Mallorca
My luck was in for the long weekend in December: I escaped the fiasco caused by the air traffic controller strike and I arrived on time to sunny, warm Palma de Mallorca! Not to rub it in or anything, but while MN was getting a foot of snow, I was eating fresh dates and clementines just off the trees, with leaves still attached, shaded from the Mallorcan sunshine by a palm tree. Only an hour’s flight away from Madrid…!
I had three days of perfect weather, just me and my camera wandering around the island. The first day I spent in the city itself: the cathedral perched on the edge of the sea, the Maritime walkway past bobbing sailboats, fishnets strung down the length of the sidewalk, the Plaza Mayor with its endless stalls of Nativity scene figurines (which, in Spain, can go waaay beyond Jesus, Mary, and Joseph: you’ve got the houses and the palm trees and the animals and the woodcutters and the potters and the… well, you get the idea. You could set up the whole town of Bethlehem if you wanted! My school actually did.). And of course walking along the beach at sunset.
The next morning I got up ridiculously early (for vacation) to take a century-old train to the port town of Sóller. There were only about 10 people taking the train that early, so they only hooked up one coach, and it had lovely leather sofas! The ride out was beautiful, passing through lush valleys and past groves of orange and lemon trees. The town of Sóller was also quite pretty (and the tapas were delicious: dates wrapped in bacon, mmmm!), but the port itself was gorgeous. I spent probably an hour wandering up and down the docks, taking pictures of the blues and yellows and whites of the sailboats and skiffs reflecting in the water.
My last day in Palma I took a bus to Portocristo to see the spectacular Cuevas del Drach (Caves of the Dragon). They’re, well, cavernous. Sadly, pictures weren't allowed, though that's probably a good thing as otherwise I might still be there. Chamber after chamber of soaring ceiling studded with thousands of pale stalactite needles, or supported by giant columns ridged like spiral staircases that plunge into a cool crystalline lake. Ribbons of striated bacon, inverted stone icicles jutting from the ground—those I’ve seen before, and in more colorful versions (in SD, for example). But Drach has, I think, forever captured the #1 spot in my list of caves, thanks to the tour’s finale. We arrived in a natural amphitheater, now equipped with benches to seat around a hundred people. Blue lights partially illuminated the underground lake that spread before us, casting odd shadows on the rocks beneath the water's surface—sometimes meters deep, sometimes only inches. The water was so clear and still you could hardly tell reflection apart from underwater object. Then suddenly all the lights went out. Two old men behind me, who had the voices of 50-year smokers and the manners of 12-year-old boys, joked that a crocodile was coming to get us all. The woman next to me asked if they could please be quiet; one answered “Well, yes, we could…!” Honestly. I had a momentary vision of how certain students of mine might be in sixty years—two prophetic images were cackling right behind me. But then even they fell silent.
One, two, three boats—illuminated only by the lights that edged their gunnels from bow to stern—floated slowly into view at the far end of the lake, a good half-football field away. The oars barely made a sound. Then, in the lead boat, a violin, a cello, and (of all things) an organ started playing a concerto as they crossed the lake. Live music, underground, on a boat. It was incredible! The volume rose and then faded as they crossed the lake towards us and then turned around the corner and out of sight, while the other two boats performed a slow, drifting dance around each other and weaving among the columns anchored in the middle of the lake. Their oars kept almost grazing a protruding rock or the other boat but, in the end, never made more noise than a gentle splash. Then the orchestra-boat reappeared and brought the musicians back the way they came, until they and the music faded away completely. We were then treated to a brief light show called “Dawn”, where the cavern grew slowly lighter at the far end, then spread rosy and then palely golden fingers towards us until all was illuminated. I figured that was the end, but the rowboats had silently lined up at the base of some stairs, and we were invited to cross the lake by boat. Each boat held, in the end, around 12 spellbound people. Necks craned up, down, and around, and bodies held unnaturally still so as not to upset the balance of the overladen craft propelled surprisingly swiftly by just one man and two oars. Splashes echoed. A few drips echoed the splashes as stalactites continued their agonizingly slow formation overhead. Just before we reached the other side, we saw a low corridor—or, rather, canal—branching off to one side. Some stalactites were sawed off so the boats could pass underneath without decapitating anybody—the musicians’ hiding spot, I suppose. Then we debarked, walked up lots of stairs past more ghostly white curtains and spires of calcifications, and emerged into bright sunshine and a warm sea breeze.
Why are they called the Dragon Caves? No one ever explained it, but my theory: either the person responsible for the name was unimaginably cursi (corny or cheesy) and thought they were simply magical… or the spelunker felt like he was standing inside a giant mouth with lots of sharp teeth closing in on him. Just a theory.
Minnesota
In sharp contrast to sunny, breezy, and mild Mallorca, I went home to snowy and chilly MN for Christmas. I had a wonderful time visiting family, eating out with friends, snowshoeing in my backyard, and shoveling. Okay, so “wonderful” doesn’t exactly apply to that last one, but the ludicrous amounts of snow made for some “wonderful” pictures to wow my students with. People here look at the picture I took of the thermometer (at only ten degrees or so below freezing) and say “But… you can’t actually go outside in that, can you?!” (Certain other people claim it's all Photoshop trickery. I invite them to come visit me in January sometime.)
