A day in Seville

After two days of relaxing travel my late Summer holiday really got going with a full day exploring Seville. This took the form of a guided tour in the morning then free time for the rest of the day.

Our hotel, the Inglaterra, was conveniently situated on the edge of the old town in the south-west corner of Plaza Nueva.

On the other side of the square was the Town Hall which gave an early indication of the decorative style of the grander buildings in the city.

The guide took us on a short walk south along the main road towards the Cathedral that was to dominate the day.

At that time we just stood and gaped at the exterior while waiting to go in to the royal palace next door. This took longer than usual due to problems with their ticketing systems. At least we had the cathedral to look at and some brilliant sunshine to enjoy.

The royal palace did not try to complete with the cathedral on scale but free of religious restrictions it won on decoration.

This was our first exposure (on this trip) to the Moorish style of colourful ceramics, intricate plaster and patterned cedar ceilings.

The structure of the palace would also become familiar with an open courtyard in the centre surrounded by small rooms that all look much the same but which had different purposes, e.g. living or sleeping.

From there we took a coach ride to Plaza de España, which is one of the places that I wanted to see, but this was a only whistle-stop tour and I resolved to go back later in the day.

That was the end of the formal tour and we were then taken back to the hotel. After a short break I went out again to do some freelance exploring.

I found a little cafe in the old town, not that easy as they were all very busy, and had a slow but fun lunch as the two waiters had a serious row and one of them walked off. I then did some general rambling turning from one pretty street in to another. A few had some loose shades to keep the worst of the heat off and this only added to the streets' charms.

I then went back to the cathedral and this time I went inside, not to look at the cathedral but to climb the tower and look at the city.

The tower was unusual in that there were no steps up but a series of ramps instead.

There were windows all the way up and with the tower being square it offered views of the whole city.

I am not that good with heights, but they have to be climbed to get views like this, and so I was pleased to find a very solid and quite tall wall with thick railings above. I was still somewhat nervous and I had to walk around the viewing level carefully.

It was quite hot by then and I had done a lot of walking so I had a beer break on the way back to the hotel where I had a short siesta. There was no time for a nap as I had to recharge phone batteries and do various web things.

An hour or so later I headed back to Plaza de España, this time by tram.

The sun was racing down when I got there and it added a warm touch of red to the brick work.

The Plaza is over the top in a way that tops should be gone over. It is almost surreal which I guess is why it was used as a royal palace in Star Wars 2 (under the new numbering scheme) rather than go to the effort of drawing something in CGI.

The building is semi-circular with a moat in front of it that is crossed by four bridges. There is a large fountain in the centre of the Plaza and two pools of water leading to each end of the building. It is all very impressive and I was right to go back there.

The light dies quickly then but I had done all that I wanted to do that day. It was still warm, if not hot, and the siesta had worked so I decided to walk back to the hotel. I may not have taken the most direct route, or the route that I intended to take, and that did not matter.

I found myself unintentionally back in the Jewish Quarter where we had stopped for a coffee in the morning so I went in to look for a restaurant.

That part of the plan worked well and I found a good restaurant in a pretty square and I sat outside for an hour or so having a leisurely paella.

The day had one final treat waiting for me back at the hotel. There was a bar on the roof where I had a daiquiri nightcap while appreciating the few monuments lit up for my pleasure. Appropriately the chief of these was the cathedral which had already featured twice in my busy day.

I am sure there is more to Seville than I managed to see in a day but I had more cities to see that holiday and a day was all that I had, and an excellent day it was too.

From Biarritz to Seville by coach and two trains

This was not the way that we were meant to get to Seville but something happened on the original route that made us divert via Biarritz and stop overnight there.

We had a prompt start on the second day and a short coach ride over the border in to Spain and a damp station in Irun where our Great Rail Journey continued.

The ride was easy enough and we were at Madrid Chamartin just before lunchtime.

We rushed through the station a little and I was snapping away as we did so, as were some others as, understandably, there were a few train fans on the tour. The stations most attractive features were the metal pillars supporting the roofs above the platforms, the semi-circular arches over the main building, the long simple roof on the front of the station and the graffiti-like art on the steps down to the platforms.

Another short coach ride took us across town to Madrid Atocha station, which was a big surprise.

A large shed with intricate metal-work I expected, the tropical forest I did not. I loved it in just the same way that I like the large glasshouses at Kew Gardens, and for exactly the same reason - the contrast between the natural and the constructed.

Lunch was less successful and the only vegetarian option that I could find in the multiple cafes and shops was some chips from Burger King. That was good enough and it was somewhat enjoyable to eat pure junk food for a change.

There was more success in the lounge that we moved on to and I helped myself to a couple of free beers and some power to recharge my phone that had been feeding me podcasts all morning.

Descending to the platform for our train to Seville revealed tall concrete columns supporting a simple roof. This was very practicable in the hot weather, even in October it was approaching 30c, with plenty of space for the air to circulate.

As with all the other trains we were in first class for the ride to Seville which meant plenty of comfort for looking out of the window as Spain reeled past, reading comics on my iPad or just listening to more podcasts on my iPhone.

This was a hot dry Spain that we rode through and most of what we saw was gentle hills covered with olive trees. We would be seeing a lot of those on this holiday. There was nothing special to see but the difference between the dry brown Spanish landscape and the usual wet green one was interesting in itself.

We arrived in Seville around 8pm.

We had to walk the last 100m or so to the hotel as the coach could not get through the narrow streets leading to our city-centre hotel, and I took that opportunity to explore a little of the city. OK, I got lost.

