired at the visitor center about other foreigners living in the area. The slightly surprised worker at the Visitor's Center replied, "I think there's one English woman teaching at the institute" (in Spanish, of course). This wasn't a problem per se, but we had already talked to our host about living in Candelario and she told us that she had been equally charmed by it, but her husband at the time talked her out it because of its remote location and, more importantly, its closed attitude to strangers of any kind. In fact, though there were plenty of tourists around, we felt a bit like we we had crashed a private party.
As for the town we were staying in, though our host was eager to extol the virtues of her chosen home (plentiful and clean water, less hot than the south of the country, low crime rate, understandable Spanish spoken (this is a real issue) and close to Salamanca), we weren't at all impressed. It was run down, full of graffiti, unattractive and way past its heyday when it was one of the richest towns in Spain due to its many woolen mills (all currently closed and many turned into supermarkets). She did have a beautiful spot high up on the hill with great sunsets and sweeping views of the rolling hills and mountains beyond and we loved sitting on her upper deck, eating dinner and watching the sunset as the temperatures dropped to a comfortable 75 degrees (24 C).
Luckily, we had all this to keep us sane in an otherwise sort of insane family situation, which I'll write about in the next posting....stay tuned....
Candelario:
The view of the town from the trail
Street scene
One of the churches
The groom's house
A young guest
The bride
Toasting with aguardiente
Candelario house
SALAMANCA
The Plaza Mayor
The University - these tourists are trying to ensure marriage within one year by finding a frog sculpted into the facade
Central Spain is known for its ham (jamon iberico) and boy are they crazy about it. In the meat and veg market:
Hervas: a mountain town recommended to us by our host as a possible place of interest. It's known for its Jewish settlement
