Spain Sunday: Christopher Columbus

Saturday was “Hispanidad (Hispanic) Day” Dia de la Hispanidad. Aka the National Day of Spain AKA Day Christopher Columbus’s Arrival in Americas Day. That’s right, while Americans have Monday off for Columbus Day, Spain has no day off because they always celebrate it on October 12th. While America uses the second Monday in October Spain […]

Mallorca Monday: How the Balearic Islands Were Formed

Hawaii is made from underwater volcanoes Come with us 250 million years ago to the Triassic Period (just before your favorite period – the Jurassic one, you know, the one with all the dinosaurs). Mammals looked like this: And the world looked like this: You may be familiar with Pangea (when everything was one […]

Mallorca Monday: Sant Antoni

Manacor has just finished a whirlwind two weeks of absolutely fun nonsense. Bonfires, communal barbecue, demons dancing, and animal blessings. It’s been a mess of partying, merriment, and chanting. The Sant Antoni (Saint Anthony) festival is fairly unique to our area. Palma (the capital) has some different stuff (also related to Saint Sebastian) but it doesn’t […]

Spain Sunday: Bullfighting!

Bullfighting is a very distinctly Spanish tradition. It’s like a sport and an ancient cultural tradition wrapped up into one event. April is the beginning of the bullfighting season, and it will end sometime in September. Given the controversial nature of the subject, I’ll try to stay impartial. Also, there are few pictures, because I […]

Lisbon

The train from Faro to Lisbon was a whopping 5 hours. We arrived late and the apartment we were staying in had locked themselves (and us) out. So we had to stand around and wait for a locksmith to basically smash the door open while the other guests shouted for quiet above us. Yikes. Faro […]

Birthday in Gibraltar

We started the day with a full English Breakfast. Yesssss We first had this when we visited London, but what sets it apart? Eggs bacon and sausage are pretty standard for any breakfast. But a British breakfast has beans, and tea. Also, most important in my opinion, is the black pudding. This is basically blood, […]