The River Ebro frozen at Tortosa, Catalonia, near its mouth. 1891, at the end of the so-called Little Ice Age. You’d have thought not much chance of this happening again for the foreseeable future, although climate sciencists say with heating world in chaos such cold snaps are also very possible.
Esbardu. A lovely Asturian word meaning bear cub.
Some 370 brown bears now live in the Cantabrian mountains, on a steady path to recovery after a a nadir at the turn of the century.
Photo. @fundacion_oso_pardo
The Cantabrian bear population is distributed across the autonomous communities of Asturias, Cantabria, the Castillan regions of León and Palencia, as well as in recent years a small part of Lugo I. Galicia. Historically, the population declined until the late 20th century, but a recovery period began in the mid-1990s and continues to this day.
Lunes al Sol starring Javier Barden. This powerful 2002 drama shows how unemployment affects men left jobless by the closure of Vigo’s shipyards in Galicia. Bardem’s later film El Buen Patrón is told from the opposite perspective of a boss, who only concern is himself.. It’s even more damning on effects of capitalism on human beings.
Lobster pots, Bueu harbour near Vigo. I miss Galicia and the smell of the Atlantic, stronger and fresher from that here in the Mediterranean.
Some time ago I sneaked inside the abandoned whaling station at Cangas de Morrazo run by the Massó family tinning company. There are remains of another small whaling factory in the Cíes’ southernmost island.
This was more or less where in 1980 Galicia’s and Spain’s whaling industry ended. The factory is in a right mess. It would make a great site for a museum to the history of that evocative, cruel and sorry business.
Some years ago in January, I watched this beautiful animal in the Sierra de Andújar, Andalucia with the mobile stuck on a friend’s telescope. She was sitting, watching us, unimpressed, about 250 metres away. The next day another Iberian lynx, a male, crossed 100 metres from where we stood before vanishing into the scrub. Enchanted moments in the Sierra Morena.
Wildflowers ablaze one spring on the slopes near where George Orwell fought with the POUM militia in the Sierra de Alcubierre.
Abandoned train line. San Esteban de Gormaz, Soria in August heat several years ago. 1000s of kilometres of lines were lost in the 20th century, Many are now idllyic cycling and walking routes but others like this in 1995, closed. A symbol of la España Vacía/da (Empty/ied Spain) as the tragedy of the depopulating hinterland is called.
