Extremadura & Lisbon

I've blogged about our time in Paris, but not about our other recent excursion to Extremadura and Lisbon.  We had a visit from Zoë's mother.  Long time readers of the blog may remember Susan from my Christmastime post which told of the delightful time she had being stranded in the UK by the incompetence of Heathrow Airport, for five days of her 10-day vacation.  Her disappointment at missing so much time in Spain was assuaged by immediately making plans to come visit us in the spring.  Finally, the time came.  She connected through New York instead of London, and arrived without incident.

We had a choice here.  Either the four of us could spend a week in Madrid, cramped into our 2-bedroom apartment, or we could all go on a fun trip.  Which would you have chosen?  We rented a car and headed for southwest Spain, or "Extremadura," a region that everyone had said to us we had to see, and then for Lisbon just a bit farther beyond.

View of Trujillo & countryside

The trip was a reminder of the fact that you cannot drive more than two hours in Spain without coming across something fabulous (and passing a lot of really nice things along the way to boot).  First stop, Trujillo, a town frozen in time, just over three hours driving from Madrid.  This was where Francisco Pizarro (conqueror of Peru) and Francisco de Orellana (discoverer of the Amazon River) hailed from.  They and their conquistador buddies came back from the New World with their bags full of gold, and used it to build fancy palaces in their hometown.  And then nothing else of note happened in their hometown for the next four-hundred years, making Trujillo a place frozen in time.  The town has a modern section, but it is not too large, so that the historic quarter is still prominent.  When you climb up to the moorish castle at the top, you look out over gorgeous Extremaduran countryside, rather than modern suburbs.

We spent the night in nearby Cáceres, another 45 minutes down the road.  This town also produced conquistadores who enriched the place with New World loot, and also has a beautifully preserved historic center full of buildings from the sixteenth century.  We spent two nights there on a lovely hotel right on the plaza mayor, and had fun wandering through its old cobbled streets.

Afterwards, it was on to Portugal, and a stop at Évora, a town not far from the Spanish-Portuguese frontier.  We had eaten well in Extremadura, but the first truly memorable meal of the trip was here, at a tiny restaurant down a narrow street where we had arroz con pato magret and cordero asado.  The highlight of the town was its beautifully preserved Roman temple, as well as its white-washed streets.

Street in Lisbon's Baixa

That same day, we headed into Lisbon, where we spent three nights.  I wish I could say I loved Lisbon, a city that many of my friends rave about, but I didn't, and neither did Zoë.  Lisbon is shabby, and people who love it find romance in that shabbiness.  We just found shabbiness.  The city feels much more Latin American than any other city we've seen in Europe, but you pay for everything in euros.  We wandered around some of its neighborhoods, saw the castle, the monastery of the Jerónimos, and the Torre de Belém.  I did get a kick, however, from seeing the new Museo de Oriente, a museum of Asian art that features a nice exhibit on Portuguese-Asian art from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.  It's in an old cod factory next to the police station in an industrial wharf area.  And we ate well, too, particularly, in our hotel restaurant, where we had dinner once out of sheer exhaustion.  Turns out that the restaurant of the Hotel Aviz is an old establishment where celebrities used to dine.  The meal was spectacular, and included memorable desserts.

The Roman theater in Mérida, on arts day for the kids.

After Lisbon, it was back to Extremadura, and to the city of Mérida.  Unlike Cáceres and Trujillo, Mérida is not know for its general ambience, but for its Roman ruins.  I must admit I was skeptical, having just been to Rome last December, but I was proven wrong.  The ruins are spectacular, and in two cases better than their equivalents in Rome.  There is a very well-preserved  Roman theater, and one of the best preserved circuses in the old Roman world.  The theater was actually in use when we visited, by a group of schoolkids from all over Extremadura who had come in for a performing arts day.  We watched a skit and a dance number before the heat got to us.  The museum of Roman art is spectacular, both for its collection and its architecture.  Large, well-preserved Roman mosaics are hung on walls, where they are visible from Once again, we ate very well, this time at the parador.  Susan had very much wanted to stay in one, so we decided to stay in Mérida's, an eighteenth century convent with a lovely patio. At dinner, we had the best técula mécula of the trip, as well as a fantastic plate of local cheeses.  Técula mécula is an Extremaduran dessert, a sort of almond pie, and it's fabulous.

After Mérida, it was back to Madrid. Susan went back to Boston, this time via Miami rather than London, and we went back to school and to work.