Spain (July 11-14)

Granada:  View of the Alhambra from St. Nicholas Church

We are headed home now [July 23], but I thought I’d try to catch up the blog for those who are following our travels.  Where we left off was leaving Finland headed for Spain.  We flew from Finland and the first thing we noticed was that no one even asked to see our passports.  They basically didn’t care who we were, as long as we had a valid boarding pass.  So different from the USA!

When we arrived in Madrid, we had to take an airport bus to the main train station and walk from there to our hotel.  We got to see a few sights out of the bus window, but really didn’t know what we were seeing because there was no guide.  When we got to the train station, we decided to get reservations for our trains through Spain since all required reservations and we couldn’t get them beforehand because Spain’s computer system didn’t seem to work outside of the country.  We waited forever to get to speak to a ticketing agent and then we found out that our planned itinerary wasn’t going to work.  We flew into Madrid then planned to go to Granada for a day, Cordoba for a day, and then go to Barcelona for part of a day before flying out to Berlin.  However, we couldn’t get a train from Cordoba to Barcelona.  So, we had to skip Cordoba and take a night train from Granada to Barcelona.  That gave us more time in Granada and Barcelona, but it meant that we had to miss Cordoba.  Oh well!  Guess we will save that for another trip when we can fit in Seville!

So, we spent most of the night in the train station and didn’t get to see any of Madrid or get our laundry washed like we hoped.  But, our “hotel” was nice.  It was basically somebody’s house with some extra rooms, but we liked it.  Like many places we had seen in large cities, it was sort of an apartment house arranged vertically, so we had to climb several flights of stairs—and there were 5 different keys (outside door, inside door, elevator, apartment door, room door).  We ate a quick dinner at a Thai restaurant next door and then crashed for the night.

The following morning (July 12) we ate at Dunkin Coffee (really a Dunkin Donuts, but they called it by the other name for some reason).  We took the train to Granada and then had to walk forever to find our hostel.  Once we got there we basically had enough time to drop our stuff off before heading to the Alhambra for our admission.  We tried to figure out the public transportation, but ended up grabbing a taxi at the last minute so we wouldn’t be too late. 

The Alhambra was amazing.  It is part of a Moorish fortress because Granada was ruled by the Moors for 700 years before the Christians retook it.  The Moors were Muslim, but not Arab; their influence can be seen all over southern Spain.  We got to see the Moorish palaces and gardens built on the hill overlooking Granada.  We spent hours going through the buildings and gardens, including the whitewashed “summer palace” and manicured gardens of the Generalife, with its shaped Cyprus walls.  Afterward we went down into the old part of town and saw a variety of street life on our way to dinner.  We saw “hippie” kids playing music on the street barefooted; we saw a girl with a group of other girls and they dressed up and getting her to ride a donkey—probably some sort of pre-wedding custom.  We also saw people leaving a wedding at a nearby church and later saw a whole group of people dressed to the nines who eventually were picked up by a charter bus for another wedding.

  

  

    

     

   

[David] Interestingly, we ate dinner at the “Palatine”, a restaurant with Roman decoration and a menu combining Italian and Spanish.  While I had paella (basically saffron rice with all sorts of meat in it—prawns, pork, who knows), others had Italian.  Erin enjoyed her melon and ham (Spanish version of prosciutto) so much that she carved a message to the chef on her melon rind—we noticed the waiter stop and stare at it before he went to the kitchen.  (That’s my girl….)

The next day we did a walking tour of Granada (following some of Rick Steves’ guidebook suggestions and reading some commentary along the way).  We saw an old caravansary where camels used to be corralled—now it has a stage for small events.  We walked through the narrow streets of an old shopping district and made our way toward the hill on which the Alhambra stands.  We found the St. Nicholas church, whose plaza has a magnificent view of the Alhambra and the city of Granada.  Heidi remembered hearing that Bill Clinton was so enamored by this view that he insisted on brining his family to that same spot on another trip to Spain, so that he could show them.  After having seen it, I can believe it.  (Picture at top of blog post)

