The Road from Santiago

  It is a lovely day. You can almost feel the potential of heat lurking in the low places ready to sinuously saunter out and make three o'clock unbearable.  We have nothing to visit so let us go five random things. Forgot Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII tried to so you are in good company. If you want Spanish Queens go to Eleanor of Castile.  Born in 1241, the 13 year old Eleanor married Edward I in 1254.  History moves its eye around and once lingered on the fact she went with Edward on the 9th Crusade and had crosses built where her coffin rested after she died. Today her sharp property transactions and profiting from the exploitation of Jewish people has nudged its way forward.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleanor_of_Castile   The Semici is one of the oldest film festivals and is based in Valladolid.  Founded in 1956 they managed to find loopholes in state censorship to show films otherwise banned in Franco’s Spain. For example, ‘A Clockwork Orang...

  We have been following a lot of roads and so I thought, let's look at driving in Spain.  I first ventured into this when taking the five month old to the land of his grandfather. I would recommend anyone who needed to get their head round the whole thing to drive from Valladolid to Astorga. It involved long, straight, quiet 'A' roads and about four turnings. It was easy to get your head round. In Spain you can not just rock up for the test. First you must enroll in a driving school.  I can tell you the Autoviatest site https://autoviatest.com/en/driving-test/spain/facts proclaims that Spain had 1785 deaths on the road in 2024.  After that it tells you enrollment will cost between 700 and 1400 euros. You also need a Primary School diploma to get a licence as well as a certificate of mental and physical fitness.  Should you wish it - you can practice the theory here.   https://practicatest.com/en/spanish-driving-test/online   So it is a day of straigh...

  In all the tapas bars, on all the hills, in all of Andalucia we happened to bypass this.  We are near Casablanca. Some films could be remade, if skill and sensitivity was deployed. For example, Passport to Pimlico is glorious and deserves a modern audience but the pace is just a little too slow for today.  Casablanca. Touch it and prepare to face the wrath of the film gods. We will by pass Casablanca and have nothing else to say.  We are heading into El Cuervo de Sevilla. When googling El Cuervo de Edgar Alan Poe turned up - so we now know Cuervo means crow.  English wiki is tiny, which is odd for such a large town - 8628 in 2018.    We will need to go to the Spanish page. So, why call it the Crow? Theory 1 - the Crow was a bandit who used to mooch around the play. Theory 2. An innkeeper had a crow that hung round on his shoulder.  Theory 3. The land was granted to the Count of El Cuervo. Theory 4. It is a translation of the name of the nearby p...

  It is going to be a bit of a vibes day. Once we get on the N-4 we can do some nostalgia for what major road ways were like before motroways and why traffic jams are so ‘the good old days.’  Until then we have the Recreo la Parra to look at. The Rec is a recreation centre. It gets 4.8 stars from 34 reviews.  Six months ago Sonia wrote ‘ We celebrated a baptism and had a great time. A very nice place with a pool and delicious, plentiful food. The waiters were very friendly.’ I’m not getting trampoline and ball games sensations here so the Google label may be misleading.  Thais confirms the location with ‘ The first time we celebrated my sister's communion, and a few months ago, my wedding. Both times, my family and I were delighted. Manuel and his entire team work brilliantly; they are friendly and very professional!!! I organized my wedding remotely from Madrid; they made everything very easy, and it ended up being perfect. They're a great team, and having followed ...

  Whoops. Wrong turn, back we go and out into the suburbs of Jerez.   We are going past a restaurante, Tuga by name, and it has 4.9 stars from 678 reviews so I think we really must allowed to indulge a little.  It’s LGBTQ+ friendly.  The website does not seem to be owned by the cafe anymore.  Yesterday Carles wrote ‘Excellent cuisine, with superb product quality and very professional service’.  Emilia reckoned ‘An absolute delight for senses! We were incredibly lucky to be greeted personally by the owner and chef of Tuga - a welcoming and sophisticated gentleman, who also helped us choose the meals. The food is outstanding, so is the atmosphere. We cannot be more impressed and indulged. Thank you!’  We must push on. We are leaving town and crossing a blasted - well, well frazzled, health.  Along a camino de servicio.  All the stuff is going on on the other side of the A4.  Now, this A4 doesn’t have the decency to head out of London ...