Exploring Caceres

Wednesday, May 24, 2017--Caceres, Spain

Last night when I returned to the Old Town around 21:15, it was mostly quiet.  I wandered all the narrow streets finding impressive sight after impressive sight.  For the most part, the town was in the process of closing down for the night.  There was just enough light to get some good photos and to enjoy walking the streets.  By 22:00, it was dark and only those planning to celebrate into the evening were still out. 

This morning, we followed the same route in the daytime.  We stepped inside the Iglesia San Juan (which was having a mass in almost total darkness last night),  we entered one of the gates to the walled city, we glanced inside the Palacio de Golfines, we saw the impressive buildings on the Plaza de San Mateo including the only palacio in Spain that managed to keep its tower after one of the Spanish Queen Isabel outlawed towers on homes, we went to the Plaza de las Veletas where we toured the Museo of Carceres (with its art collection, its native costumes, its collection of items used in commerce and agriculture, and its Moorish cistern among the more interesting areas), we walked through the old Jewish quarter known as the Barrio de San Antonio, we glanced into the Iglesia San Jorge while listening to a group of kindergarten children sing a song, we rested in a small garden to the east of the church, and we glanced into the House of Moctezuma (which was built by a descendant of Moctezuma's daughter Isabel who came to Spain to marry and live).  (Many of the Spanish explorers of the New World were from Caseres and came back here to build homes in the old town which are now the famous palacios that tourists see mostly from the outside, since many of them are not open to the public.)

Tonight, we will return and tour the Cathedral after all the tour groups are gone. We'll wander through the streets in the quiet again.  Finally, we will stop at a special group of stalls in a nearby park to see the specialty food items from the area and buy a snack for a late dinner before calling it an evening.
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I finished reading A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara.  It was a finalist for the 2015 National Book Award, and after reading all but one of the finalists including the winner, I would say this is the book that SHOULD have won the award.  Reading it is like being on a roller coaster of life as sections veer from happiness to depression, from descriptions of horrible experiences to joyous occasions, from disappointment to success, etc.  There are lots of negative things that happen in this book, but as this review in the New Yorker explains, they come in small doses and the awful truths are very slowly revealed to make it palatable.  Also, it is one of the most realistic novels I have ever read in that it accepts what is happening with explanations of WHY it is happening rather than condemnation for what is happening.  I felt I could truly understand why things people sometimes do are actually done by them.  Anyway, it is really well written and a very good, if difficult, subject.  I gave it 5 stars out of 5.