Where have all the Spaniards gone?



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Chapter 60: Quien dice españa dice todo
It is spring. The trees are laden with oranges. They are now really sweet and the juice squirts out of them the moment you cut them into segments. I open my mouth and squeeze in a stream of juice.

The car is parked under the trees somewhere up the track. This track goes over a spring and I dont want to get bogged down. Anyway, it is a pleasant walk to the end of the village.

The river winds away to the west of me. I can see a bend where it curves into Portugal, and then curves back again and disappears behind a hill. The Guadiana is a proper river. It widens out to a respectable estuary three or four kilometres from the sea. It is an easy-going river, and is still tidal right up near Mertola. If you have a plot facing the river you can put in a jetty and skim your way down into town, and tie up the boat right outside a supermarket in Ayamonte. I rather like the idea of speeding down the estuary to go shopping: your own wide highway with a great view and no other traffic; nice!

On the Portuguese side are several ruins which overlook the river. They are a little expensive. The houses are very expensive, but the access is good. There is a nice road running parallel with the river right up to Alcoutim. I like it all along here. I could have a really nice house here. But the real problem is, the place is a bit lonely and empty. There would be a lousy social life.

On the other hand, Ayamonte is a very pleasant little town, and the coast all along Spain here is charming, with inlets, marshes, islands, and lagoons. All around Isla Canela and Isla Christina is very pleasant. But the prices of the houses are extortionate.

Ayamonte is built alongside the Guadiana. There are two very pretty squares which are filled with playing children in the evenings. The seats are covered in mosaics. Back in the muddle of streets are fancy shops, and cosy restaurants. To the south is a jumble of streams, inlets, a fishing harbour, and miles of sandy beach with restaurants.

Upstream are the twin villages of Alcoutim and Sanlucar de Guadiana. There is talk of putting a bridge across the river, which is only about 100 yards wide at this point.

The road out to the village of Sanlucar was appalling when I first made the trip, but it has improved considerably, and is now a comfortable ride. That is not the case with the road going south back down to the river along a very windy, appalling rocky dirt-track to the derelict village of Romerano.

Wrecked bumpy caminos attract me. I can smell fascinating fincas and ruined villages. I have to go that extra mile. I have to almost wreck my car negotiating the potholes and streams. Mostly the streams are dusty, sometimes they appear to be only a few inches deep, occasionally they deceive and I get stuck.

After a couple of kilometres of winding around, down valleys, up hills, and round hairpin bends, over potholes, and skirting landslides, the track evens out, and starts to follow the river south. Then it curves round again and drops down to a tiny hamlet nestling in a creek, where there is a rather nice hacienda.

After a few more kilometres the track comes to the ruined village of Romerano. First, on your right is the old schoolhouse, now a ruin. Down the hill is a row of houses, most of them renovated, or 'reformed' as they say in Spain. They are all empty during the week. At weekends the owners struggle up the track, and potter about their tiny gardens, make more repairs, talk, pick a few oranges, and get out the paella pan.

The road goes round in a circle, under the trees. There are ruins everywhere, some with gardens going down to the river. But you can sit on a dodgy rooftop and dream. How lovely to live here. But what a struggle getting to the nearest bar. And how would I get my building supplies delivered? No business would deliver down this track.

The next week I am back again sitting on the roof of my favourite ruin. At least it is mine for the time being. I idly make plans for a couple of bedrooms with large verandas that look down to the river. I even talk to Emilio, the owner. He will sell the ruin to me. He runs a building firm up in Villablanca. I ask about getting cement delivered. He laughs and shrugs his shoulders.

The sun slides through the trees. I dream on my roof. I think of those Lorca poems. I start writing a few small poems of my own. They are written first in Spanish, then I translate them into English. They are short, imagistic, clean in line, elegant, and the words are simple and crisp.

The white moon
bends
to look through the trees
searching
for tomorrow.

The river opens a window
the light shines out
across the shadows.

There is a crash
as my neighbour
blinded by the light
stumbles home.

I write quickly. I can write dozens of these little poems. Somewhere beside me is a plate of olives and a bottle of fino. A fox barks. An owl sends a strange wobbling sound through the trees. Another answers from the headland. It is nearly midnight. It feels as though it could be midnight forever.

*****

We are in a small town just to the north of Huelva. I park alongside a small square. Opposite is a cafe. It is late, and we are well into the second sitting for breakfast. The clientèle consists mainly of middle class woman, well dressed, chatting with their friends, and sipping coffee. There is the occasional working man wolfing down a coffee, and finishing off with a small glass of brandy.

I order a carajillo. "With whisky or brandy?" asks the waiter. I always thought carajillo was made with brandy.

