Musings

What a first peek outside our window!

And there’s the sun! [Forty-four minutes later, but who’s counting??!!]

Off on our adventures, aha, there’s the first castle we’ve spotted, waaaay up high.

We enjoyed the last few meters before reaching an Iron Age village, along with munching cattle. [For the amount of dairy and pork we see on the table, we see remarkably few of those critters in the countryside.]

And there’s the settlement…with working archaeologists! Actually, looking at recent maps, that is the highest settlement area; more is “behind” us/me. But what’s exposed is ahead….

This rather large room produced multiple Greek and greek-style artifacts, including large ceramic vessels. This settlement was well-connected with Mediterranean coastal trading ports, undoubtedly Empúries, 12 miles away as the crow flies, so a day’s walk if you were in good shape and the path wasn’t muddy.

This area was built later, and some houses had even larger rooms.

Next stop: Lake Banyoles, the largest lake in Catalunya, and long renowned for its fishing.

Cormorants look like cormorants.

Early 20th C fishing (and bathing) “hut”—there’s more than a dozen spaced along this stretch of the shore.

However, people fished Lake Bangles even in the Neolithic. This hole is a below-the-water-level excavation that has now re-flooded. The water kept organic artifacts from rotting away, preserving wood, basketry, bones, seeds, and textile matter that’s usually totally absent. Archaeologists also found the remains of buildings, including structures on pilings.

Today’s Roman site is a farm called Vilauba. It began as a U-shaped building from the 1st–3rd C AD. Later, more rooms were added through the Visigothic period. This was the location of the press (represented by that interior rectangle of stone), probably for olives (I should have read the signs more closely, but: Catalan).

Speaking of Catalan, this room was a “rebost”, meaning pantry. The raft of pottery containers found here kept various foodstuffs and items (relatively) safe from critters and insects.

Back at our hotel, I took the trail down down down…

…to the beach. It’s pretty much high tide, I think.

Back up at the hotel, I spotted a gull taking a bath in the (closed for the season) pool. I shot a series of photos and discovered it turned its head to the right every time it ducked (is that term okay?) under. Here it’s fluffing its wings and tail.

Posted at 12:37 PM | 2 Comments »

Leaving Capellades via the highway in the valley, we looked back up at the Quaternary travertine cliff formation. Here I see probably more modern housing carved into the soft-ish rock, but not the caves. Still: interesting.

We visited a geopark in a valley lined with caves. We didn’t arrange to enter them, just walk the path in the valley, and peek through the bars. Cova del Toll.

Cova del Toixoneres (Catalan spelling), usually Teixoneres in the academic literature. The strings outline 1 m squares to trip the workers…um, to make it easier to keep locations straight.

Artistic rendering of comely young archaeologist.

Cova Morta. They get significant runoff here at times, I’m guessing.

Reconstructed Neolithic huts.

Beside the access road to the cave-valley: dolmen de Cuspinar, dating to the Chalcolithic (sometimes called the Copper Age), so after the Neolithic.

Also by the access road, Republican trench from 1936.

Roadside view—high-elevation snow.

Heights with snow; horses in foreground (ignoring guardrail).

Our first view of the Mediterranean: Playa Castell walking to the Castell.

Look at some of the huge stones at the Castell de la Fosca, a promontory fort. Ascending to the top is no longer permitted, but at this level, inside the protecting wall at the neck of the peninsula, excavations produced datable remains. The first occupation was in the 6th C BC, in the earlier Iron Age—several small semi subterranean huts, then abandoned. The site was reoccupied in the mid-5th C BC, and the hut depressions were used for garbage. The maximum population was in the 4th C, and into the 3rd C BC, when buildings were built on terraces along both sides of the landform. The presence of column bases (shown here), of imported stone, and other features suggests there was a public building, possibly a Hellenistic temple, on the highest point in the community. Both Greek and Phoenician trade goods are among the pottery/material culture recovered by excavation, although most artifacts are of indigenous types/styles.

Enough archaeology. We have arrived at our home away from home for the next six days, and the splurge of the trip. Here’s our private patio and our sea view. Lovely.

From the secure railing, here’s the view down onto the rocks where the sea is crashing.

