'Tis done

Last night we wandered around downtown Girona before having a meal in Independence Plaza. The main retail street has boutique type shops not the chain stores we have seen all across Spain and luckily there were closing while we were there and are not open today being Sunday 🤑🤑

Independence plaza

Earlyish this morning we went back into the city to particularly have a look through the Old Town. Sitting highish on a hill is the Cathedral - 90 steps up to the main door so not sure how the older locals make it to worship as we barely survived the climb!

The interior of the Cathedral I would best describe as bland in comparison to others through Spain

We moved from the Cathedral to the Jewish Quarter and went through a museum which gave a very good insight into the Jewish history in Girona through the centuries. Given the persecution Jews have suffered over history across the world it is a miracle that Jews as a race still exist.

A nice entrance of a residence in the Jewish Quarter

Taken in the museum - an interesting monument to the contribution Jews have made to science 

Lunch was interesting but that is another story! Having refreshed the inner man we moved onto the Roman Walls. There was no comparison with the Muralles we visited in Tarragona however from the top of the walls there was a very nice view across Girona 

Basilica on the left Cathedral on the right - raises a question why one would construct a Basilica in close proximity to a Cathedral that was there 2 centuries earlier?

What Girona would look like if you were a bird

Today is our last day in Spain - we arrived almost 7 weeks ago in Northern Spain and have travelled the length from north east to south west and basically up the south coast along the Mediterranean so that tonight we are 78kms from the French border, we move onto Montpellier tomorrow and will spend around 2 weeks in France before coming home.

What will we remember about Spain?

The heat! 7 weeks where every day it has been 30 degrees plus and on a good number of days 35 degrees plus. The last inclement day was when we were in Portsmouth and believe it or not according to the BBC weather forecast just seen on TV, tomorrow there may well be rain in some of the southern Spanish towns we have visited. 

We will also remember..

Guggenheim building in Bilbao

La Concha beach at San Sebastián 

Picasso museum in Madrid

The Aqueduct in Segovia

Old Town in Toledo

The Windmills at Consuegra 

The Mezquita in Córdoba

The Alcazar and the Flamenco show in Sevilla 

Cadiz

The monkeys in Gibraltar (not Spain but close)

The Alhambra at Granada

Our swim in the Mediterranean at Almeria

The Roman ruins at Cartegena

The crowds on the broadwalk in the evening at Torrevieja 

The beautiful buildings and unfortunately the quality of the Mediterranean in Valencia 

The Cathedral at Zaragoza 

The Roman Walls and amphitheater at Tarragona 

The view from the Walls here in Girona 

How cities come alive in a very social way in the evenings

The number of kilometres we walked to try and get a reasonable meal each evening 

Our tussles with the language

How all bar a very few who came in contact with us cheerfully assisted with our tussle with the language

The difficulty in getting the 3008 into some of the underground car parks

.....and much much more!

Our Spanish Odyssey is all but over