I order toast. I get two halves of a small toasted baguette. On the counter is a pot of tomato tapenade, and beside that is a pot of something akin to a rich meaty dripping. I drizzle olive oil across the toast, then spread the tomato on one slice, and the dripping on the other. I then grind some fresh black pepper over the top, and tuck in.

At a table across the way is a lady pouring a stream of olive oil onto her toast. When the bread is thoroughly soaked she spoons piles of sugar onto the bread. Yikes!

But I guess it's just a simple breakfast scene in south west Spain.

*****

We are in a small town to the north of Seville. It is sunday. I suddenly decide to go to church. I have not attended a church service in Spain since I lived up in Cantabria when I was a teenager.

It is a clean, bright, white building. Inside all is light. I am amazed. I am not used to seeing light airy churches. The priest is intoning something up the front. The congregation is chattering away, not paying any attention at all.

Suddenly the priest sits down on a large red cushion to the side of the main aisle. The choir is ranged round in a semi-circle on the other side. The priest picks up his guitar and starts playing. The choir begins to sing. The audience immediately stop chattering and pay attention. A tall thin boy stands up, and walks to the edge of the choir. He turns, faces us, and starts to play the trumpet.

The sound is enchanting; the choir, the guitar, the trumpet; it all seems so perfectly right. All I had to do to enjoy this was walk through an open door into a totally different world.

*****

It is autumn. The leaves on the trees are beginning to go rusty. We have been lost in the hills to the north of Seville. The road goes round and round, and up and up. We wind along through thick woodland. Occasionally we come out to a small straight track of road, with the occasional farmstead. Then we start winding around again, back through thick woodland, round and round. Julie wants to stop. "I'm beginning to feel sick," she complains.

We find a pleasant spot; a clearing in the woodland. We unpack the food, set out our lunch on the grass and uncork a bottle. The bread is fresh and crumbly. The cheese is strong. The olives are huge and succulent. I cut oranges, and squirt them into the wine to make sangria. We have empanadas filled with tomato, and others with spinach.

After a long and lazy meal I stretch out on the grass. It is hot. I take off all my clothes and fall asleep. (It is months later when Julie shows her photos to the family that her mother giggles when she sees me lying on this blanket surrounded by the remnants of lunch.)

Later we drive through a seemingly endless tangle of trees and hills until at last we reach our destination; the village of Aracena. This place used to be a cool hill station for the English who worked in the Rio Tinto mines. In the nineteenth century there were many splendid houses here with swimming pools. Now it looks a little like a lost alpine village.

The villages here are a tangle of houses and trees all jumbled up and stuck to the side of the hills. Some are capped with tenth century minareted mosques. Deep in the woods are deer that browse in the shadows.

To the west is the village of Jabugo, famous for its ham, cured by simply hanging the meat from beams in the roofs, or in cellars for between 18 and 30 months. The meat is from the Iberian pig, which is a small black beast, with slender legs, and greyish-yellow fat with a soft consistency. It is a ham which has its own denomination which is protected by law, and is considered to be the best in the world. There is a festival of ham during the last week in october.

Aracena is topped by yet another of those castles of Spain. It dates back to Muslim times. But going in the other direction, down under the town is the amazing Cave of Marvels. This is quite a spectacular place with twelve caverns, six lakes, and all the usual stalactites and stalagmites.

We drive through the village, turn back east and drive slowly into the chestnut groves. On every side are large, stately spreading chestnut trees laden with spiky globes which shelter the dark shiny nuts. In front of us are two old women with plastic bags collecting the fallen nuts from the side of the road.

I stop the car, get out a couple of cardboard boxes, and we gather the fallen fruit. When I get home I will drop them in the ashes of my fire and roast them. They will go nicely with a glass or two of port.


*****

The beach goes on for miles. I walk up to my knees in the sea, then tramp back to the restaurant. Behind us are the palm trees, beyond them are the apartments and villas, mostly empty. Behind them are the marshes criss-crossed by inlets of the sea.

Julie calls me. I go over to the table, sit down, pour myself a sangria, and smile at the dish before me. There are six red mullet waiting to be eaten. They fall apart as I pick them up. They are delicious.

To the west the sun goes red and blotchy, and starts to sink into the sea. The waves make almost no noise as they lap onto the beach.

There is something special about this place. I dont know what it is. I constantly find myself sitting on a chair in a cafe, or lazing on a dusty hillside, or perching on a rock overlooking a vast panorama, or looking out across a moonlit lake from a hotel balcony, and simply soaking in the strange ineffable something that is all around me.

Spain is that strange wonderful and enticing girlfriend that keeps hitching up her skirt and smiling at me .....