Yo Tengo No Problemas Con Mallorca

Hola my peoples. W-O-W. I must say unequivocally that Mallorca is a special place. My trip was good. Like really good. A few things could have improved it (like say, Heather) and better weather, as I was really cold. This happens when you head to a sun destination and pack only sun destination clothes. Pretty small complaint overall I suppose. Shoot, I almost even enjoyed my flight. I only sweated through one shirt.

Be forewarned- This is going to be a long posting, so settle in with your glass of bourbon and enjoy.

So I started off the trip by getting up at the ungodly hour of 4:30. I suppose this is the drawback to getting cheap flights on the low-cost carriers. I wouldn't say I won't do it again, but man, it really might be worth shelling out the extra 20 pounds to not get up so bloody early. The flight was not the best, but at least it was quick...only 2h10m. My passport is actually filling up too quickly so I got a little sticky post-it and said to the Immigration officer "Pagina seis, por favor"(page six please). He smiled, said 'si' and promptly stamped page seven. I picked up my rental car and headed to the north coast of the island, a town called Alucudia.

One of the reasons why I enjoyed Mallorca so much is it was set up for easy travel. Every roundabout was signed for the next town, it was laid out logically, car parks were set up on the outskirts of old towns so you didn't have to drive in them. I was easy. I didn't have any reservations anywhere, just a guide book (with no map), but I managed to find a cheap, clean hotel that was 30E a night.

Here is a shot out my bedroom window.

Alucudia was really nice. It had a 10th century wall and towers around the city and all the buildings were a sun-baked light orange, which felt very Mediterranean.

The main reason I had come up here is a national park called the Cap de Fumentor and it was worth it. I have driven some bonkers roads lately, most notably in Portugal last year, but this one takes the cake. The Cap is a 20 km winding, twisting, switchbacked, magnificent, breathtaking road of death. Basically, the Transmontana just ends and the ocean starts. I really wished I was able to rent a motorcycle instead of the Ford Fiesta I had (all the places were closed in the off season. Sad face.) There were a number of viewpoints to stop at and soak in the sights. I stopped at them all. Man, it was awesome. Just plain awesome.

Here are the pics. I wished I had a deluxe camera there.

A lot of the town is shut down for the off season (where do they go?), but I did manage to find a sweet restaurant and get some quality eats. I took off the next morning not really knowing where to go. I made a bunch of stops along the way to check things out.

Here is the beach outside of Aluciuda. It was not warm, but I just imagined it in the summer. If you have never swam in the Mediterranean, I would add that to your bucket list.

I stopped at a go-kart track because the book said they had a museum of vintage motorcycles (it was closed), but I saw this kid no more than 5-6? burning around the race track on this little pocket bike. He was going so fast I couldn't believe it. The camera didn't even have the shutter speed to keep up with him. Look at the tires behind him. They're bigger than him!! He was even dropping his knee and dragging leather around the corners. I was impressed.

So I kept going and headed to a town called Cala Figuera because the book said more businesses stay open there in the off season than the surrounding towns. Well, one hotel and one restaurant shouldn't really qualify as a lot of choice. The hotel wasn't that bad, and they did have a heater in the room, so I scooped it for a sweet 35E. The rest of the town was nice, but the highlight was the old fishing port that was around the bend of the cove. The green shutters apparently mean the people who live there are fisherman. It was, again, set up easy to walk around and I did so three times (because there was nothing else to do).

I skipped dinner in Cala and headed to Sayatani, the next big town. It was mostly shut down too. I ended up eating at a restaurant run by Germans (they love it in Mallorca) and had an overpriced, but fresh salad. They really stole the show with dessert though--some sort of lemon and custard torte. Dang, it was good.

The next day I was off to the capital, Palma.

I ditched the car at the airport and found my hotel. Another good off season place of 30E a night! It turns out that Mallorca is gearing up for a 'mini' Carnival celebration that was slated to start on the 2nd. To get ready for this festival, they had a festival--The celebration of the Balearic Islands. There were about 200 tents with merchants from all over Spain and Portugal selling their wares and food. It was raining quite hard by now, but I just walked around eating. MMMMMMMM.