We also saw the beautiful Cathedral of Granada, built as a symbol of Christian triumph after the reconquest of the Moors.  (To add insult to injury, the mosque on that site was completely razed and the cathedral was built there, despite the availability of a much better building site elsewhere in the city.)  The cathedral has elaborately decorated altars and the most over-the-top set of pipe organs I have ever seen.  I found it quite interesting that I could find no information on the pair of organs anywhere in the church--not even in the book shop.  It appears the Spanish don't take the same pride in their pipe organs as the Germans and Austrians.  Also interesting to us were the numerous display cases of oversize illuminated manuscripts of medieval chant.  All in all a very impressive church.  The Renaissance cathedral and the Alhambra add to the fascinating interplay of Christian and Muslim culture in Granada.  Their decoration and architecture are completely different, but beautiful in their own way.  The colorful geometric designs in the tilework, ceiling plaster, and stonework of the Alhambra appeals to me in both artistic and mathematical ways--much as the decoration and pipe organs of the cathedral appeal to the musician in me.

  

  

Visiting the Alhambra was, for me, a dream come true.  I had learned about it some 30 years ago in junior high in my Spanish classes taught by Señora Suco (who is still one of my favorite people!).  I had always wanted to see the intricate geometric plaster and tilework up close, and it did not disappoint.  Equally thrilling was finally getting to Barcelona to see the famous cathedral Sagrada Familia, designed by the architect  Antoni Gaudí.  He worked on the cathedral for about 40 years before his death in 1926, and the project is still unfinished.  Significant progress was made before the Barcelona Summer Olympics in 1992 and the nave was finally completed in 2000, just in time for Pope Benedict to come hold a dedication mass there.  The cathedral reminded me of other cathedrals we had seen in Europe—floor layout in the shape of a cross, tall spires, carved stone entryways, high ceilings with arches, richly decorated altar, stained glass windows, etc.  Even so, this cathedral looks like no other in the world; it is in a much more modern style, which the Catalan people have embraced.  (Note:  Barcelona is in Catalonia, which is now part of Spain, but which has its own language and distinct culture.  It was interesting to see signs first in Catalan, then Spanish, then maybe English.)  The spires have interesting shapes and are crowned with different color “fruit;” there are four spires on each of 3 entryways, with another four central spires planned (for the four evangelists Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), plus a larger Mary spire over the altar area, and finally a Jesus spire in the center which, when completed, will be the tallest church spire anywhere—but a few meters shorter than a nearby hill, because Gaudí thought something man-made should not overshadow what God had made.  Each entryway has a different theme:  Gaudí himself basically finished the Nativity façade (picture below), while another architect recently completed the Passion façade, and the Glory façade has yet to be finished.  (Gaudí knew he wouldn’t complete the cathedral, so he drew up plans which allowed for future architects and artists to bring their own ideas.)

  

Stained glass windows are a recent addition by another artist—according to him, they bring a “symphony of light” into the church, and I couldn’t agree more.  I was transfixed by the colors reflecting off the columns and walls of the cathedral.  The most interesting use of color, to me, was the Resurrection window behind the altar, which has darker oranges and yellows at the bottom but becomes clear at the top, letting in all the sunlight; a clear skylight illuminates a glass mosaic.  The columns themselves split into “branches” at the top, resembling palm trees, and the arches they form are hyperbolic, a mathematical form Gaudí found to work best to hold immense weight with minimal support.  (The museum had a whole exhibit about the mathematics behind the columns and arches!)  One of four planned pipe organs had already been installed, and we were lucky enough to hear it.  It most likely has a MIDI recorder which was set to play back several selections periodically.  We were sitting right behind the organ, seeing all the colors of the windows reflected by the pipes…an awesome experience for me!

   

Barcelona seems to be a favorite city for many people on both sides of the Atlantic—many of our friends in Europe asked if we were going there—but we unfortunately had just a little time there.  We could easily spend a week there, I’m sure.  But it was time for our evening flight to Berlin, to begin our exploration of the eastern part of Germany….

Nordic Countries - Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland

So, it has been quite a while since we've blogged!  So much has happened in that time, it is hard to keep up with it all.  But, I will try my best to summarize some of the major points.

