The Road to Algodres

I am feeling a little like Don Quijote, a man with an imbalanced view of the world and his place in it. A man of imagined adventure. I have signed up as a volunteer to help construct a stone entranceway to the Faia Brava nature preserve in northeast Portugal. I will be working there for two weeks with a group of 10-15 people, both Portuguese stone masons and international volunteers. We will be starting around dawn each day and quitting at 1 pm when the temperature is expected to be in the high 80s. There are four main tasks outlined in the write-up: collecting the stone from the surrounding hillsides, shaping the stones with hand picks, building the foundation and placing the rocks on the entrance wall. I am imagining myself as a burro driver, delivering the stones from the surrounding hills. I also foresee spending a lot of time picking at the granite rocks to shape them. I am trying to avoid the vision where I am lifting heavy rocks all day in the blazing sun but I guess there might be a lot of that too. I really would rather not think about my back at all.

I flew into Madrid today, rented a Peugeot Kangoo (two bikes should roll in without taking the front tires off) and drove west to Salamanca. This is a university town. The university here was established in the early 1200s and has been considered one of the most prestigious schools for centuries. Salamanca boasts a Plaza Mayor that rivals Madrid in size and grandeur, as you can see. The historic buildings are built in a beautiful tawny sandstone.

Of course I arrived in time for lunch. The Spanish love seafood and must have the highest per capita consumption of cephalapods in the world. They have perhaps a dozen different names for squid (mostly to distinguish the size, from less than an inch to 14 inch monsters) and eat cuttlefish and octopus regularly. I enjoyed a plate of chiperones a la plaincha for lunch and couldn't resist taking a picture of them. Life is good with a plate of grilled squid in front of you. These were so tender, perfectly grilled.

I have to start work on Monday. I'll let you know how the burros are behaving.