30 Monday May 2022
It’s always a treat meeting up with Anne & Paul, either here or in Jerez, where they live. This time I got to see them twice in Jerez while I was there doing the Vinoble thing. We had one lovely afternoon tapeo and then one disastrous lunch (WORST SERVICE EVER). And yet both experiences were just fine, and enjoyable, because you can’t beat great company. Makes everything work out in the end. Thanks guys! See you soon.
26 Thursday May 2022
Posted in friends, sevilla, tapas, tapas bars, tourism
My old pal Marcello @marcellobrito from Brazil is back in town for a travel fair and so of course I took him out on a tapeo. We can’t remember if it’s been 10 or 12 years since we last saw each other but in the end it doesn’t matter because it feels like just yesterday. Good times.
20 Friday May 2022
I’ll have a lot more to say about Barcelona later, because it was quite an amazing experience in so many ways and I am still processing everything. BUT… it would not have been anywhere near as happy for me if not for these two. I met Charlotte & Brian on one of my tapas tours last October and we really hit it off. So when I found out they have a second home in Barcelona and that they would be there early January, I planned to go there for my 65th birthday. But then… fucking Omicron happened, so I decided to stay put until hopefully things settled down. Then the Decanter commission came up and as luck would have it, Charlotte and Brian were going to be in Barcelona the same week I was planning to be there doing research – perfect timing!
Not only were they great company when we went out to the vineyards and out for dinner, Charlotte also kept me “company” on whatsapp during the week, and that really meant a lot. To be honest I had doubts about this trip, and not just Covid concerns. I hadn’t travelled anywhere (other than day trips) on my own since I went to Madrid in October 2019 and I was worried I might be hit by my old nemesis PANIC. Those of you who also suffer from panic attacks will know that even thinking about having an attack can bring one on, so just knowing Charlotte and Brian were there really eased my mind. Anyhow, more about Barcelona coming up next week. I’m so glad I went.
05 Tuesday Apr 2022
Posted in food & drink, friends, instagram, twitter
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Twitter strikes again. Though this time is was more of an indirect hit as Heather and Eric are old friends of my neighbour Robert Warnock @warnock.robert and they got in touch through him about a tapas tour. I was booked already for the week, or as booked as I can be right now, but we decided to just meet up for a quick beer and a tapa… which then morphed into a lovely lunch. And with Robert joining us! I’ve known Robert via social media for at least a couple of years, recently finding out that we live about 10 minutes away from each other, and he is even one of my Patreons (helping to keep my Sevilla Tapas website going)… and yet we had still never met until now. So what a great time, and so nice to have finally met Robert in person.
04 Friday Mar 2022
Posted in food & drink, friends, sevilla
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A few weeks ago I got an email from Mary, who was going to be doing a road trip through Spain and was interested in a tour with me, even though she saw that I have a two-person minimum (since now all my tours are private and so I can’t add others to existing groups). And THEN she wrote…
Special pleading as follows: I’m 78 and have been to Spain three times before. This will be my last. I’ve always wanted to see Flamenco in a Peña-type setting but have not felt comfortable on my own. I’ve seen more touristy ones but not great. I speak Spanish. I am very interested in food though I avoid the label “foodie.” I am a retired lawyer and in the process of retiring as the guiding teacher of a Zen Center. I hasten to add that I eat and drink most anything.
And well… how could I say no to such excellent pleading? So I said we could probably work something out and I checked out peñas for her. Meanwhile she wrote back saying that instead of a tour she would like to invite me out for lunch while she was here. Which happened today! Somehow we avoided the usual “how did you get from _______ to _______ ?” question, which both of us have answered more times than we can remember. Anyhow, we had a fabulous lunch and I have set Mary up with a list of places to go and, of course, great places to eat. We will try to meet up again before she leaves but as this weekend is actually quite a busy one for me (figures, all the other weekends this month are quiet) it may end up being just lots of WhatsApp chats. Still, what a lovely encounter.
casa azahar 