02008-11-24 | Touring, Travel
Enjoyed the coffee at Caffè Nero, not far from the hotel, but at Fernandez & Wells on Lexington Street the coffee was really excellent, especially the “Stumpy”!!
Showed up at the club at 15:00 sharp as noted in our tourbook (((the book of lies!!!))), but the doors were locked, the place was dark and nobody answered the doorbell. Called the contact number we had, but there was only an answering machine. Called our manager, who called my U.S. agent, who called my European agent. No news by 16:15. Not worried, because it will only take us 30 minutes to set up the sound, and since they don’t have a vid projector we won’t need time to set that up, but inconvenient as it is a nice afternoon and one would have enjoyed walking about. Walked back to the hotel, which was conveniently down the street.
At 16:45 the doors were still locked. London completely dark by now.
Finally got in around 18:00. Nice club and good food. Enjoyed playing guitar for the audience… it’s how most of my music is born anyway: just me and my guitar in a room. Even nicer when it’s a room full of people.
Sneaked out through the back entrance of the Pigalle right after the show and started packing, but could not fall asleep until after midnight. At 04:30 we left for the airport still dead tired.
Didn’t buy coffee at Heathrow, because we hoped to sleep on the plane. I guess that worked, sort of… lots of micro-sleep.
The German tour manager picked us up and drove us to Freiburg.
02008-11-23 | Travel
Long journey. Bumpy ride over the Atlantic. Read this marvel of an insightful poem by Gary Snyder:
As the crickets’ soft Autumn hum
is to us,
So are we to the trees
As are they
To the rocks and hills.
Arrived in Barcelona, where my friends picked me up at the airport and drove 1 1/2 hours in a South-Western direction. The Priorat is contained in a large bowl of granite, a handful of small towns – some with less than a hundred residents – that produce grapes, almonds and hazelnuts. Because there is only dry-farming, meaning that there is no irrigation, and the ground is not rich dirt, not even dirt really, just rock into which the vines drop roots up to 30 feet down to obtain water, the fruit is very concentrated and intense. Similarly the nut-trees are small, but with very flavorful almonds and hazelnuts.
On my last day in the area we drove to Corbera D’Ebre, a town which was the location of the last and deciding battle of the civil war. We took the long route and briefly visited a cave that served as a makeshift hospital. Coming to Corbera we crossed a river in which many of the retreating forces drowned because they could not swim. The town abandoned the buildings bombed during the civil war, which recently have become an art project, the alphabet of liberty.
Route to Peace – LIME
Like most medieval towns, Pinyeres is situated on the highest point of land in its valley, the better to see danger approaching. Throughout the centuries, the more modern town of Batea grew up around it. When destruction came in the 20th century, it came not by land but from the air, delivered not by invading foreigners but by Spanish countrymen.
02008-11-23 | Photos, Travel
Siurana is an old mountain village where the last Moorish princess rode over the cliff, persued by Spanish soldiers.
02008-11-22 | Photos, Travel
This photo was taken on Tuesday in back of a hermitage near Torroja, the Priorat, Spain.
02008-10-18 | Travel
The Things He Carried – The Atlantic (November 2008)
Airport security in America is a sham—“security theater†designed to make travelers feel better and catch stupid terrorists. Smart ones can get through security with fake boarding passes and all manner of prohibited items—as our correspondent did with ease.
02008-09-27 | Travel
Got up at 4:20 and left at 5:00. Many deer along the road – and sometimes on the road. The moon is a lovely waning sliver. Without a city’s light pollution I can see the whole dark disk in the night sky, illuminated from the left. Nice drive until I hit 101S.
Posted at Oakland airport with phone.
