Moszna Castle

Moszna Castle, Poland

The rich, especially hereditary aristocrats, are freaks. Free from such concerns as how to get food and free from manual labor, their thoughts turn to exploiting the labor of those around them. How big and stupid a castle can I get these beasts to build? They wonder. Who can stock it with furniture, or work the fields in the surrounding farmland?

Even when their monuments to folly burn to the ground, as happened in 1896 to Moszna Castle, a neo-rococo fantasy tucked into the Opole district of Southern Poland, the aristocrats cannot be made rational. They pick themselves up, brush themselves off, and continue throwing cash at overlarge fireplaces, witch’s hat towers, and brass weathercocks until the money runs out. 

On the brighter side: these days, if you are looking for a pleasant place to spend an evening or a night, the remnants of these absurd lifestyles are a great option for a day trip. The previously mentioned Moszhna Castle is  a charming fairy-tale of a building in a secluded town far from the fast-paced cities of Poland. Tucked into the rural countryside, sporting dozens of turrets and towers, Moszna castle has foundations dating to the 17th century. Yes, the grounds have been haunted by the wealthy for centuries, up to the days of industrial giants the von Tiele-Wincklers, who owned several castles across the region. It wasn't till the great surge of Soviet communism liberated Moszna from the von Tiele-Wincklers in the later stages of WWII that these great castles could be made accessible to us ordinary folk. 

For years the castle lay neglected, until in 1972 it was converted to a sanitarium, a true palace to the people. After the fall of communism, though, it gained its current incarnation as a tourist destination.

Admission to the grounds and castle together is 25 złoty per adult. This allows you to wander along the tourist path, which consists of seven rooms on the eastern wing. The path includes a lovely library fringed by ornate gothic-themed stained glass in stone frames. In the dining room, ornately carved wooden framed mirrors stand over grand dining tables. The path leads through a restored family residence, where a bed lazes alone and melancholy in the heart of a round tower overlooking the greenhouse.

All tours, recordings and written information are in Polish, but don't worry, the details are obvious enough you get the idea. It's an old castle where rich people entertained other rich people while the peasants made plans to riot.

Contemporary art by local residents, their talents stretching towards competence, hang from the walls. A blond, busty woman on horseback gazes at you from one frame, and then again from another, this time with a hawk her arm. Later, a family posing with the stone lions on the main Piazza. Scenes with flowers or swans. It's decent art, nothing outright third rate, just the best the locals could muster.

Which leads to another point: overall, the castle is a vital part of the community. On our visit schoolchildren were playing dodgeball on the lawn near a huge lonely pine staked and cabled to remain upright. And at least five couples in wedding finery were having photoshoots on the piazza steps. Restaurants and gift stalls lined the entrance but not extravagantly so. The cafe was a bit stuffy, and filled with families not quite following coronavirus protocols. 

All in all one wonders on the tour whether the current owners are conflicted as to whether they are a museum with a hotel or a hotel with a museum. Certainly as a guest it would be uncomfortable to have tourists clogging up your hotel, and as a tourist it seems odd to have half the place closed off for guest rooms. If aristocrats had money problems, capitalists have issues of where their revenue stream comes from. So it turns out grand castles are nothing if not problem generating machines.

At least you get to walk away clean.

Feet in San Francisco

I'm joined by special guest feet for this picture. Thanks, Akasha!

We're back, safe and sound, but once again Frontier airlines has let us down. The first leg of our flight was delayed long enough that we couldn't make the connecting flight to Minneapolis, so we were forced to spend the night in Denver. And by Denver, I mean some face- and soul-less corporate park in the Denver vicinity. And, by spend the night, I mean kill six hours, from ten p.m. till 4:00 am, which is more of an extended layover, about half of which was shuttle rides over dark freeways. By the time we got home we were travel zombies lurching from room to room seeking food and rest. Still, a lovely trip.

San Fran finale...

