Ends in View

The Arabic symbols floated up through the water, rose to the carved wood ceiling 20' overhead and stared down at me. I lay on my back in the body temperature water and stared right back. We were in a restored hammam, an Arab bathhouse which was much more common when the Moors were here. But tourism here is heavily dependent on their Muslim history and the economy is heavily dependent on tourism so they've deftly mingled tourist wants with some verifiable pieces of the past. Tourists want a spa and a back rub and hey, Muslims we're big on cleanliness so we make that desire look like an authentic step into the past. I'm sure the original version was a loud meeting place for men to hammer out deals and get a good soak away from the wife. Today's is a hushed spa with dim lighting, multi-temperature pools and choose-your-scent massage. I particularly liked the cold pool with ice piled around the edge and the salt pool with an overflowing vat of salt at one end.

I've been luxuriating in the role of tourist for the last ten weeks but it comes to an end in a few days. We're currently in Jerez de la Frontera having arrived yesterday via Blablacar and today was a sojourn to Cadiz. It was a 30 degree day on the downtown beach and they take this fabulous weather so much for granted that they don't feel the need to provide services. Sure, there was a guy willing to take some money to sit in one of his chairs but no washroom, no refreshment stand. The majority brought their own chairs and bevvies and not a word of the English language was heard.

Which was nothing like Torremolinos. Like Mexico to Canadians, Costa del Sol is Spanish soil but really a British playground with pubs, breakfast fryups and eating times more in line with British rhythms. Torremolinos is littered with bars and beachfront restaurants all designed to provide respite to weather-weary Brits who are vacationing, not travelling. Which is good because there's nothing of interest there other than a beach and good weather which was the magnet for Deb and I.   We were exhausted from the trials of discovering, photographing, walking, getting lost and found. We (Deb) booked a magnificent condo overlooking the beach courtesy of Airbnb with a kitchen that enticed us to cook a meal and a washing machine to restore our travel-weary clothing. The meal was frozen canneloni that was as bad as it sounds but the empanada stain from Seville was finally removed. Unfortunately, what we came for wasn't there. Poor Deb, sometimes I feel bad about her sharing my bad luck. As luck would not have it, the two days of rain they get annually happened as we arrived. Rain so heavy it made the news in Vancouver with flash floods flowing to the sea and taking several tourists with them. Bamboo was stacked high on the shore, torn from some distant shore and thick rolling clouds blocked the sun and didn't roll away until we got in our blabla car bound for Gibraltar.

When Deb was planning this journey and I saw we were going to be in this part of the world I said "We gotta go there!". I didn't know why but I had to see the rock. I didn't know it was a British rock but as it grew in the windshield my understanding grew with it. It's British territory so part of the British way of seeing things, of the way my mother saw things. The Rock of Gibraltar was synonymous with steadfastness, someone you could rely on, someone who was always there when you needed them. My mother often used it as a positive descriptor but I hadn't heard it in decades. It had sunk to a subterranean level until I stood before it. To get to it you have to go through customs (kinda, they just waved us through) and cross an airport runway. On the other side we jumped in a cab and said "Gondola please!" and a few pounds later we stood at it's base. A little more planning would have revealed we needed more time. Our tentative driver got lost looking for his boyfriend who joined us for the drive and he felt more comfortable driving slightly under the speed limit. It's not a big place but needed more than 90 minutes we were left with. We stood in the lineup for 20 minutes before realizing we couldn't make it to the top and back before our next driver showed up for our trip to Torremolinos so our visit consisted of a drop off at the gondola and a walk back. Still, the sudden understanding of why I was there and the photograph made it worth it.

I'm at the point where, as I'm about to step back into my 'real' life, to make comparisons between here and there. But I'm hungry and we meet the next driver at 6am for our flight to Paris. Talk soon.