First, we headed from Moritz's house to Denmark (June 30 - July 2).  In my opinion, Denmark wasn't that exciting.  It was similar to the Netherlands, but didn't have quite as distinct of feel as the Netherlands.  It was interesting that our arrival route took the train on a ferry across to Denmark, so we had a little time to enjoy the scenery from the water.  We had a nice walk around Copenhagen (København) and saw several touristy things--the underwhelming Little Mermaid statue, for instance.  The Round Tower, built as an astronomical observatory was very interesting.  We also visited Rosenborg Castle and saw the crown jewels and that was quite nice.  Also, I got to eat steak with David on my birthday while the kids were riding rides at the Tivoli Gardens amusement park--so everyone was happy!

[David] After Denmark came Sweden (July 2 - 4) and our visit with Daniel Stigberg (one of my roommates from the International House, 1993-94).  Our train took us on the lower part of the relatively new bridge connecting Denmark and Sweden (Copenhagen to Malmö).  We enjoyed meeting Daniel's family--Maria and their boys Johannes, Jesper, and infant Ulle--and camping out in their house.  Daniel took us out on his boat and gave us a nice private tour of several of the islands that make up Stockholm.  Erin and I tried local fish soup at a little restaurant on one of the islands, while Heidi and Daniel tried the other entree offered, a nice thick hamburger.  We met the rest of Daniel's family for dinner at a restaurant on the water in Stockholm and had a great time.  It would have been nice to have a little longer in Stockholm, but I appreciated the time we had to reconnect and share family stories.  It's been really interesting seeing many of my old friends with kids now--it kids consume everyone's lives no matter where they live.

We spent most of the day July 4 traveling by train across Sweden and Norway to Oslo.  We had some time in the evening to walk around downtown and compare it to Copenhagen, Stockholm, and the other major cities we've visited this summer.  We saw the cathedral, ate At a Thai restaurant that Rick Steves recommended, and saw a big crowd gathered to watch the World Cup soccer match on a huge screen. We walked to the Akershus castle and fortress down by the sea. We had a great view from the ramparts and could see across the bay (and also see the crowd watching soccer!)

Our hotel was comfortable (at least for us--we let the kids have the bunk beds!) and had the best breakfast buffet I've seen anywhere.  A highlight for me was the ability to make a pot of loose tea to enjoy along with all the breakfast offerings (including scrambled eggs & sausages, fish cakes, smoked salmon, yogurt & muesli, fresh bread, jam, cold cuts, and more I don't remember. 

July 5 was reserved for meeting our new exchange student, Daniel Olaisen, and his family north of Oslo.  (Yes, there are three different Daniels to keep up with in this post.  It will be interesting having two of them in our house for the next school year!)  Daniel's mother, Carmen, and stepfather, Trond, had planned a wonderful day for us, starting in Lillehammer, which we remembered as the host of the 1994 Winter Olympics.  We took a morning train to meet them there and had a nice lunch.  We saw some of the Olympic sites there and in surrounding cities--we were reminded that Lillehammer was the last "small" city to host the Olympic Games.  Trond recalled having been there in 1994 and the streets were totally packed with people trying to get around.  

We walked across a bridge over the lake to meet a paddle steamer which would take us south to Hamar.  The ship was one of the old-style riverboats with paddles on both sides--originally powered by steam but now by fuel.  This one, called "Skibladner" (named after Freyr's ship in Norse mythology) still has regularly scheduled service on Lake Mjøsa and has been in operation since 1856.  We had dinner served during the trip on the lower rear deck; it was quite a treat to enjoy our meal along with spectacular scenery.

Carmen and Trond had left their cars in Hamar, so they transported us to their quiet lakeside home in nearby Tangen and treated us to strawberry pie and drinks.  Trond had been telling us about their special liquer called Aquavit, so we all tried it--it was very tasty, and (shock) even Heidi liked it (in small doses).  We enjoyed talking more with them about their lives and ours, and answering questions their Daniel had about the upcoming year.  I think he will have an easier transition to life in Jacksonville since he has at least met us now and will hopefully be less nervous about coming.  He actually leaves Europe the same day we do (July 23), as he is going to a 10-day "language camp" that EF (the exchange sponsor) is holding in Boston.  So by the time he arrives in Alabama on August 3, he will be fairly well acclimated to the time change and have more of an idea what to expect during the year.  Kira and Sandy really enjoyed their language camps last year and made several international friends there.