The room is designed so you can chose to shower watching the Mediterranean—at least until the glass steams up! Dinner at 8pm tonight (we chose early), petit breakfast at…we chose 8:30am. Off to eat, sleep, eat. Good night!

Posted at 12:48 PM | Comments Off on Caves, fortress, sea views

On the table as we sat down to breakfast: salt and olive oil. This is (drip-line irrigated) olive orchard country, and there are plenty of new terraces being built and planted. The development seems to be by multi-national agribusinesses, not small-holders.

It’s 10am, and the sun’s too high for a sunshine slow-down.

The map on the left shows the Ebro River, flowing north-to-south on the far left. The site, called Castellet de Banyoles (Tivissa), is triangular, with the only foot access from the right as there are cliffs elsewhere. The right map is an enlargement of the fortified entrance there (see next photo).

Those two points facing us are the rebuilt bases of two large pentagonal towers that totally controlled access to this ~4.4 ha city.

Here’s one residential compound, two rooms wide and three deep, with the doorway in the front. Often with such a layout, the innermost room was where people kept their valuables, food, etc., so that visitors could be permitted only in the front/reception room, and remain ignorant of the family’s wealth.

Here’s another compound, two very long rooms deep, and two wide.

This very wide open area functioned as a broad street between dwellings left and right. Despite all this construction (I haven’t mentioned the effective sewage system for the whole city), this settlement was built in the 4th C BC, and was wealthy, probably producing Iberian drachmae coins, imitating types from the Greek city of Emporion, far northeast of here on the Mediterranean. Excavations recovered luxury goods of gold and silver (including earrings, bowls, plates and bracelets), pieces of lead bearing Iberian script, and significant traces of metallurgical activity. The Romans burned/destroyed the settlement about 200 BC, probably in connection with indigenous revolts, although there is some evidence of reoccupation. Recent fieldwork has found Roman-period items east of the fortifications, which point to a Roman camp having been established there.

Over the wall to the west, a bend of the Ebro was below, and the arable land that this city controlled, too.

Here’s the southwest lookout tower base, visible in the map.

Our second site today was totally different. It’s on a tiny, narrow landform, and overlooks a small tributary of the Ebro, so it is not in the main valley. The settlement was far earlier than Castellet. It’s called Puig Roig (red hill in Catalan—from the rock substrate, not the sign!), and dates to the the ninth and eighth centuries BC.

These walls are not even 2m apart; these were much smaller rooms.

These are the largest rooms I saw….

Here’s the central street, not quite two meters wide. During occupation, I’m sure it was more level than at present.

Generic mountain drive view, 12:30 pm.

Look what JCB found! Don’t recognize this “Tasty Burger” place? It’s a Mickey’s! [Part of the Playland sign is visible, left.]

We checked into our hotel and made a paseo (walk). Here’s a perimeter entry, now only one-way for vehicles. [And rightly so!]

This town is called Capellades, and is famous for making paper of cotton/linen rags plus hemp, including for cigarettes and currency. Look at the detail on the bottom of the balcony floor! We stopped here because of Abric Romaní, a rockshelter in the Quaternary travertine cliff formation (called Cinglera del Capello) that forms the east edge of the town. Excavations from the multi-meter deep deposits recovered important information on Neanderthal lifeways in the area, with dates to the Late Middle Paleolithic, and the oldest layers dating to ~56,000 yrs ago. Only the top layer (Layer A) dates to the Upper Paleolithic and has Aurignacian artifacts indicating human use. Open hours are scanty, so we’ll look at the cliff setting and move on.

Posted at 12:05 PM | Comments Off on Iron Age towns, more

We took the long way back to our room after breakfast (the short way was maybe a dozen doors away), and the maze of streets brought us by the church, and the door was open!

So we looked in. Two priests and fifteen parishioners. What a surprise to see that oval ceiling and pantheon-like dome. A bit of digging (you know where), and I see that the building, Iglesia de San Pedro Mártir de Urrea de Gaén, was designed by Agustín Sanz (also the contractor for construction), with the building completed in 1782. The unusual layout was allowed by the church’s patron, 9th Duke of Híjar, Pedro de Alcántara de Silva Fernández de Híjar. A very progressive design.

