Spain week two, day five

Wednesday May 7th 2008

Moorish Farmhouse, Orgiva, Spain

Today is Linda and mine 20th wedding anniversary and there are few nicer locations to spend it than where we are now. Today is our usual rest day from classes, and our guests surprised us first thing by announcing that they didn't want us to do anything at all for them today as it was our anniversary. So we were all set to take some people with us to Granada but no one wanted to come! They would sort out their own breakfast, have a relaxed day by the pool, perhaps a trip into Orgiva later to a cafe. And so we could go off and do our own thing

So we travelled up as we did last week and were soon settled into our favourite cafe where they serve the local do'nuts. Winding through the back streets we stumbled across a jigsaw shop where they had a Da Vinci's "Last Supper" jigsaw with 13,200 pieces. We might pop back next week for a Rosina Wachmiester cat jigsaw that Linda liked.

Our initial destination was the Basillica Juan de Rios which has one of the most ornate alters in a city full of ludicrously ornate alters. After some initial confusion we found that this was accessed via the entrance to a hospital, but once inside we found it wasn't open till 3:30 anyway. So maybe next week.

Instead, we went round the nearby Monastery of St Jerome and this also had a quite extraordinary alter

The Monastery of St Jerome

The alter of the church inside the monastery

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Close up of the alter - the figures are only slightly smaller than human sized!

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I was very struck by the complex ceiling

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Yet another religious statue on a street corner in Granada

We had to head back home early afternoon as Nigel and Zoe were being paid a visit by a Polish film crew who were making a documentary. One of the group had translated Chris Stewart's "Driving Over Lemons" into Polish and they had been filming earlier at his place just up the road. They are making a film about foreigners living in Spain and what they get up to. So part of this programme could feature us. After a long series of filming and interviews, we staged a short pilates class for them to film. I also gave them a brochure about us. Later it turned out that they were also going to be writing something for a paper so we might get a mention there as well.

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After many changes of plan, we settled on the "El Limonero" restaurant for a dinner out to celebrate our anniversary. This was actually very good - the first time I have eaten a good steak for some while. And they had a delicious almond liquer that we should try and find.

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So an interesting way to spend our anniversary.