Life: Idiotropic

On the list of things to take visitors to is the old Carthaginian city of Arse, now known as Saguntum on top of the hill overlooking Sagunto just 10 minutes from our house by car.

This week I have a visitor thus, to Arse we go!

Fortunately, instead of dying from complete boredom, I am able to find new things each time I go.  It's also fun to see what my guests notice.  My friend Julie notice (and squatted playfully by) the old toilets.  Today's friend likes the prickly pears so much, I think it would be great to pick one.  Not smart.  They're really a lot more prickly than they look!

 Today I discovered three new things:

1) This view.  I usually take the shortcut up the hill and don't bother with the road.  Today we took the road.  A nice walk, a different perspective and this view where I can actually sort of fit the entire "old" Roman theater in my camera view with part of the camera and the sea too.  It's nice.  They have concerts here.  I'd like to go to one some day.





2)  There's a long rectangular building of no particular interest along the long stretch of path between one part of the city and the other.  It's been there, but I've never cared to go inside.  Today I did.  Apparently here in this not-horribly-publicized place there resides the largest collection of epigraphs in the Iberian peninsula.  It's pretty impressive with many column heads and engraved stones from the first century A.D. and even a few B.C. stones as well. 

See this one?  This is the top of a column.  You can see the tiny cut marks where it was carved into the coil.

3) A cute cafe.  La Taverna de la Serp is a tiny little bar/cafe just below the theater where we stopped to have a cafe con leche and a small snack.  They serve tapenades here of various types with bread.  We had one of olives that was absolutely delicious and one with bacalao and potatoe that was good, but didn't quite have the kick that I hoped for.  I ordered from my table to the man behind the bar, the only one in the tiny cafe at the time.  "Dos cafes con leche y..."  The man behind the counter looked at me and asked in Spanish, "Do you want the coffees after your meal or now?"  "Now."  Again, I get the inquisitive look like I surely must be mad.  It's just one of those things.  Americans, I tell him, will drink coffee at any time of day and with just about any food.  Yes, I know it's strange, but we just really like our coffee.  So he brought them and they were good and I've now discovered a nice little place in Segunto to go for a bit of something.  The service is inquisitive, but nonjudgmental and quite friendly.