We reluctantly left on a late train back to Oslo to prepare for an early morning train west (July 6).  We took the Oslo-Bergen route, renowned for its mountain scenery, and it lived up to the hype. At one point the train stopped in Finse which was next to a glacier.  We got to get off the train and take pictures of the glacier and snow that was still present at that elevation (1222 meters).  The glacial river (the color of cement) reminded Heidi of her experiences hiking in Alaska as a child.  

We went as far as Myrdal, where we took the famous train route down to Flåm, a small fjord town.  Many people arrive there on cruise ships and ride this train up and back just to see the scenery, and it is easy to understand why.  Over the course of an hour, the train descends about 880 meters down the mountainside.  Some of the track goes through tunnels—including one spot where there is an 180° turn inside a tunnel—but mostly there are spectacular views the mountains and numerous waterfalls resulting from the snowmelt.  

We had only been able to get tickets with a 4-hour layover in Myrdal (all of which we saw within 15 minutes of arriving), but we luckily got seats on an earlier train, arriving in Flåm midafternoon.  We checked in at our hostel (nice room with 4 bunk beds) and set out to look around.  It was nice to have some unexpected extra time to walk down to the water's edge and just look around at the gorgeous scenery.  While the kids found rocks to skip, I found a rock to sit on and just soak it in.  It was one of those rare quiet "God moments"--full of awe for the beauty around me and thanks for my family and the opportunity to travel with them.  (I also realized that, at the same time, church services were going on at home, so I guess that was my church service for this week!)

We decided to try eating at the Ægir brewpub built in Viking style (yes, Flåm is rather touristy, what with all the cruise ships coming and going--but it's not cheesy).  This turned out to be a great choice, as the food and atmosphere were excellent, and I didn't have to make much of a decision about what to eat--I chose the "Viking platter" which had 5 small courses (local seafood [shrimp, mussels, and their local small "lobster"], reindeer, fish soup, pork shank, and apple cake) paired with 5 locally brewed beers.  It was one of the best meals I've ever had.  We all liked it so much we ate there the next night as well; the only difference was that they had goat instead of pork.  Heidi and Daniel enjoyed the pork and then goat, while Erin tried a venison burger the first night and fish soup the next.  (This, by the way, was no ordinary fish soup--it had big chunks of salmon and whole mussels to fish out and eat!)

The next day (July 7), we took a fjord cruise around the nearby Sognefjorden area—a UNESCO World Heritage site consisting of the longest and deepest fjords in the world, including the offshoot fjords Nærrøyfjord (Narrow Fjord) and Aurlandsfjord, where Flåm is.  (The depth allows full-size cruise ships to dock in Flåm.  This is quite an odd sight, since there are many times more passengers on these ships than residents in the town.)  The day started out rainy, and it was still raining when we took our bus over to Gudvangen—not that it mattered, since the majority of the road was through tunnels, one about 3 miles long, and the other about 7 miles.  But then the weather was just sort of misty and overcast, and it was sunny later in the day.  Our ship left from Gudvangen, at the end of the Nærrøyfjord, with maybe 12 people sitting on the upper deck.  The fjord scenery is spectacular, with sheer granite cliffs rising on either side—one of the reasons Heidi took about 4000 pictures in Norway!  We enjoyed the 2-hour cruise immensely.  (The only issue we had was all the seagulls blocking our view at first.  A Japanese couple and their son continually threw bread to them for about half an hour.  It was cute for about 5 minutes, but very irritating after that!) After the cruise, we strolled along the pedestrian walkway in Flåm, around to where one of the waterfalls ends and the water rushes under the roadway and walkway.  All in all, this was one of our favorite places anywhere—I could easily spend much more time here just relaxing.

The next morning (July 8), we once again had to pack up for a long day of traveling.  The difference now was that we had to repack everything for air travel, keeping liquids and weight in mind.  We took the Flåm railway back to Myrdal, then a train back to Oslo, and then to the Oslo airport.  We were plenty early enough to figure out the self-service kiosks, print our boarding passes and luggage tags, drop off our bags, and then find somewhere to eat.  We laughed that we ended up eating at an American sports bar (O’Leary’s)—but at least the food was good and we got to watch the end of the Tour de France.  Our short flight put us in Helsinki, Finland, around 11:00 p.m. local time (an hour ahead of most of Western Europe).

