Sometimes I think I am one of the luckiest people in the world. Well, not today—I am recovering from another cold—but many, many other days. I have a loving and lovable family, amazing and interesting friends, I get to travel to beautiful places, I live in a coastal village that enables me to have daily walks along the sea, and I have a little patch of ground to fill with flowers and greenery.
Back from a week away (more on that in a moment), I awake to early morning birdsong; the infamous ‘Dawn Chorus’. This is the time of year that male blackbirds attract mates and defend territory with song, which goes on for hours. I LOVE it. I love it so much that I wrote a whole post about it a couple of years ago, which includes links to four different versions of the Lennon-McCartney Blackbird song, plus a bonus one hour track of blackbird song for those who may also be similarly enchanted. If you missed it or want to repeat a blackbird extravaganza, here’s a link:
Blackbird
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April 18, 2024
I didn’t start out to write about blackbirds this week. But then this wonderful post came across my desk and I had to share it with you. One thing led to another, and here you go: a whole post about blackbirds!
Our garden is finally greening up a bit and a few flowers have burst back into bloom. The new plants from last year are reappearing again, but on their own timetable. These mysteries live alongside hope and joys of a garden. Here are some of our foxgloves; maybe it’s just me, but I find the exuberance of foxgloves astonishing. They bring true delight every time I wander between them or look out the window and see them rocking gently in the breeze.
Last week I had the immense joy of going to Spain to meet two friends and fellow writers for five days of focused writing. We stayed in a beautiful hotel in Úbeda, a walled UNESCO Heritage City in Southern Spain. Besides being surrounded by stunning sixteenth century churches and other buildings of substance, we were planted in the land of olives. Úbeda is in the Spanish Province of Jaén, which produces over 20% of the world’s olive oil. I won’t say more about our experience tasting olive oil since Andrea did a fantastic job of describing that event here:
Besides hours of writing each day in the hotel’s gorgeous plant-filled atrium, we walked around the city two or three times each day, ate VERY well at every meal, and enjoyed writing feedback sessions over evening glasses of wine before dinner.
Our walks alternated between moving briskly for exercise and other times wandering thoughtfully to take in what we were seeing, read interpretive signs, and take photos. Or maybe to wander into a shop to see what local products we were encouraged to purchase and take home. Why yes, that is a beautiful hand-painted plate and of course we need to take home some of the local extra virgin olive oil! (We now know why it is so good!)
There was a long reasonably flat boulevard just along and outside the walled city, with a wide pavement/sidewalk which was great for combining exercise as well as stunning views across acres and acres of olive trees.
During a few of our walks along the boulevard, we noticed a lot of cats hanging around one particular section of fenced-off undeveloped spare land filled with building rubble, bushy undergrowth and trees. Once or twice there was a lady cleaning water bowls just inside the fence and also filling the large bowls of—now that we noticed it—cat food.
Eventually we found a sign that described the Cat Sanctuary. The spot of land has been preserved for feral cats and is cared for by a network of volunteers. We noticed one day that as soon as the cats heard the sound of a particular car coming nearer, they ran out into the road to greet it. The driver finally had to toot her horn to get the cats to move out of the way so she could park safely. Although we had cat-lovers in our group, the cats showed no particular interest in us, no matter what cooing sounds we offered. They knew where their next meal was coming from, and we were not it.
What I wish I could capture for you were the scents that filled the air: sometimes freshly blossoming orange trees, but mainly another tree that I could not get my iphone to identify for me. It was intoxicating. Also, sometimes we caught the scent of fresh manure, but it wasn’t too awful, and we could always find those scented blossoming trees to replace it soon enough.
The other sense that was ever present along the boulevard was the sound of birdsong. It accompanied our daily walks and reminded us of how lovely it is when car sounds are not dominant. Ahh, deep breaths.
Luckily for me, both Andrea and Jayne live in Madrid, of course speaking fluent Spanish. They guided us seamlessly through every interaction and knew what foods to order, and what to avoid. Almost unconsciously, we aimed straight for as much garlic, fresh vegetables, fruit and olive oil as we could find. We were never disappointed.
We also–more than once—ate divine salmorejo: a cold tomato-garlic-bread soup with oil and crumbled hard-boiled eggs sprinkled on top, alongside roasted or boiled artichokes drizzled with olive oil. Are you sensing an oil and garlic theme here?
I am positive the copious amounts of garlic we ate managed the stave off the cold I was on the verge of getting until the day before I flew home. On our travel day the volume of garlic dropped far below our previous days and I am sure that is why this cold finally caught up with me. 🧄
Leaving you now with one last photo of Alliums (garlic and onion are alliums) in the Madrid Botanical Garden, so as to ward off any incoming colds, for ALL of us! May the stinking rose work its magic on you all 🪄✨
Thank you so much for reading this week! Does garlic work to help you stave off colds? Do any of my botanical readers know what tree was scent-bombing us in Úbeda? Can you believe it is already mid-May??? I’ll be back with you the last week of the month.
xoxo Sabrina
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