We drove quite a ways, trying to absorb a bit about the always changing landscape. Here’s a lovely valley.

We reached our first crossing of the Ebro River, the major river of northeastern Spain. It’s south of the Pyrenees (duh), and flows east-southeast with a large, roughly triangular basin that I think was a breadbasket in Roman times. It eventually turns south and cuts through some low mountains, before reaching the Mediterranean at Tarragona. We will spend perhaps almost half of this trip in the Ebro basin. [Map on WikiPee here.] The area along the river is called the Ribera today. Shortly after crossing this bridge, we entered Catalonia, where we’ll stay for the next eight-ish days.

On our hill-climb to the first yacimiento ([archaeological] site) of the day, called in the literature Sebes, I spotted these flowers, mostly old dried out, but not this specimen. The one to the left is different. I don’t recognize either.

The heydey of Sebes was the Early Iron Age (7th C BC, and thus pre-Roman), when I think the best place in town was up here, but structures were on many terraces below the hilltop. Here’s the view of the Ebro from the high-point.

On a lower ridge-nose, the Sebes people put their dead beneath these careful rings of stones. Long before the Romans, people in Iberia put their dead outside their communities, but close by.

That ridge-nose off to the right and barely visible has the ruins of a later Iron Age settlement, high (as you can see) above the Ebro. The name for it today is Sant Miquel de Vinebre, so not an indigenous term that the Romans recorded before they ousted the inhabitants in 44 BC. Further parsing the photo, you can see the geological bottleneck to the left, which allowed this site to control passage up the Ribera, and the arable lands to the right or west-northwest and out of the photo.

This site is typically referred to as El Molar for the adjacent town. John says the community’s business is dentistry, but the WikiPee indicates it’s agriculture (olive and almond orchards, plus some vineyards). This site dates to the Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age (so earlier than the two above), and is along a narrow N-S ridge. Most of the excavation was a century ago, so we have far less data than if had been opened up in the last several decades. However, excavators did save some funerary artifacts of copper and lead. Interestingly, this site is in a mining area that produced the lead, but not the copper, although copper is known from the area. Instead, the copper was from southeast Spain, mostly from the Linares mines of Jaén, and, to a lesser degree, from mines in the Almería province. So I read.

We reached Catalonia, an autonomous community (Spain has 17), not a province. Here’s another bridge across…the Ebre, Catalan for Ebro. Our second Catalan word befits language learning in a Catholic region, and is creu, meaning cross. Poking around the internet just now, I learned that in Catalan, the name is Catalunya. Now up to three words!

Note the three balconies of laundry (I gotta include some cultural anthropology)—and one without—perhaps preparing for the weekend?

Posted at 2:26 PM | Comments Off on On to Catalunya

We got on the road before sunup, having quite an adventure trying to get the gas pump to accept our credit cards–no problems yet anywhere else. JCB finally used cash…and we zoomed off….

First stop was a ghost town amidst active agriculture high on a slope above the Río Grío, a tributary of the Jalón, which flows by Calatayud.

Almond parts: seed/nut, shell, then these: hulls…dessicating and rotting roadside next to an almond orchard.

We walked into the Castillo de Langa del Castillo, and found this central tower still standing; a sign indicated the excavated area in the foreground was a church.

The Castillo fortification has steep walls and only one entrance. Portions of five wall-towers remain. Notes indicate this was a large enclosure for the time. Note how sections of the fort are starting to hive off. Conservation is never-ending.

From one “corner” of the castillo, we could see the piscina municipal below. We’ve seen swimming pools in quite small towns, like this…suggesting there was a provincial or federal program supporting their construction.

Somewhat later, we zig-zagged through some complex geology/geomorphology along the Río Aguasvivas near Segura de los Baños.

We also encountered a road crew cleaning up after a rock slide. Yes, the car fit between the pile and the guardrail.

Here’s a look at the upstream side of a Roman dam south of Muniesa. See the curve helping the dam be strong against the weight of the water?

Later, we went toward Muniesa proper, and checked out the cemetery on the edge of town, established in 1903. Most people are planted in a many-rowed columbarium, and I was surprised how many continue to be deposited here. Many plaques note that they were placed by relatives, listed not by name but by relationship: sister, nephews/nieces, cousins. Interesting.