This is one stand where they had these pots of pork, the biggest octopus I have even seen, and a very large bbq of ribs.

I had a bunch of bits of grub, but my favorite was a glass of red wine and piece of chorizo from the Basque region for 1.50E.

I also ended up with a slice of Quesada. It was kind of like cheesecake, just more creamy and infinitely delicious. It has a wicked strawberry topping on it. MMMMMMMM!

The rains kept coming and I stopped at tent and had a nice hour visit with the Portuguese couple running it. They had a great deal where you could buy a ceramic 'horn' mug for 6E filled with mulled wine and then your refills are only 2.50.....just like a super big gulp, but better. Let's just say I received good value for my purchase and I warmed up considerably.

The Wine People!

I was really excited too to see my first works of Gaudi, the early century Spanish architect. His buildings in Barcelona are some of my favorite. In a nutshell, he hated straight lines and created this kind of melting surrealist look to buildings. He only contributed a small amount of work to the grand cathedral in Palma, but I was still pretty stoked. Unfortunately, it was closed! Alas, you can see the side arches are his. I will get to see all the big ones in Barcelona anyway in April (whoop whoop!).

Some shots of the market at night and the port.

My hotel did have the weirdest shower...it was like a stand up hot tub.

I ended up staring at this little guy for like 10 minutes. I heart owls.

The last night I ended up going to a tapas bar that had the best wine idea ever! They give you a charge card type deal, and then you go to a machine that has 48 different wines and you choose what you want. You can pick three sizes of sample size, 1/2 glass, and full glass. The prices ranged from 35 cents to 4E. They had a lot of Mallorcan wines that I wouldn't have been able to taste along with a wide variety of Spanish mainland ones. It was great. I also had great meatball and tubes tapas. I always refer to calamari as tubes- who doesn't.

So I paid to check my bag on the way home and stuffed it with Spanish goodies. It was very heavy. Here a pic of all my loot.

I splurged a little too much and bought a pair of handmade leather shoes. Hopefully, I can manage to take care of them for a long, long time. Well, I have to because I can't afford anymore shoes for four years...

The funny thing was Manny was really nice when I was gone. Here is my smokestack when I got home. Ha.

All in all, a great trip and I will definitely go back there. Do you wanna go? Just come visit and I'll hook it up!

Blast-er from the Past-er

In light of the medieval feel of Palma, here is a pic of Heather's lair last year in Kelowna and her roommate from the netherworld (not Scott, the dragon).

Much to the chagrin of many of you, I have run out of Manny cats to post. I may have a source on some good intel for some more, but in the meantime, I have a Spanish treat for you!

Mallorqui Cats!

I shall call him Jorge.

This guy was mad I was taking his picture. I shall call him P.O.'ed Paul.

Until next time, CC.

The Post Industrial Castle

Hey Folks. I was just daydreaming yesterday, whilst staring at the brick walls of our house, and imagining our house was a castle. Not figuratively, but a real castle made of bricks. I always wanted to live in a castle, quite a bit before I ever visited one and realized they would probably be atrocious places to live, being very dark, very dank, and very cold. They sure do know how to dominate a landscape though. Then I started imagining our entire 17th century cotton mill as one giant castle for just Heather and I with great halls, big fireplaces (using the smokestack!), giant ceramic room heaters, and lots of cats running around. A giant industrial castle for the 21st century!

Instead, we have this.

Man, I really wish we had a dryer. Oh well, it's not like Manny has a damp climate and it takes a whole day for the clothes to dry or anything. Oh right.  Heather is not very good at ducking either. She keeps getting the socks caught in her hair. I will say though...the whole set up only cost two poundies!

We went out on Friday night to a friend's art collective/gallery opening and ended up coming home at 3am with a better understanding of the bars and pubs in our neighborhood. It was a really fun time.

We still don't have a solid solution for internet yet. One neighbour has showed minor interest in sharing. Shoot, I'd even just pay for the whole thing if it comes down to it. I have been, and am currently, at the public library using the internet. I actually kind of like it. First, it's free. Second, they let you borrow books and movies for free too. I wish we had these back at home! I like going out every day and having something to do. It is pretty benign, but it gets me out for a walk every day. It's a nice walk over here too. Here are some of the buildings I pass on the way.

