Egg Chips and Potato Omelets

Friday, March 29, 2019

Cordoba and Antequera, Spain

As soon as I landed in Madrid, my family whisked me off in a rental car and we went zooming down the highway towards Cordoba. Rental car travel is an important part of almost every Hawthorne trip, and I’ll tell you why. First, I firmly believe it gives my father a chance to showboat his exceptional driving skills internationally (he was a professional bus and ice truck driver for a spell in his pre-dad days).

Proof that I found the family

Second, is that it gives us the fantastic opportunity to stop at any and all truck stops and if you haven’t been inside a Spanish truck-stop, did you really go to Spain? Most of these places had toilets around back, that may or may not lock, gas pumps, and full-service coffee bars. And most importantly, they have every weird flavored chip your heart could ever desire. I picked up some fried egg chips, which tbh were actually kinda good, but then later I became so nauseous (probably unrelated) that I now can’t even think about them without feeling like I’m going to throw up. Awww well better that egg chips took that fall than chocolate or raspberries or something.

Gross, I can't even look at them anymore!!!

The third reason we rent a car is that between four of us, it’s probably the cheapest and most efficient way to move around from city to city. But that’s a super boring and practical reason and doesn’t involve any side stories about vomiting egg flavored chips so it was demoted to reason #3.

The side-effects of renting a car may include: sleeping in many pretzel-like positions, listening to the same four songs you remembered to pre-download on Spotify before the road-trip, pretending you meant to take the “scenic way” when you’re really just lost as hell, and finding random seat-crumbs stuck to your body. Cute, right? But our lovely vehicle (that I could not have picked out of a line-up because all silver cars look exactly the same) allowed us to make it to some really incredible places. Such as…

The Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba! This site has gone through a lot of changes, as has Spain over the centuries, and I am by no means an expert, nor do I pretend to understand all the shifting powers in Spain’s history. What is do know, is that originally, there was probably a Roman temple to the god Janus on this site. When the Visigoths seized Cordoba in 572, they converted it into a church. (I know this from Kahn Academy). In 784, the Umayyad Muslim rulers took control of Cordoba, and converted it into a mosque, and continued to expand it. In 1236, the Christians conquered Spain during the Reconquista, and the mosque was turned back into a Cathedral, (and these dates I know from ye old Wikipedia). The result is a beautiful mosaic of architectural styles, courtyards, orange trees, and religious beliefs.

The Mezquita

Awww sweet family

The art inside was also straight up fantastic! (You should know that when I say the art is fantastic, I mean super weird and awesome and I loved it. So please don't expect an art-hitorian analysis here. You will instead get meme-y comments). 

Your very own baby-head shield

(Probably?) Mary being stabbed (also we match how cool is that?!)

The token black friend

After leaving the church, we stopped for some allegedly famous “potato omelet” at Bar Santos, and then drove off to the Dolmens of Antequera.

POTATO OMELET

For the less archeologically inclined among us, a dolmen is an ancient megalithic tomb, that consists of one large flat stone laid on top of a bunch of giant upright stones. So the Dolmens of Antequera comprise 2 separate dolmens and a tholos: the Menga Dolmen (which is the biggest dolmen in Europe), the Viera Dolmen, and the Tholos of de El Romeral. And now you’re wondering, what is a tholos? A tholos is a beehive tomb, so instead of a giant rock on top of other giant rocks, it’s a bunch of smaller rocks stacked on top of one another.

The Menga Dolmen

Inside the Tholos

These were cool to see, but a little tricky to navigate. Their little museum was mostly in Spanish, and the path to the dolmens was well marked, but the tholos is a little ways away and it was not. But you know, if we figured it out, you could figure it out.

Me being sick and slightly miserable on a sundial outside the dolmens

And now you must wait for tomorrow, to hear all about our next stop, Gibraltar...

Adios,

Cristiana

P.S. Thank you mom, for most of these pictures ;)