More b****y cathedrals: Burgos (5 Sep 2013)

But what a cathedral. First though, the start of the day. It was an earlyish start with the taxis arriving at 8am to take us to the station for our first train trip of the tour – and it was a long one, some 6 hours, across the north of Spain. It was drizzling for the first half of the trip but we were in the train, which was quiet and comfortable, so that didn’t bother us. The landscape changed from hilly near Santiago to more agricultural … and golden fields with haystacks … near Burgos. Northern Spain is well-known for its food and wine, so vineyards started to appear too.

Sights of Burgos

Burgos was not on the trip when we booked it – Salamanca was – but due to changes in transport timetables, Salamanca was dropped in favour of Burgos. Sue was initially disappointed as her brother Ian had lived in Salamanca many moons ago and she was keen to see it for herself. However, Burgos turned out to be a lovely place, which was designated Spain’s gastronomic capital for 2013. It was founded in 887, and was capital of Castile and Léon from 1037 to the fall of the Moors in 1492. It is also the area from which the now legendary 11th century warrior El Cid comes.

Burgos’s top sight though is its cathedral. Started in 1221, it is the third largest in Spain, after Sevilla and Toledo (both of which we have visited on this trip). In many ways we found the Burgos one the most interesting … and perhaps the most beautiful. As we did in Toledo, we listened to the audio guide. It’s impossible to remember the names of all the people – clerics, artists, rulers – who were involved in building and decorating this cathedral but it is truly magnificent inside and out. Externally, it is essentially high Gothic, but internally it represents centuries of changing architectural styles with chapels being built and rebuilt over the centuries. It contains some beautiful funerary and other statues, the golden staircase, and stunning ceiling work/cupolas including some gorgeous stars – all in various styles from Gothic to Renaissance to Rococo-Baroque. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in its own right, that is, not as part of a larger designated site.

Gourmet Burgos

As we didn’t arrive at our Burgos hotel until around 3.30pm, and didn’t leave the cathedral until some time after 6pm, there wasn’t a lot of time for sightseeing, so we had a refreshment at a little cafe, Cafe Latina, which had free wi-fi, before joining the evening paseo, along the river and in the square. The paseo is the Spanish practice of going out walking – and gossiping – in the early evening. And boy, the people were out. The squares and river were quiet when we first walked by on our orientation walk around 5pm but by 6.30pm they were abuzz with people of all ages, walking dogs, pushing prams, helping older people, sitting on benches. It was delightful – though surprisingly cool after two weeks of balmy nights. We joined the throng for a while, before meeting up with those of our group who were going to Cyra’s mussel bar, La Mejillonera.

Now that was an experience … as Cyra warned us. A stand-up bar selling tapas and racione portion mussels, calamari and the like, cooked various ways. There was a lot of yelling and jostling, and a “drain” just under the counter at your feet into which you throw your rubbish, such as mussel shells. We shared two serves of 3 different mussel tapas, a calamari racione and some bread, with one glass of wine or beer each, for less than €4 per head. Amazing … and a great experience though as a rule we’d prefer a quieter way of eating where we can talk to, not yell at each other. Not this night though, as some of us (others went on to a bar proper) then went next door to another cafe-bar where we shared some patata bravas and tempura vegetables, which included tuna and anchovies! It was also noisy but we did manage to find seats for some of us, eventually.

… and a (little) disaster

Sue then … in a somewhat fateful decision … decided to go with two others to the bar that the others had previously repaired to, while Len returned to the hotel with Cyra. Sue joined the others in having the recommended gin and tonic, which was poured with different theatrics to the one we’d experienced in Santiago de Compostela. Then the eight of us caught a taxi home (well, two taxis), as it was drizzly by then. And Sue made her next fateful decision … to pay for the taxi. After all, it was only €7. Somewhere between paying for the taxi and getting to her room she lost her wallet, which we didn’t discover until the next morning. It’s likely that in juggling her daypack, small shoulder bag (which was in the daypack but in which she usually keeps her wallet), her wallet, the change (including working out the tip) , and crawling across the taxi seats to get out, she managed to drop the wallet. So with some cash lost and credit cards stopped (but fortunately still with her passport), she’s feeling mighty angry with herself, after all the careful security-conscious locking and zipping she’s been doing. It’s the small decisions – such as to not put the change away immediately as she usually does – that get you! (Then she thinks of Jill Meagher not accepting an escort home and is grateful that her silly decision has resulted in an irritating but comparatively small price.)

In retrospect, she thinks, not having fully recovered from the lurgy, she should have gone back to the hotel with Len and Cyra … but it was our penultimate tour night and so …

Burgos is, nonetheless, a lovely place.

Three-words

SUE: Gorgeous, Fun, Sad.
LEN: Funny Little Town

and the stills…

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

and the movies…

Our fearless leader, in her usual position up front

 

In the La Mejillonera mussel bar, Burgos