In town, we walked around Iglesia de la Asunción de Nuestra Señora. Doors were locked (we’ve yet to find an open church…although we haven’t been persistent, either.) Note their lovely Mudéjar tower.

We were so glad to leave the gloominess behind, as it turned out, at the same time as we reached open terrain and commercial agriculture.

Our next stop was a Roman villa in another flat agricultural area, on a low hill. Obv, it’s well-excavated, but not open today (s’okay). The dwelling has a porticoed peristyle layout, with under-floor heating (a hypocaust system). An attached building has two mills and five beam presses, for olive oil. The tanks that received the oil have an estimated combined capacity of >17,845 liters. That suggests the villa controlled a large field area, although their mills/presses could have processed the olives of neighbors, too.

Here’re the remains of a qanat/qanāt, which is an underground Arab (supra-Mediterranean) tunnel system for moving water in arid places. They dig gently sloping tunnels for the water to flow through, with periodic vertical shafts. This is an eroded vertical, with the horizontal visible at the bottom…holding water! I was pretty excited to see this, having read about qanat systems for years.

Near the qanat, we have the best room in the house! Dinner begins at 8:15, and breakfast at 9:30. We’re still adjusting to these mealtimes, which in the evening give me an opportunity to create my posts before we eat. And here you go, you seven gentle readers!

Posted at 1:26 PM | Comments Off on Water management, more

Today’s first stop was a Celt-Iberian settlement, apparently called Sekaiza, on this hill, named Poyo de Mara. We know the name of the fortification from coins the Romans allowed the city to mint—and pay taxes with. I hypothesize that it controlled passage through this valley and especially…

…broad farmlands to the east and south. Here’re the remains of houses/structures on northeast shoulder of a major terrace about half-way up/down the side slope of the landform. View to SSE.

The Romans “destroyed” (conquered?) the settlement, and established their own settlement south of the hill, called Segeda. View north (see the hill?).

Here’re more foundations even further south. This was a big place, yet only occupied less than 200 years, I think.

South of Calatayud on a broad hilltop was another Celt-Iberian-then-Roman settlement, today called Valdeherrera. It was contemporaneous with Sekaiza and similarly suffered Roman degradation later, as well as becoming a Roman settlement. I think the plow zone was removed with mechanical equipment, then hand excavations began. This was a residential and artisanal area of a much larger settlement. Valdeherrera and Segeda are about 8 miles apart, as the crow flies.

Mid-afternoon, we created our own walking tour of Calatayud. Here’s the main (WNW) façade of the Basílica-Colegiata del Santo Sepulcro.

Low side passage with wooden beams supporting the rooms above.

The late-day sun made the parochial church of San Andrés, with its famous octagonal Gothic-Mudéjar tower, glow. Mudéjar refers to Christian architecture design and decorative detail modeled on Arabic styles used during Al-Andalus times, when Muslims controlled much of Iberia.

Abandoned compound.

South door of Colegiata de Santa María la Mayor, built, I think, in the 14th C, rebuilt in the 15th C.

West door of Church of San Pedro de los Francos, with its famous leaning tower.

Tiny Plaza Goya, view to west.

Monument set in astroturf honoring Covid victims and everyone for their solidarity, in Plaza Joaquín Costa. I couldn’t find out one thing about Sr. Joaquín Costa in a quick web search. Shrug.

Backlit moto.

Thank you for your patience.

Posted at 2:16 PM | Comments Off on Roman x 2, more recent religious

Our hood at 11:15am; car was in the shade all morning. Brr, yet nice in the sun.

Here’s a stab at the layout of Bilbilis (sometimes with accent), a Roman fortified town on a hilltop and slopes. You can see the city wall clearly in this reconstruction. The forum is the rectangle with the red circle-numbers. It’s close to north-south, with the nose looming over the valley to the south. This location controls a major pass to the east, which today includes the important train route from Madrid to Zaragoza, and was a significant transportation corridor well before the Romans arrived.

Looking southwest across the forum and into the northeast-ward flowing Jalón River valley.

View west from the northwest corner of the forum, down into the amphitheater, which is nested into what would otherwise have been a ravine. A sign indicated there was a previous Roman structure of some sort here.