The Urbis

I can't remember the area of town this is, but it's one of the only 16th century buildings downtown still. It does take you back when around them. One of my favorite spots in town to look at.

I'm not sure why they built this wheel, but they did it after the whole square was bombed in 96? by the IRA. I would like to ride it, but it's too expensive. I'm going to look for a coupon later in the spring.

Something pretty funny happened last week too at the library. Some background for all the North American readers out there. Across the UK, there are a group of people who roam between dance clubs, pubs, and your nightmares ,and they are know as chavs, or sometimes Burburry Troglodyte.

Here are some pictures of chavs

Back to the story....I was at the library on Tuesday and was disturbed by a group on four men and one woman who where stumbling into chairs and talking very loudly, like really loudly. Let's just say they were pissed drunk. I'm not too sure how, but they acutally managed to type on computers and check their facebook. Now these weren't the smoothest chavs. When the lady tried the 'ol cough and fart, but instead of farting opened a tallboy of Carlsberg, it was not quiet. I think she knew that everyone heard it, because that was the fastest I have seen a beer chugged in a while. I was quite amused watching. I only wish I had my camera.

I was even more amused when I went back to the libary on Friday and, lo and behold, about seven of them showed up and checked their facebook again. This time they were more pissed--I mean it was 3:00 instead of 1:30 and it was Friday---so can you blame them? This time one on of the dudes pulled out a tallboy from his pocket, opened it and chugged it, then crushed the can and put it in the paper recycling bin. He then pulled out another one to drink slowly while updating his status on facebook with something about the library not having properly marked beer can reyclying bins. I am still kind of laughing. I hope to see them again this week.

To end....a few housekeeping notes. I have fixed (hopefully) the issue with comments on the bottom of the blog. A few of you let me know they wouldn't let you post. I have added the ability to comment anonymously. I believe it should work. I'd love to hear from you all.

Although I have been trying desperately, I have not been able to spy any Manny cats. I saw one running across the street, but it was gone before I even blinked. I apologize. Instead, you can read this link about cat detectives.

Also, I booked a vacation for this coming weekend. I am off the Spanish island of Mallorca for five days while Heather is at a conference in New York. I think I may get a little bit more sun than her. I still don't have any reservations or know what there is to do, but as long as the sand is warm and I bring my suntan lotion, I'll be fine. I'm really excited for the olives! Anyway, there will be no blog next monday, but I'll set something up here the middle of next week.

I still can do the blast-er from the past-er though. Here is a pic of my motorcycle gang circa 2009.

Later,

CC

District, Peak

Hey Peoples. Not too much to write about these days as I am spending all my time joining Cameron's Big Society. I may have some free time for myself next year. I think all of this just re-enforces my hatred for Nick Clegg.

On Saturday, Heather and I got up early (kind of) and set off to the main railway station with no real destination in mind. We decided on a town called Buxton, which is in the middle of the Peak District. It only took us an hour and 8 poundies return to get there. Good choice.

I'm sure that I could write a whole bunch on how the peaks in the UK must have a bad case of penis envy, but I'm not going to. They are not high, or mighty, but are fantastic. It was funny how much at home I felt as soon as the azimuth was higher than my head. Straight from the heart comfort.

There was a great market in Buxton and we got a delicious potato and chickpea curry for lunch and had a little picnic in the park. We also bagged some better than wicked-awesome mature cheddar. I know cheese isn't that exciting, but it is that good. Other goodies we picked up: a ginger and lemon cookie, farmer made potato chips, fresh veggies, and an organic pork roast. We didn't even go for the shopping.

It was kind of hard to find information on the walks, but we tracked some down and headed out from the market. It was a quick walk through town to the start of the 'walk' up the mountain. We hiked up on Poole's Trail. The walk itself was supposed to be two hours return. We made it up in about 15 minutes. The summit was very cool. The whole area is limestone, and in the 16-17th century is was a major lime producing area. Back then, they dug these big pits and burnt different materials for three days in them before breaking the ovens apart and harvesting the lime. Quite the industrial mess I think. A duke in the late 17th century got sick of looking at the mess and ordered trees to be planted on the hill/quarry so he didn't have to look at it anymore and it became a park with this walk. Kind of fun. At the top, was a little castle/tower to increase the sights.

