Yesterday was Good Friday and being a very important holiday here, most things were closed. This is important to note, especially if you are living day to day like we are. Often things are closed in this country on Mondays. Often things are closed in general everyday from 1:30pm until 5 or 6. Sometimes, things are just closed. Proper planning is required. Unlike North America where shopping 24/7, 364 days of the year is a religion, the pace here, as I’ve mentioned, is a little different. Lack of planning means getting to the grocery store Friday morning, like we did, and saying ‘Oh S***T’! Change of dinner plans, drinking plans, and breakfast plans! Fortunately, the touristo stuff always seem to be open for business, so…we grab our meals where we can.
Being quieter, there wasn’t that much more to do than we did on the previous day. The narrow streets were packed as usual, but we did stumble upon a tourist attraction which had some appeal. After checking it out, we bought some tickets for that evening for a performance by the Caballeriza Reales de Cordoba, the Royal Stables, celebrating the Passion and Spirit of the Andalusian Horse. Being horse people, well….it was nice to see a ‘Espectaculo Ecuestre’. A great evening of amazing horses, riders, and flamenco dancers.
It wasn’t all that quiet in the late evening though. Did I mention it was Good Friday? I think the reason everything was closed was the shop owners all spend the day digging out their Klan outfits, so they can march around the streets scaring the tourists with pointy hats and sharp instruments. We found that our way back home was blocked, the Roman bridge being guarded by the local policia, Klan members, marching bands, and Jesus carrying his cross. We finally gave up and hoofed it back the long way.
Today we took a leisurely walk in the opposite direction of the tourists, after grocery shopping of course. We found a nice park along the river that turned out to be a botanical garden. It was open, and the sign said €3, so we walked in but there was no one around to take our money. There was hardly anyone around at all. A nice change from the old town area. It was pleasant, quiet, with lots of birds, lots of impressive plants, and best of all, it was free.
Time is just flying by here. Always things to go look at and the weather has been nice. We are not far from the good stuff and it’s easy walking. There is probably a lot more to see here and I am sure the outlying areas are full of neat little towns with historical or cultural significance. We are not in Cordoba for long, 4 days to be exact, and we don’t have a car to roam around the countryside, so those things will have to wait for a return trip. We obviously can’t see everything. We’ll catch the ‘big fish’ while we are here and make some notes about what we should have done for future reference. And sometimes it’s just nice to put your feet up, relax, and soak up some sun. It is a vacation after all.
Good post. I learn something totally new aand challenging
on sites I stumbleupon on a daily basis. It will always be
interesting to read through artficles from other authors
and practice a littlee something from their web sites.
I’ve heard from other people Cordoba is one of their favorite places.
Yes, it’s a nice city and has a good vibe to it. However, it has the highest daily average temperatures in all of Europe and the locals told us that it’s 40+ degrees regularly in the summer…a little too warm for our liking.