We were met by the ever-reliable Kari Honkanen, my friend from the 1990-91 International House.  I had visited him in 1992, and I was glad to have the chance to visit again.  He now lives in Helsinki with his wife, Hanna, and 9-year-old daughter Siiri.  (Yes, she pouted when I showed her on my iPhone the next day that “Siri is unavailable.”)  After a good night’s sleep at our no-frills Omena hotel (no lobby staff, just a room code emailed to us), we met them downtown to walk around the market square,where we found the necessary refrigerator magnet and a few other items—and ate filled crepes at a small outdoor cafe.  We took the ferry over to see the Suomenlinna fortress (another UNESCO World Heritage site) and enjoy an uncommonly hot Finnish summer day.  (It was nearing 80° F, but that’s hot by their standards, since air conditioning is very rare.)  Afterwards, they went home to take a break and we walked around town some more, visiting the Lutheran cathedral—an iconic Helsinki landmark—and the equally interesting Russian Orthodox church.  (We missed an organ concert at the cathedral by 2 days; that has been common on this trip, but at least we were able to catch one in Salzburg.)  We met Kari and Siiri for dinner at a sort of organic Italian restaurant—excellent pasta.

After we slept in a little bit again (interrupted at 2 a.m. by our neighbors after the Argentina-Netherlands soccer game), July 10 dawned a bit cooler and windier.  (I use “dawned” loosely, since technically dawn was before 4 a.m.)  Kari took us and Siiri to his boat—a typical wooden Finnish fishing-type boat converted to having two sleeping cabins.  We had a wonderful afternoon touring around Helsinki and surrounding islands.  We stopped for lunch at island where there was a great little restaurant serving typical Finnish food.  Some of us started with nettle soup—something I would not have thought of but which was quite tasty.  It was sort of like broccoli soup, with fine bits of vegetable matter, which Kari figured must be young nettle leaves, as older ones would probably be too bitter.  Heidi and Daniel had meatballs, Erin had fish soup, and I had a nice salad with salmon.  We tried some typical desserts, including a French toast-like dessert which translated as “poor nights” (I suppose when you have nothing else, frying up some bread and serving it with strawberries makes a nice dessert!) and cheese cooked in phyllo dough, served with blueberries.  It was all delicious.  We stopped again later to see the Sibelius monument--which looks sort of like a conglomeration of organ pipes--and also, of course, happened to find some ice cream. 

After boating back toward Kari’s marina, he grilled some sausages and kebobs for us on his nifty little grill, which used a quick-starting charcoal block made from coconuts—handy both in that it heats quickly and that you can just dispose of the biodegradable “charcoal” overboard.  Siiri wrote and drew in her ship “logbook” and had us sign and draw as well.  Despite the fact that she hasn’t studied any English yet (she’s in a French immersion school and starts English next year, I think) we had a lot of fun with her.  I hope we’ll see the Honkanens in Alabama before too many years pass again, and maybe even at horse-camp in Oregon when she is a bit older.

We are now on a Norwegian air flight from Helsinki to Madrid (July 11) for a few days exploring Spain.  So we say goodbye to Scandinavia.  Scandinavia (or, more generally, Nordic countries) often gets lumped together as one place but, in reality, it is a huge land area, especially for Europe, so there is a lot more open space (at least once you get past Denmark, which is rather cramped).  The northern countries have a lot of similarities, but many things that make them unique.  Danish and Norwegian are similar languages, so they can generally read each other’s writing; their speech sounds quite different, however.  Norwegian has a characteristic lilt which somehow reminds me of the Southern U.S.  Swedish is a bit different, but we could follow some of it, since it is a Germanic language and they use quite a few words from English.  Finnish, on the other hand, is entirely incomprehensible to most people; it is only related to Estonian and distantly to Hungarian.  It is very clipped and measured, with very little rise in tone and very predictable pronunciation (once you know the letter sounds).  The Finns are a quiet, introspective people who are gracious and polite but not overly social (which I do not mean to be a negative thing).  Kari had told me this in college and I found it to be true, along with the fact that once Finns are friends, they’re always friends.  I have found this to still be the case with not only him, but with many other friends around Europe—and for that, I am grateful.