You can see the remains of all the pits and some limestone cliffs in the background.

This is cute Buxton and the other peaks!

We might have chosen the wrong path back down and ended up walking through a sheep paddock getting some very wet feet in the process, but we did get to see the other side of the mountain and the different trees. They were creepy. I wish I had brought my other camera with us to fully capture the lighting, but was lazy and only brought the little guy. Here is the best I could do.

Not the creepiest pictures, I know.

Mystery shot in the Blas-ter from the Past-er! Who is it?

....and who doesn't want to see some more Manny Cats? I'm calling him Two-Tone Steve.

New Flat or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Brick

Good Morning All. Great game yesterday if you were at all interested. I stayed up way too late watching it, but was very impressed with the quality of the game and happy in the outcome. I found beers at the Aldi grocery store (kind of like buy-low foods) called Brassiere, a french beer stubbie. Good value I tell you...they were 3.09 for a 10 pack. That alone should tell you how they tasted. Regardless, I enjoyed a few while watching some low-quality superbowl video.

We had a nice weekend. On Friday, we went out for a curry on the curry mile. Pretty good, but we picked one that was a little too creamy/buttery. Next time we will go with an ol' standby and stop being so adventurous. Later on we went to a pub-type place for a few pints with Heather's work peers. On Sunday, before our skype//opening mail date with Sandra and Dan, we went to a dance piece called "ROTOR" at the Whitworth Gallery. It was three parts and I really liked one of them, one was ok, and one was boring. It had the most intense backward running I could have ever imagined--It was really cool. We were going to check out the big Chinese New Year celebration in town, but it got too rainy and cold and we went home.

Two stories of note from Friday night:

1) I said 'mate' without even thinking about it. I believe it might enter my lexicon.

2) Not sure if this one translates as well, but I was absolutely cracking up. We were out with Catriona, from Ireland. Heather asked her where she was from in Ireland and she replied, "Oh in Offaly. It's kind of in the center of Ireland". Heather says, "Sounds nice. Was it a good place to grow up?". I really like that question, becasue it usually gives the person the excuse they can say it was a good place to grow up but a better place to leave or something like that, but Catriona says, "Well...No. It's in a bog. Offaly means 'small hole' too. So it's a small hole in the bog. I was happy to leave". I was dying. Super funny.
Fun Ireland trivia fact--It's also the same area where the now ex-prime minister is from!

Our place is shaping up nicely. It's mostly being furnished with Ikea things (from the landlord and us), but starting to feel a little more like 'our' space. I wish we had things for the walls--I might have to make some things. Here are some photos of it and the outside! It's a 300 year old cotton mill that was turned into apartments in 2002. I don't have any shots of the canals, but they run just 20 meters away from us.

My mom told me never to wear plaid on plaid, but I like to do it at home. Please note what our landlord described on the inventory list as, "One large, two seater brown leather sofa".

 It's actually a pretty big bedroom from what I originally remembered it as, which is really nice. I wish it was queen bed though....arrgghh doubles are about 1.5 inches too short for me.

 Glass tables are very deceptive in low light conditions too. I've already bumped into it three times.

It has a lot of really good natural light during the day. At night, different story. Hopefully we have rectified it with Ikea lamps.

 Wow. A bathroom.

 I really love the old smokestack from the kitchen. It's sweet. It's the same one as the top picture.

Notice the lamps that we bought. I almost cut my finger off the first day chopping veggies! It was sooo dark.

Well, now you kind of have an idea of where we are living. Still haven't solved the internet problem, but I have passed notes under the doors of the neighbors, so hopefully soon I'll hear back from them and be able to be in more constant contact with 'the peeps'.

Blast-er!

I hope you enjoyed last post's Blast-er from the Past-er. It was delicious. This week, let's go waaaaay back to 2009 and my old man. I still have the shirt too, but haven't had the guts found the right occasion to wear it myself.

Also another Manny cat- A little out of focus, but what a beauty! I'm going to call him Tim.

Take care. Out. CC.