We’re in Salamanca, staying in the old town, right next to the Cathedral, so of course the place is full of restaurants that cater for tourists. (El hamburger, los chips etc).
But the spouse and I went down a side street and found Restaurant Valencia, which specialises in Castillian cuisine, and lo! guess who else ate there in his day? One of my favourite authors, Graham Greene!
BTW, can anyone help identify the subject of this sculpture? It was tucked away beside the bank in a small square, and I couldn’t make sense of the inscription….
He’s obviously a literary hero of some sort, could it be Cervantes? (I bought a gorgeous little bit of literary kitsch here: Don Quixote with his book of chivalry).
Over to you, dear readers!
http://www.red2000.com/spain/salaman/sight.html
that may help lisa ,it looks like columbus he taught there ,all the best stu
By: winstonsdad on October 15, 2010
at 6:10 am
Not Cervantes but Carmen Martín Gaite (December 8, 1925–July 22, 2000), was an award winning Spanish author.
Your trip souds wonderful.
By: Meg on October 15, 2010
at 1:03 pm
Looking at your photo I made out the words ‘salamanca a carmen [something] gaite’ and a search turned up the author Carmen Martín Gaite. “Born in Salamanca,” says Wikipedia, “over the course of her life she won various awards, including the Prince of Asturias Awards in 1988, the Award Premio Castilla y León de las Letras in 1992, and the Premio Acebo de Honor awarded to her life work. She was married to fellow writer Rafael Sánchez Ferlosio.”
By: DKS on October 15, 2010
at 2:20 pm
Fantastic! Thank you all *grateful smile* How good is the internet, eh? If I had taken this photo before the web I would never have known who it was!
By: Lisa Hill on October 16, 2010
at 12:02 am
Fantastic. You must be having a wonderful time.
By: Karen lee Thompson on October 16, 2010
at 4:40 pm
Thanks, Karen. And thank you to you for that lovely post about Thor, he sounds like a lovely dog and those of us who have loved and lost a beloved companion animal share your feelings.
By: Lisa Hill on October 16, 2010
at 11:17 pm
I did think that statue looked decidedly feminine!
By the way, Lisa, can I ask what type of Netbook you are using to keep us all up-to-date with your travels? I’m planning on buying one for my travels in November/December, but I am sooooooo confused by all the options out there.
By: kimbofo on October 18, 2010
at 2:33 am
Well, yes, but many of the Spanish statues look girly even if they are blokes because they all had long hair in the 16th century!
Re the netbook: I have an MSI Wind notebook, running Windows. I bought it two years ago so it’s probably not available now but there are heaps of similar things available. It is not the smallest one around but it is handbag sized and not very heavy. The smaller ones have skinny keypad letters and a very small screen and I prefer being able to type normally and to see what I have written.
What may also interest you is that I couldn’t face paying for the whole MS Office suite on this as well as on my desktop computer at home and opted for free open source software instead. It’s called Open Office and it has all the usual MS stuff on it, with a menu that looks almost like the old MS 2002 suite (and if you hate the MS 2007 menu as much as I do that’s a good thing. I only have it at home because I have it at work and it drives me crazy having different systems at home and school.)
On this I run MS IE8 because that’s what I’m most used to and most readers of my blog have it so I like to be sure my posts are readable on it, and I’m also using the old MS Outlook Express for email (which they have now replaced with something else) but Firefox and whatever its email program is (Thunderbird??) are also free and work reliably as well. In other words, you should be able to run all the software you need for travel for free once you have an operating system installed.
I am so looking forward to reading about *your* travels!
Lisa
By: Lisa Hill on October 18, 2010
at 3:50 am
Thanks, Lisa. That’s all helpful.
I’ve booked and paid for the trip now — going to China for 23 days before landing in Oz in mid-December!
By: kimbofo on October 18, 2010
at 4:35 am
Hey, China! Is Mr Reading Matters coming too?
By: Lisa Hill on October 18, 2010
at 5:06 am