KARETHE LINAAE
December is here, and are celebrating Christmas in Spain for the first time. Like anywhere else we have lived, the fiesta is seen and felt far and wide. People elbow their way through the supermarkets with bulging trolleys, prepare meals for a small army and eat and drink far too much. Yet, Christmas in Andalucía…
There is nothing lovelier than an olive tree – this symbol of peace with its silvery leaves and its twisted body. Sometimes the trunk will divide at the root and grow like entangled lovers, Siemese twins or like a couple who separated in mid-life and came back together in old age. You may strip the…
Last November, my husband and I packed a few belongings, left Vancouver B.C. and set out on a new journey. We arrived in Ronda the following night in torrential November rains, not knowing how long we would stay nor where we would go next. A year later we are still here. Ronda is one of…
Ever since my dad took my sister and I to see Disney’s Jungle Book at the World Theatre in my little hometown in the late 1960s, I have had a special affinity for vultures. Remember the friendly barbershop-quartet in the bleak petrified desert? Originally, Beatles’ manager wanted the band to record the song for the movie,…
In a country with an abundance of historical and archeological sites, many places get overlooked and others are left to ruin. There isn’t enough money in the Spanish coffers to restore all and even though some 50 million tourists visit Spain every year, many astonishing places are overlooked or forgotten. Living here one gets used…
My husband got his first driving license in Mexico in 1969. I got mine in Norway in 1981. We both have valid Canadian driving licenses, international driving licenses and official prof of perfect driving record in Canada for the past five years. We have been driving for a combined 78 years – Yet, we found…
When my husband and I lived in Vancouver, we loved to stroll along the railroad tracks and admire the Kitsilano Community Gardens. We always wanted a plot, but we never imagined it would be here in Andalucía. Truth be told, we are not what one can call avid gardeners. I have always had flower orphanages,…
I have to admit, I had become a great disappointment to the ladies of my furniture restoration class. Week after week I would come into the class empty handed. The other students would look at me with lifted plucked eyebrows, wondering why I would not bring old treasures from my grand casa(we have none…) or at…
I simply cannot fathom why some people love to repel themselves hundreds of meters into caves and squeeze themselves through even darker cracks into airless underground chambers. Yet, somehow, I found myself voluntary locked into an unlit cave amongst million-year-old stalagmites and petrified human remains, and loving it! Meet La queva de la Pileta: In…
Looking out my window this morning, I see fields of pure gold. Gold and dust. Summer is here. The Andalucían winter landscape is foggy and mystical, shrouded in dark greens and cool greys. Come February, things start to change. The fields go electric green, by April interspersed by a plethora of multi-coloured blooms. By…