Having found the hotel and dropped my bag off I went for a quick walk to see what Seville does at night and also to find something to eat. I hit one of the many cafes just off Plaza Nueva where I found something with spinach in it. And beer.

It had taken two full days to get to Seville but the journey was very much part of the holiday and I was rested and happy.

From Richmond to Biarritz by train

I booked my late Summer holiday with Great Rail Journeys, rather than go independently which I usually do, as I fancied their Marrakech Express tour and that looked far too complicated and foreign to book myself.

The point of a tour like this as that they sort out all the travel arrangements and also take you to the most interesting places at each destination.

This is all well and good once the tour starts but I had real problems getting to the start!

I had not checked the travelling the night before, i.e. planned weekend working, as I was had allowed plenty of time to get to St Pancras and had several routes to choose from. The first warning light came on in the morning when I looked to check the buses and the next 65 was due in 25 minutes. So I went for the 317 in 10 minutes instead, a little slower but I had allowed plenty of time.

Worried by the lack of buses I checked the route to London only to discover that there was an incident on the District Line and that a separate incident at Clapham Junction meant that there were no mainline trains. The London Overground was not going either for some reason. The best the staff at Richmond could offer me was a slow train to Barnes in thirty minutes time and then a bus replacement service to Waterloo. I certainly did not have time for that.

It looked like the only option was to hope for a bus to Hammersmith and then to catch the tube from there but even that would probably have taken too long. Then a stroke of luck, while waiting desperately for a bus, a taxi arrived to drop somebody off and I was able to commandeer it. He was not actually looking for a ride and I was asking him to go out of his zone but he agreed to my pleading and I got to Hammersmith in time to catch a tube to St Pancras and I arrived there about ten minutes before the drop-dead time I had been given.

The rest of the journey was simple.

In Paris we swapped from Gare du Nord to Gare Montparnasse which is a brutal concrete cavern, and not in a nice way.

The train was pleasant enough though and we were travelling first class all the way.

It was a fast and a smooth journey and it was three hours before we made our first stop. As I tend to do, I got out at the station and took a couple of pictures before we moved off again.

The countryside that we flew threw looked empty compared to the UK, which is understandable given that it has about five times the space for the same number of people.

I soon bored of the countryside, I prefer towns and villages and took the opportunity to read some comics on my iPad that I had brought with me just for that purpose.

One of the nicer stations that we stopped at was Dax, wherever that is.

We arrived in Biarritz around 7pm and it was starting to get dark so once I had checked in to the hotel I crossed to road to the beach for a walk along the promenade.

At the end I found a fashionable and busy cafe, Victoria, for a small meal and a large beer. The food was excellent and the service exceptional.

The rest of Biarritz was quiet with just a few tourists out at the end of a day at the end of the season.

There were a series of lights along the beach to highlight the waves, one of the rocks sitting in the sea just offshore and a cluster of trees on a headland. These few lights apart it was pretty dark and unwelcoming and great effort had to be made to imagine why Biarritz is a famous holiday resort.

I found a little harbour but it was so ridiculously dark there that the pictures that I took show little more than grey blobs against a black background.

Even the big church nearby was unlit. Perhaps tourists are meant to keep to the main beach where the few lights were.

I thought about exploring a little more of the town but then it started to rain and that made the decision for me and I headed back to the hotel.

We were there for just one night so there was no un/packing to do and I went straight to sleep happy with a day well spent.

The troubles at the start of the day were forgotten and the holiday really had begun.

The Wasp Factory at Linbury Studio Theatre

The Wasp Factory is one of the most extraordinary performances that I have ever seen and any casual reader of this blog will know that I am not unaccustomed to going to unusual shows.

And I only saw this by accident, somebody else was attracted to the opera via the Iain Banks book and I tagged along for the ride knowing nothing of the book or of this adaptation.

Several things combined to make it extraordinary and while some of these had resonances with some other shows that I had seen  other elements were new and the result of putting them all together was decidedly so.

The music was partially electronic and partially acoustic with a small band on the stage battling with some relentless rhythmic sounds. There were touches of Glass' 1000 Airplanes on the Roof here in the dark musical onslaught.

The set was lit by low lights on each side of the stage to produce sharp contrast. That was not unusual but what the stage did was. It started as the island flat and covered with soil before tilting in stages until it was vertical and became a burning house.

The story (I think it was a story) was delivered by three singers who did everything from crawl in the earth to climb the structure with safety harnesses on. And they sung beautifully. There were no surtitles and none were needed.

The Wasp Factory remained dark and threatening throughout and was not cheapened by an interval.

I've only touched lightly on some of the key elements but everything about the production had clearly been thought through in some detail and with great care. Every part was perfect and the way that they came together was better still.
 
The Wasp Factory was one of those extraordinary performances that does so much that it defies categorisation; yes it was an opera but it was also much more than that. It was also so stunning that my first reaction was that I wanted to see it again immediately.

The Wasp Factory was simply one of the best things that I have ever had the privilege to witness.

DC Comics Digital Sneak Peeks: 2 October 2013

Green Arrow is looking good at the moment so it gets featured again. This is an interior page from #24 by Andrea Sorrentino that has a neat structure and a nice use of just two colours.

The Witching Hour in the Vertigo line is another new title and this one promises "nine tales of divine horror". That sounds good and this page from the story Birdie looks good too. Coincidentally it also has some circular panels and, as with Green Arrow above, they contribute pleasingly to the page structure.

Finally there is another iconic Batman cover. I love icons and I love Batman so it is understandable that I love covers like this one. OK, so it says Batwing rather than Batman but the argument is the same.