It's been an interesting week so far. From my mom almost dunking my niece in the pool on accident when she stepped off the deep end, to the Salvadore Dali museum yesterday and the local Roman ruins on the hill above town today, there's definitely a bit of something for everyone here on the sunny Mediterranean coast. Actually, one of the most awesome things to happen so far on this trip was Monday night's extremely productive thunder storm. I've seen some decent displays in the PNW, but this was more like a Louisiana gully-washer on steroids: Alternating periods of downpour and clear dry air, all the while there was lightning cracking across the sky, sometimes keeping it lit up for what felt like 20 or 30 seconds without a break. It was like the entire countryside was lit by a giant strobe for a while. Very cool.
Working backwards...Today (Weds) we went up the hill from town to the local archaeological dig. There is an old town on the ridge dating from the 5th or 6th century BCE, and its museum if chock full of pottery, metalworks and glass from the site. It was inhabited by various ancient groups up through the 1st century CE, when the Romans built the coast road that ran from the Alps to the Pyrenees right through this region, which brought many local inhabitants down from the hills until the road fell into disrepair and disuse in the dark ages. Neat place, a good number of wall-bases remain intact, too, as well as their underground cisterns and food storage.
Yesterday (Tues) we went West across the Spanish boarder and into the town of
Figueres, birth and burial place of Salvador Dali. We wen to
his museum and had an amazing lunch at an out of the way cafe in the predominantly
Catalan-speaking portion of town. It was interesting to me that our waitress - an adorable early 20-something - spoke very little Spanish or French, and had been raised on the regional dialect of Catalan. It's pretty close to Spanish, so we were able to communicate, and we all had a good laugh at the crazy Castilian lisp (which is not present in Catalan. I guess there's some kind of friendly linguistic rivalry there). The Dali museum is a very...surreal place. But then, I guess that's the point. I'd always been familiar with a few of his painted works (and rather liked them), but to see the vast range of mediums and subjects he had worked with was impressive. It also served as a reminder to me that a lot of what constitutes 'art' has to do with how famous you are. Even very basic works seem to gain high regard if they have a famous artist's name attached, while the same work, if the labeled product of little Billy's 4th grade art class, would probably be given no more than a moment's glance before the viewer goes looking for the 'intersting' stuff. That mentality has always kind of pissed me off. Anyway, there were many astounding works and lots of clever use of subject positioning and plenty of near-real dreamscapes. The place was really crowded for a Tuesday afternoon. Seemed mostly to be college-aged kids and retirees. But then, I guess that goes for a lot of museums this time of year. After the Dali museum and lunch, we headed back to France, and hung around the town of
Perpignan checking out the 15th and 16th century manor houses that are still around and used as multiple-family residences. Also, we finally got around to eating crepes, something I haven't bothered to do since my last trip to France (yes, they are just that much better here). For dinner we did something I didn't think we'd ever do. We went to McDonald's. All four of us (plus Lily). As a family. I might be wrong, but I think the last time we all did that together, it may have been the France trip we took back in the 80's. Anyway, all moral and health issues aside, at least I finally got to order a
Royale with Cheese. :)
Monday we went over to Pezanas. It has a rather well preserved old-town area that has many working artists and artisans, and a ton of old 14th through 17th cent. buildings currently under renovation and restoration. This is going to be an extremely beautiful city someday. For now, though, it is mostly a touristy little backwater with some good restaurants. Lunch at the Glass Fish (Le Poisson Verre) was good, and the panacotta for dessert was stellar.
Sunday I slept in. We dropped my brother-in-law off at the train in
Beziers in the afternoon to get him home to take care of business matters. After that we went over to the 9 locks, decided it looks better on postcards, and headed home.
I'll get around to posting some pics of various places from this week at some point... probably when I get back to Seattle, but maybe tomorrow if it's a slow day.
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