We had a great final day, wandering around the Presidio, gazing at Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge and the misty hills of Marin county. Then we visited the cartoon museum, which had a nice exhibit on the Samurai's impact on graphic novels, and original artwork from eighty years of Batman, including Frank Miller and a Japanese Manga adaptation of Batman from the sixties. They also had originals of Krazy Kat and dozens of other cool things. So I got my geek on, a bit, so to speak.
This morning's airline check-in was another mis-adventure - I may have to write a strongly worded email to Frontier Airlines, suggesting that their clerks should put more priority on getting people their boarding passes than on handing out candy to ten-year olds. Grr.
See you in Minneapolis!
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Kuleto's cioppino

Kuleto's, on Powell Street, doesn't have Cioppino on the menu, but there it was, a huge bowl of it, and another in front of Akasha. Two steaming bowls of seafood sampler in a tomato base. Crabs, mussels, clams, fish. The local speciality. Why was it here, where they don't serve it? Good story.


We'd met up here the day before with my Cousin Terri, who works in the neighborhood. I hadn't seen Terri since 1976, when I was eight and the family was out on vacation. So I looked her up, and we talked for a while in Kuletos, and as it does, the conversation turned to what we were doing here in San Fran. I said we were looking for Cioppino, and hadn't found it yet. She said go up to North Beach, or Fisherman's Wharf, maybe, but wasn't sure. So we asked the waiter. He said Fisherman's Wharf, but he was hesitant. He was a food person, and he hated to send us up there for food. We don't have it ourselves, he said - it's tourist food.

At the conservatory

This conservatory is in Golden Gate park, a beauty of rolling hills and walking paths. This train set is in the south wing, and is made up of largely of discarded junk like computer boards and bottle caps - there's even a baseball park on the far side.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Day two... We go to a Spa

We spent the morning at the Kabuki Spa in Japantown, not far from the hotel. Being a Minnesotan, I'm a bit leery of pleasure (you never know where it will lead). But a massage and a spa are a couple of the best things you can do for yourself. There's a steam room so full of steam you can't see across the room, and it was incredibly calming to sit and stare at the foggy lights and let myself disappear into the steam. We moved on to the dry room and the hot pool, but the second go-through on the steam room was a bit less serene, as this tall, bearded hippie fellow was salting himself up next to me, and finding that zen sweet spot is a bit tough when you're being pelted with second-hand cleansing salt. Oh well. It was still better than a midwestern winter. Follow that with a dunk in a 55 degree tub, then a nice warm soak, and the shock in contrasting feeling is almost self-punishing enough to be approved of by even the most dour Midwesterner.

Next up, Golden Gate Park.

On our way...

The bags are packed and we're on the plane after the worst performance
by an airline check-in guy ever. I'm sure by now the house-sitter has
settled in, and probably eaten all our secret stash of chocolate
bunnies already. Next stop, Denver, then San Francisco!

Spoon and Fork

Lesser known than his sword, the fork and spoon of Damocles were lost for generations before turning up in a diner in Duluth, where they hang over the heads of unknowing tourists to this day.

Madrid, an adios, espana -

Madrid is much the same as we left it, though we've had more time to
appreciate its character. On day one we pretty much just wandered the
streets, down to the official royal palace. (The king now lives in the
suburbs, I believe). The reflecting pool was unguarded, so there were
maybe a dozen folks wading in the pool, cooling their feet from the 40
degree heat. That's 40 celsius, of course. You Canadians understand.
Dinner was paella and fried vegetables at a fancy place downtown,
where soccer played on the overhead tv and a scornful French woman and
her unruly children dissaproved of my American eating methods (picture
to come).
Today we got up and made a day of the museums. First was the Reina
Sofia, home to a collection of modernist art, most notably Picasso's
massive anti-war piece, Guernica. It's a painting perfectly suited to
his habit of destroying bodies to depict emotion; and it seems fitting
that long after the fascist regimes of Franco and Hitler are dust,
this protest of their damage is what survives.
The Prado is Madrid's other great museum, and home tpo countless works
by masters such as Rubens, Velazquez, and my two favorites, Goya and
el Greco. Funny how they're sort of opposites but both touch me - Goya
painted brooding secular things with short, dark people, and el Greco
painted tall, elongated saints in vibrant reds and blues.
Well, that's it for Mike's brief history of art. We did some shopping,
then had a last meal of melons and Iberian ham and returned to our
hostel to finish packing up for the trip.
--
Sent from my mobile device
Mike Ramberg
mramberg@visi.com
http://grebmar.net
buy my book: http://lulu.com/mramberg

