Wanderings

Today, we begin the 19th day of traveling. As we travel through southern Spain, we take the train to Seville and Cadiz, where we spend about six days in each city, gaining a sense of the local culture.

We have developed a method to process our travel. When we arrived at our rented accommodation, we were usually tired from packing and moving the suitcases from the last location to the new one.

We need to rest for a couple of hours. Consequently, we nap and restore our energy. Then we explored our new city by finding a coffee cafe.

Once settled in with our beverages, we explore the internet to learn about the city and the places of interest we choose to visit. We might try to strike up a conversation if people are sitting nearby.

Riding tuk-tuks

In the past, we took many hop-on, hop-off bus tours. Currently, we prefer tuk-tuk tours, as these smaller vehicles can access places that large buses cannot, and the compactness of the vehicle creates a rapport that is not possible on the larger buses.

Our first experience with tuk-tuk touring was in Rome, and we have continued using this method in Lisbon, Porto, Coimbra, and Seville. Recently, in Cádiz, that particular tour was the most disappointing and overpriced experience to date, which was a bit disappointing as we like this form of touring a new city.

Discovering

To discover a new Spanish city, you must walk, and walking on the cobblestone streets of the old towns requires comfortable shoes and curiosity.

In the Past

In the past, these historical cities were essential and impressive places, complete with castles, palaces, and churches. These sites, surrounded by walls that encompass these cities today, are decaying reminders of the past.

The level of construction that was achieved is remarkable, as building a structure took at least three to ten years; depending on the structure, a church could take one hundred years.

Nowadays, we tour these structures in hours and minutes, savoring the architecture and history while photographing on our cell phones, with hardly a camera in sight. 

Sometimes, by hiring a private guide or taking a tour, we gain a deeper understanding of the place’s history and its structures. We visit the past, where living was considerably different, with dissimilar complications, than it is today.

Today, we take the high-speed train to our next destination.

Finding Milongas

As we continue to explore the cities of southern Spain, we are always on the lookout for a new Milonga; our tools include local references or contacts, web searches by town, Facebook, and Instagram.

While visiting Seville, we discovered that our visit coincided with the holiday. La Feria de Sevilla, also known as Feria de Abril, takes place two weeks after Semana Santa and lasts six days, during which the entire city takes on a party atmosphere.

We discovered many Seville businesses altered their business hours to accommodate the fair festivities, as many of these businesses had a kiosk at the fair.

Many of the milongas in Seville suspended their dances during this time, but the only milonga we found on a regular schedule was La Baldosita. This one occurs every other Saturday.

We went to this milonga after venturing to the Feria.

The Feria

The Feria de Seville is an exhilarating event. The whole city of Seville dresses up in the traditional style of Flamenco. Women wear flamboyant, brightly colored dresses with large fake flowers atop their updos. The men are all relatively quiet in their blue suits. These folks are everywhere, walking the sidewalks, waiting at bus stops.

We travel on a bus that is filled with partying fairgoers. This event attracts over five million people from all over Spain and Europe.

Upon entering the fairgrounds through these colorful, gigantic arches, there is no admission to pay or ticket to turn in.

There are people on the move everywhere. All in the colorful costumes of Flamenco. Lots of polka dots. Reds, purples, blacks, yellows, and whites.

Walking the streets of the fairgrounds, we glimpse open carriages pulled by horses and mules. The horse’s hair is braided, and they are wearing lots of bells or ribbons. With the motion of the carriage,  a festive noise accompanies the horses as they trot by.

Next, we notice all these folks drinking and dancing, which we learn is Sevillano style.  We watch. The whole area is packed with people partying. The only other observation is that all these little houses
[casetas] are private. We don’t know anyone, so we are not permitted entry by the security guard at the opening.

We walked for another 15 minutes before we found the public house. We are enthralled with our discovery and thirsty. It’s a bar inside the building. Looking around, we notice these pitchers are filled with ice and wine. We ordered a pitcher of the Tinto Blanco de Verano. [A white wine mixed with lemon soda]

Luckily, after waiting a few minutes, we could acquire seats. It’s much easier to observe the local culture seated than standing. We drank our beverages and enjoyed the promenade of Sevillanos walking or dancing by.

We sat captivated for a few hours, chatting with whoever sat with us. The experience was fantastic, yet totally exhausting, as I listened to the music and observed everything.

We left the noise and dust of the fair by crossing the street and realized we were starving. We found an open restaurant run by an Argentinian man. It’s such a small world. After ravishing our food, we walked a few more blocks and found the bus to the location of the Milonga.

Once in this new section of town, we discovered that this location was complicated. But we were lucky as a couple of tangueros were walking by, and we followed them.

La Baldosita Milonga

This milonga, La Baldosita, is run by a Portuguese tango teacher named João Alves.  It happens every other Saturday during the month.

The space is old, predominantly used by a circus school, for all their ropes and ribbons hang on the walls and ceilings, which feel as if they might collapse from all the rusty decay. The floor is also concrete, but it’s a spacious area. Your admission of 5 € includes a beverage.

Unfortunately, I discovered I cannot dance here as my knees are unhappy with pivoting on concrete. The people seemed friendly, but we had very little interaction with them. With the fair running simultaneously, the attendance at the milonga was slim, said the organizer João, who was also DJ’ing that night.

In Cadiz, we discovered that the local dance organization was having its monthly Milonga. We had a contact on Facebook who supplied a time and an address, as this event is not well-posted.

Getting to the milonga

Once again, we boarded a bus, which dropped us off quite a distance from the milonga location. Then, we patiently waited and were able to hail a taxi to deliver us to the destination.

We located the address on the second floor of a sports center.  It was a beautiful location with a tufted ceiling and a disco ball.  We were introduced to the host, Maria Jesus Barba, the president of the local dance organization. 

The space is a dance studio called Glamor. This milonga takes place on the third Wednesday of each month. Admission is 5€ per person, with the money all placed in a box by the entrance. It’s totally an honor system here.  The beverages on sale are all very inexpensive, i.e., 6.50 € for a bottle of wine or cava.

Dancing on the highly polished aggregate floor was enjoyable, and many locals attended the milonga, along with a few foreigners, including those from the Netherlands and Germany.

While thoroughly enjoying the event, we danced with a few other tangueros. The milonga ended at 00.30.

We asked Maria Jesus to call a cab for us, and our time in the milonga was over.

We are finding that the places to dance tango are not in the usual milonga halls in the
Southern cities of Spain, but in a different setting.

Next adventure in Cordoba

A few additional photos