It's true. It had not occurred to us to consider Spain as a holiday/hiking destination until we knew that our NZ friends, Ros and Ian, were going to be there for the 20th International Congress of Nutrition. They convinced us: September was the perfect time to visit. There would be great weather and fewer tourists (unless you count the 4,000 nutritionists). We could hang out in Madrid for a couple of days, head up north for some spectacular hiking in the Picos de Europa, nip over to Bilboa for shot of culture, and then end our trip exploring Granada--providing congress attendees left us at least one empty hotel room.
We were easily persuaded, and we did have a wonderful holiday!
By the time we packed our bags to leave, we had even adapted (sort of) to peculiar Spanish meal times. Ros noted at that eager American delegates at the Congress were waiting in vain, all hopeful, for breakfast at 7 a.m. The more usual 8:30 desayuno suited us just fine, but it took our entire holiday to convince our stomachs that a 9 p.m.dinner-time was acceptable. Any earlier and we were marked as tourists. We might as well have walked into a restaurant in head-to-toe Tilley, with a Canadian maple leaf sewn onto our backpack.
| They knew we were tourists; no need to advertise. |
No comments:
Post a Comment