Toledo

We'v e had a good run on food here, as well. Barcelona started poorly
- it's touristy where we stayed, and crowded, so the quality was a bit
off. But starting in Valencia food has been fresh and delicious. One
local specialty is Jamon Iberica - ham of iberia. This is basically a
pig's entire leg, smoked and sealed in wax; servings are then cut
right from the ham and served on small bagutte rolls with olive oil
and cheese. Delicious. I'm told the ham varies by region, like wine,
depending on local salts and smoke... Mmm. Markets and supermarkets
have sections filled with ham legs for take-home. Seafood has been
fresh & tasty; calimari and mussels are the highlight - again, the
secret is a garlic and butter. One night in Almeria we ordered the
tomato salad. It turned out to be a simple plate of quartered
tomatoes, covered in olive oil with some garlic chunks. But the
tomatoes were so fresh and the oil so olivey it turned out to be a
food highlight - who knew? Gazpacho here is light and brothy, served
with diced vegetables you put in yourself. There's nothing spicy hot
here like Mexican food - it gets over 100 F here regularly, so my
theory is their food is light and refreshing, like the gazpacho.
Side note: if you see a 'menu of the day' posted, and it's evening,
don't order from that menu. It's for the day. Not the evening. Made
that mistake twice now...
Toledo is much more medieval than the other towns we've been to. The
buildings are rougher, with exposed stonework and less ornamentation,
except the cathedral, which is covered in statuary nooks, and squats
over its tiny plaza like an lopsided, surly angel shrugging one stone
wing in frustration at the turistas below.
There are many painting by the great el Greco in town; unfortunately
the works are closed while the buildings are being repaired, or
they're on loan somewhere, I'm not sure which. El Greco is even buried
here, in one of the churches whose altarpieces he painted. I was
milling about, mustering up the old feelings of awe and some such,
when one of the kindly old nuns who runs the place said something in
Spanish that sounded like el Greco, and Tomb. She gestured with a
finger, then flipped a switch, and a sqaure of light appeared in the
stone floor. Underneath I could see a grey box with a stone cross
resting on a marble slab. El Greco's.
Well, on to Madrid tomorrow. Three nights left. Hope all is well with you.
--
Sent from my mobile device
Mike Ramberg
mramberg@visi.com
http://grebmar.net
buy my book: http://lulu.com/mramberg

Seville, and sunny

Today is the second holiest day of the year in Spain, the festival of
the ascension of the Virgin Mary. At 7 this morning, the statue of the
virgin was carried around the cathedral plaza by 40 men and displayed
to the gathered crowd, as is their tradition. We did not get to the
cathedral till after 9, but there was still a great crowd of locals
gathered, all dressed in their good church clothes, soaking in the
holiness. A brass band in heavy coats milled around, and a troupe of
chinese tourists came by wondering what was happening. One of them
asked what was going on, but she didn't understand christianity, or
virgin births, or rising to heaven. I believe in me, she said, and
then she went off looking for tickets.

We went out to the train station to book tickets for Toledo, and by
the time we returned the city had been shut down for siesta. Ouir
hostal is in the upscale shopping district, tucked away on a narrow,
dead-end side street, in a four-story building with a nice open
central court. But it felt odd that it was three o'clock on a bright
Saturday afternoon and the streets were deserted and the shops all
shuttered up. So we're back at the hostal, resting ourselves from the
100+ degree heat.