We set off to check out the eastern hill of the settlement, and looked up to see that we were disturbing a herd of grazing Iberian ibex. What a treat. The harem-boss is fourth from the left facing us, perhaps trying to stare us down. He’s got a large set of back-curving horns.

The Romans apparently built this as a cistern, and later Christians repurposed it as a chapel by creating a doorway, and no doubt adding interior features.

Back in the main part of the site, north-northwest of the forum, is a modest bath complex. This is the only one in this prosperous city—it even had a mint—due to the hilltop locations. The Romans built three cisterns to provide water just for the baths (not only for bathwater, but also for the steam-heat.)

View west of the east hill, with the cistern-church to the left and what looks like another chapel with a round window hole to the right…not discussed on the signs likely because the site managers didn’t want tourists visiting it.

We thoroughly enjoyed our hotel’s restaurant’s prix fixe lunch to recover from our Bilbilis adventure. It included a first and second course, dessert, and a choice of beverages. I chose the ¼ liter of red wine, and was surprised when a whole, full (opened) bottle (a local garnacha) was delivered…I asked, eyes wide I’m sure…she said, just drink two or three glasses, whatever you like, that’ll be fine. Okay! With tax, all of the above for €16. A fine deal! BTW, that’s my dessert, a sorbet of lemon with a few drops of vodka.

Late in the afternoon fortified from our fine luncheon (and a nap for one of our duo), we drove up to the main castle above Calatayud, formally: Castillo Mayor del Emir Ayyub ibn Aviv Lajmi, named for the official mentioned late in yesterday’s post. It’s a darned narrow castle, as that’s all there’s room for on the sinuous hill. The curved side is facing downhill to the Río Jalón valley.

Here’s the west end from dead on. Ignore the nasty lights, far more acceptable before everyone was taking so many photos and instead watching and oooh-ing and aaah-ing at the night-time display.

Here’s the view of the east end from the northeast, a massive structure against the sky—and what a sky!

Returning to our hotel for the night, we spotted these storks circling and returning to their nests (two to the lower left; one high, just below the cone). I had to ask the ever-helpful Sandra, the afternoon desk person, what the Spanish is…cigüeña, pronounced something like see-gwain-yuh, very strange spelling for Spanish. Too long for Wordle, fortunately.

Posted at 4:32 PM | 2 Comments »

First time a pilot came out to apologize for a late flight—he did it twice, over the mic to all, then walked around and took questions. [Really: last night, but first part of flight in essence.]

First high-elevation corporate witticism I had to “share.” [We left about three hours late; our destination: Madrid.]

Best airline food I’ve ever eaten. Yum. Truly.

We took off in the rental car, headed north, and the first time we hit a dirt road we saw our first caballero.

First Roman villa. This is a late one, and the central courtyard-garden still sports a tree.

First five-arch Medieval bridge. Last modified in 1973.

First Neanderthal cave cluster (mostly protected from the elements with a roof or with small openings—fenced, so we couldn’t get closer).

First fabulous sky of the trip.

First mystery. Sign says the water isn’t potable.

First dramatic bottleneck/pass we’ve driven through.

First night’s hotel room view.

We’re getting into the swing of the Spanish lifestyle: we will dine tonight at 8:30; only two more hours to wait. Over and out.

Posted at 12:28 PM | 2 Comments »

We dined this evening on hoppin’ john slightly re-imagined, which I sure hope still qualifies to give us good mojo for 2025. The black-eyed peas were fresh, mmmm. I lightly cooked the collards. The grain is off piste—it’s wild rice, which of course isn’t rice botanically…. The broth of all three was from some turkey thigh bones I held back for this evening.

Posted at 9:05 PM | Comments Off on Fiber-loaded augury

I went down memory lane today and came up with this sunrise from October back when we were up in northern Michigan. What I was actually spending time delving into was the excavations in Cova del Toll and Cova del Teixoneres…although the caves are right next to each other, the excavated remains date to very different periods…early no-humans, then Neanderthal, then some human stuff. Cave deposits can be terribly complicated to figure out, and I’m only superficially delving into these (apologies)…anyway, pondering a sunrise is far easier.

Posted at 9:56 PM | Comments Off on Looking about