24 October 2014 - the day before the wedding

Two years ago, son and daughter-in-law married. Here's the video we put together in a hurry the day before when we realised it was a bit difficult to find the register office https://vimeo.com/109978971. It's a beautiful castle - an amazing place to marry and much more romantic than Aldershot register office where his father and I married nearly four decades earlier. Mind you, the officer at Aldershot was lovely. We were overwhelmed of course and hardly took it in, not helped by my tardy arrival though I kept telling my parents a bride couldn't be late for a wedding at a register office, so I was in tears!

Aldershot 1978

The next weekend, in a more leisurely fashion, new husband and I were strolling round the local supermarket when a woman greeted us, and then as we stared, she said, "what were you doing last Saturday?" and we stared again, realising that she was the officer who had registered our marriage. How nice of her.
Someone took some informal photos that show the officer but I can't find them.  Here's an official photo as we sign, looking more relaxed than we had been feeling half an hour earlier. You can see my mother's cousin and my brother in the background The pendant I'm wearing was a wedding present from my new mother-in-law, who'd been so pleased to find something so pretty and appropriate. I've passed it on to my new DiL.

Visiting the city of Barcelona

Our holiday includes two day trips to Barcelona, the first being last Wednesday and the second tomorrow. On Wednesday, we looked round the old Gothic quarter, going round and round till I was utterly lost. I made an audioboom recording and took a few photos. See Swarm, Instagram and FB. Then husband and I dashed, short of time over to see the Sagrada Familia, Church of the Holy Family,which was fantastic worth a visit.  Gaudi designed it and despite building starting nearly 100 years ago it is not yet complete.

Here's the front door: a dove amongst the flowers

What most impressed me were the towering pillars, splitting at the top into branches, emulating a high forest, and the archways - effigies something between Disney world and Gothic.

East window of Sadrada Familia

The west windows reflected warm colours of sunset (above and here) and the east were cold colours (here).
 But time was short. We learned how the metro works, used it and arrived at the meeting point in time. But the meeting point was place de Catalunya, a huge square , and it took us half an hour to find our group. Too stressful and exciting.

Tomorrow we go back there, after seeing the Hospital  de Pau, to meet my cousin and his partner for lunch. Looking forward to it.

Back to Catalunya

Roman bridge

Years ago I was in Catalunya, La Escala to be precise, on holiday with a French family. Now I'm back again, on holiday with my husband. We're staying in this ancient castle in Cardona and learning about Catalan battles and history, and salt mines. Here's the misty view from our bedroom window one morning.

Salt mine

This enormous salt mine, 1300 metres deep, is here, has been here since the Romans paid salaries in salt.

But in the twentieth century rather than mining for edible salt they mined for potassium chloride for explosives.

And quite an explosive history was round here. In 1711, the Bourbons thought they had the right to the city of Cardona, laid siege, but allies fought against them. The history of the siege and its outcome is here.