More later.
--
Sent from my mobile device
Mike Ramberg
mramberg@visi.com
http://grebmar.net
buy my book: http://lulu.com/mramberg

My feet at the sea

More serious postings to follow...

Almeria.

We've been in Almeria for two days now, and time here slips by like a
thief in the night; when you notice, the day is gone. Almeria is a
smaller city on the Maditerranean coast; like Barcelona and Valencia
it has an old town, it also has a beach. What it doesn't have are
crowds; there are tourists but not mobs of them.

We spent yesterday at the beach, alternately bobbing in the light surf
and reading in the shade sipping a beautiful red summer wine poured
into a stein over ice. Then, after a nice walk to burn off the sips of
wine, we drove back to the hotel for dinner.

Driving here is hectic and stressful, though not unrewarding given the
challenges involved. Streets are narrow, lanes unmarked, and other
drivers are alternately ballsy and courteous, and sometimes both at
once. We're in a Toyota Yaris, a tiny car with great handling, but
still often pass cars - parked or otherwise - with what feels like
less than an inch of clearance. Street signs are ambiguous, parking
rules lax. Two nights ago, following the example of locals, we drove
up over a sidewalk and parked on the dirt margins of an undeveloped
lot. No ticket, no tow!

Fun, perhaps unrelated tourist fact: In Valencia, the names on the
posted plaques didn't match the names on the map!

We spent a few hours in Aslcazabar, the great fortress on the hill on
the outskirts of town. For centuries it has sat there as a defense,
though it changed hands several times as the christians and moors
traded dominance in the region.

Well I could go on but we're getting ready for a short drive along the
coast to capo del gato. We'll let you know what's there when we find
out...
--
Sent from my mobile device
Mike Ramberg
mramberg@visi.com
http://grebmar.net
buy my book: http://lulu.com/mramberg

Valencia day 2

We´ve spent most of our time in Valencia in the old quarter, a beuatiful, charming region of narrow streets, sidewalk cafes, and iron-balconied architecture. The streets come together at plazas where large civic building stand in over-ornamented splendor, angels and horses and gods and local heros in marble standing over everything. It began to rain last night as we were eating mussels and shrimp drinking fine wines. It rained hard for a few minutes and we scooted under the umbrellas. When it stopped, several children ran out to play on the wet marble plaza, splashing in puddles and chasing each other, so even the rain turned out to be charming.

More rain this morning that came down sideways, trapping us in a cafe for an extra coffee. Right now we´re doing laundry in a charming laundromat, and Akasha is scouting for a place to have lunch.

This really is a cool city. There´s a remnant of the old riverbed that must have long ago silted over, but it still cuts a channel through the heart of the city and is now a long, thin park with soccer pitches and groves of trees and hibiscuses. The trees lining the streets are orange and lemon, and they are currently bearing ripe fruit. We ate an orange that had fallen into a fountain, and are sorry to report it was a little bitter. So it isn´t quite paradise.

Okay, all for now. Tomorrow we get a car and head south.

Goodbye Barcelona, hello Valencia

We spent much of yesterday at La Sagrada Familia, Anton Gaudi's
masterpiece, show-stopping cathedral, a re-invention of cathedrals yet
still rooted in their cassic form. I was fascinated at how the seeming
randomness is actually rooted in advanced geometric shapes; hyperbolic
rhomboids, or some such name; I have no memory for technical things
and limited internet access, which is just as well since I should be
soaking up sights and not googling gaudi for hours on end anyway.
We left Barcelona this morning at 6 am, riding the early metro with
working girls and early packers like ourselves. The train to Valencia
was beautiful, a coastal smooth ride past orange groves and castles
perched along sweeping tops. Valencia itself is a pretty, renaissance
feeling city with marble sidewalks and brightly painted cupolas. We've
just checked in and are resting up before storming the sites.

More Barcelona

Random gorgeous view from Parque Guell...
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T