Spain Travel News 12/21/2010

Read abut the history of an Andalusian Christmas

Months ago, I wrote about the golden padlocks locked to the Isabel II Bridge in Seville. Then I spotted the same tradition in Paris, on the Pont des Arts, surely one of the most romantic examples of civil engineering that anyone could find. Somewhere between finding love in Paris and stumbling across the handcuffs on the Hohenzollernbrücke Bridge in Cologne (try saying that out loud), I realised just how far the padlock tradition had spread.

Across the world’s cities…or so I thought.

Then I travelled to the least-visited part of Andalucia, the Cabo de Gata in Almeria. Guess what I found?

Police have arrested a 50 year old Briton, accused of setting fire to the hotel room where he was staying.

Thirteen people, all of them British tourists, had to be treated for smoke inhalation following the fire which also led to the evacuation of six of the ten floors of the Hotel Ambassador in Calle Girona in the town. El País reports nine people of the 200 evacuated were hurt and needed hospital treatment, taken to the district hospital in La Vila Joiosa. Two of the injured were allowed home shortly afterwards.

Your Scoopettes are back with another video on Barcelona’s merriest market, the Santa Llucia Christmas Market.

Christmas is not the biggest holiday here, that would be Kings’ Day in January. Still, the city is looking festive as the 25th of December approaches.

IT was a mistake that she almost lived to regret for the rest of her life.
But, Michelle Gabbott, 34, has been handed the perfect Christmas bundle of joy – her baby daughter Taeya – after a fraught two month legal battle with social services.
The reunion came after she realised she had made a huge error to give up her new-born child for adoption in October.

If you're planning a busy Christmas, perhaps with family visiting, why not get away for New Year? After many days spent cooking and entertaining friends and family, take time out for yourself and have a change of scene to welcome in 2011.

Spanish children may be considered among the most lucky in the world, as they have not one, but two days they receive presents during the holidays. The first is Christmas morning, and the second, (and even bigger holiday) is Dia de Los Tres Reyes, or Day of the Three Kings, as in the Three Kings of Bethlehem.

This year, being the centenary of Madrid's (now slightly dowdy!) Centre Piece, the Gran Via, the sheer complexity of its history forced me into writing a trilogy. The finished result, liked by many, I am pleased to recount, reflected only the more striking, more interesting (from my point of view – this is my blog, after all) of all the stuff I had to sort through. Such is the complexity of the history of any great city. It was, in fact the culmination of seven months (on and off – this is not a full time occupation) of research on line, in my local library, asking people who had lived through that history and so on.

CULINARY PROGRAMME: “EAT THE MEDITERRANEAN WAY”.

On the second Saturday of every month, an expert Spanish chef shall demonstrate and prepare local dishes as part of our feature “The Spanish Kitchen.” This is within the planned programme “Eat The Mediterranean Way”. The programme will take place within the Castelar Hispanic Studies Centre.

Topics Include :

1. The History of Tapas, Types & forms of cooking.
2. The History of Paella, Types & forms of cooking.
3. Mediterranean fish.
4. Meat from the region.
5. Our famous desserts.
6. Spanish appetizers, drinks, including Sangria, Coffee etc…

As Christmas in Barcelona gets closer and closer, everyone is staring to think about what to eat during their Catalán Christmas and also Catalán families and housewives are trying to figure out which traditional Christmas dishes they want to cook up for Catalán Christmas Dinner in Barcelona.