My luck was in for the long weekend in December: I escaped the fiasco caused by the air traffic controller strike and I arrived on time to sunny, warm Palma de Mallorca! Not to rub it in or anything, but while MN was getting a foot of snow, I was eating fresh dates and clementines just off the trees, with leaves still attached, shaded from the Mallorcan sunshine by a palm tree. Only an hour’s flight away from Madrid…!
I had three days of perfect weather, just me and my camera wandering around the island. The first day I spent in the city itself: the cathedral perched on the edge of the sea, the Maritime walkway past bobbing sailboats, fishnets strung down the length of the sidewalk, the Plaza Mayor with its endless stalls of Nativity scene figurines (which, in Spain, can go waaay beyond Jesus, Mary, and Joseph: you’ve got the houses and the palm trees and the animals and the woodcutters and the potters and the… well, you get the idea. You could set up the whole town of Bethlehem if you wanted! My school actually did.). And of course walking along the beach at sunset.
The next morning I got up ridiculously early (for vacation) to take a century-old train to the port town of Sóller. There were only about 10 people taking the train that early, so they only hooked up one coach, and it had lovely leather sofas! The ride out was beautiful, passing through lush valleys and past groves of orange and lemon trees. The town of Sóller was also quite pretty (and the tapas were delicious: dates wrapped in bacon, mmmm!), but the port itself was gorgeous. I spent probably an hour wandering up and down the docks, taking pictures of the blues and yellows and whites of the sailboats and skiffs reflecting in the water.
My last day in Palma I took a bus to Portocristo to see the spectacular Cuevas del Drach (Caves of the Dragon). They’re, well, cavernous. Sadly, pictures weren't allowed, though that's probably a good thing as otherwise I might still be there. Chamber after chamber of soaring ceiling studded with thousands of pale stalactite needles, or supported by giant columns ridged like spiral staircases that plunge into a cool crystalline lake. Ribbons of striated bacon, inverted stone icicles jutting from the ground—those I’ve seen before, and in more colorful versions (in SD, for example). But Drach has, I think, forever captured the #1 spot in my list of caves, thanks to the tour’s finale. We arrived in a natural amphitheater, now equipped with benches to seat around a hundred people. Blue lights partially illuminated the underground lake that spread before us, casting odd shadows on the rocks beneath the water's surface—sometimes meters deep, sometimes only inches. The water was so clear and still you could hardly tell reflection apart from underwater object. Then suddenly all the lights went out. Two old men behind me, who had the voices of 50-year smokers and the manners of 12-year-old boys, joked that a crocodile was coming to get us all. The woman next to me asked if they could please be quiet; one answered “Well, yes, we could…!” Honestly. I had a momentary vision of how certain students of mine might be in sixty years—two prophetic images were cackling right behind me. But then even they fell silent.
One, two, three boats—illuminated only by the lights that edged their gunnels from bow to stern—floated slowly into view at the far end of the lake, a good half-football field away. The oars barely made a sound. Then, in the lead boat, a violin, a cello, and (of all things) an organ started playing a concerto as they crossed the lake. Live music, underground, on a boat. It was incredible! The volume rose and then faded as they crossed the lake towards us and then turned around the corner and out of sight, while the other two boats performed a slow, drifting dance around each other and weaving among the columns anchored in the middle of the lake. Their oars kept almost grazing a protruding rock or the other boat but, in the end, never made more noise than a gentle splash. Then the orchestra-boat reappeared and brought the musicians back the way they came, until they and the music faded away completely. We were then treated to a brief light show called “Dawn”, where the cavern grew slowly lighter at the far end, then spread rosy and then palely golden fingers towards us until all was illuminated. I figured that was the end, but the rowboats had silently lined up at the base of some stairs, and we were invited to cross the lake by boat. Each boat held, in the end, around 12 spellbound people. Necks craned up, down, and around, and bodies held unnaturally still so as not to upset the balance of the overladen craft propelled surprisingly swiftly by just one man and two oars. Splashes echoed. A few drips echoed the splashes as stalactites continued their agonizingly slow formation overhead. Just before we reached the other side, we saw a low corridor—or, rather, canal—branching off to one side. Some stalactites were sawed off so the boats could pass underneath without decapitating anybody—the musicians’ hiding spot, I suppose. Then we debarked, walked up lots of stairs past more ghostly white curtains and spires of calcifications, and emerged into bright sunshine and a warm sea breeze.
Why are they called the Dragon Caves? No one ever explained it, but my theory: either the person responsible for the name was unimaginably cursi (corny or cheesy) and thought they were simply magical… or the spelunker felt like he was standing inside a giant mouth with lots of sharp teeth closing in on him. Just a theory.
Minnesota
In sharp contrast to sunny, breezy, and mild Mallorca, I went home to snowy and chilly MN for Christmas. I had a wonderful time visiting family, eating out with friends, snowshoeing in my backyard, and shoveling. Okay, so “wonderful” doesn’t exactly apply to that last one, but the ludicrous amounts of snow made for some “wonderful” pictures to wow my students with. People here look at the picture I took of the thermometer (at only ten degrees or so below freezing) and say “But… you can’t actually go outside in that, can you?!” (Certain other people claim it's all Photoshop trickery. I invite them to come visit me in January sometime.)
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