Just looked at my photos and thought, hmmm, which one shall I post that will best sum up my trip? As if one photo could do that -- but the possibilities are: Egg yolk custard, possibly the richest dessert I've ever eaten... The Alhambra at sunset... Penitentes entering a church after a procession... A memorable cheese and wine interlude... Drifts of poppies... The sparkling clear sea... The public market in Almeria... Or the mountain of red garlic inside... I think I need to set up a Flickr account and post them all -- but I have to learn how to do that...
Odd how, after returning from the Yucatan, my dreams are filled with green and flowers and smiling brown-skin people -- but now, after Spain, I'm dreaming of mountains and stone walls and steep stairways. But I went into the Mediterranean! Yes, it was literally freezing-ass cold but we flailed around in it for awhile... and it wasn't like the Aegean where you get used to the cold and can relax into it. No it wasn't.
So I went to the beach. And there were flowers everywhere we wandered -- not just at the beach but in the mountains and the towns and cities. And the light was fantastic, the clouds always changing. Why am I not dreaming of these things? Because stone dominated -- massive stone buildings, cobblestone streets, craggy stone mountains, stone stairways. I love stones. I pick them up wherever I go. I brought a backpack full of them home from Turkey 40 years ago and I still have every one of them despite the number of times I've moved. But I don't love these dreams.
I look at my photos and am awed by where I've been, what I've seen. And the photos that got away are just as vivid -- the glossy black and white magpies in the field of yellow-orange button flowers interupted with emerald green, set off by the almost cobalt blue sky... There are a number of those planted firmly in memory. It's all planted firmly in memory and I'm grateful for every moment of it.
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