Autumn Vienna - Episode 2

Well, I won’t lie to you, after posting the first episode on Facebook, I was thus fully invigorated, and headed out to the first museum visit of the trip. Whenever I’m making a trip like this, one thing that I always really enjoy is leaving the hotel in the morning, and heading off to the tram/bus stop, or the Metro station, with a basic plan for the day, but no real idea what it might have in store. I like that very much. Of course, seeing other people all off on their way to work just adds to the pleasure. We call that schadenfreude. Mind you, so do the Viennese.  

Which brings me to the question I failed to answer yesterday, namely, why was Vienna at the top of my bucket list? Well, partly, it was because I’d enjoyed Prague, 3rd city of the old Austro Hungarian Empire, and Budapest, 2nd city of the old Austro Hungarian Empire so much when I visited them in 2017 that I just had to visit the number 1 as well. But it’s more than that. Vienna is just a place which kind of associates itself with pleasures. You don’t believe me? Well, give yourself a couple of minutes to add words to ‘Viennese’ in order to make phrases. See what you come up with. What did I tell you? Viennese waltz, Viennese fancy/whirl, Viennese coffee, and of course, the daddy of them all, Walls’ Viennetta. All wonderfully light and sweet confections. Add to that the fact that Vienna was where two of my heroes, Mozart and Klimt lived and worked in important periods of their lives, and maybe you can start to see the appeal. Or failing that, have a look at the sketch I made of the outside of the Kunsthistorische Museum this morning. Any city which houses a world class art gallery in a building like that gets my vote.  

In front of the building is a very imposing ornamental fountain. In case you don’t recognise the lady in the statue on top, that’s the Empress Maria Theresa. You might not have heard of her, but you’ve probably heard of her daughter, Marie Antoinette, who came to fame through her starring role in the Great French Head Off, after her ‘Let them eat cake!’ material went down like a lead balloon with the sans culottes.  

So, it was 9:30 when I arrived, and thought I might as well get my ticket from the booth outside even though it would be half an hour before the museum opened for me to go in. Or so I thought. Actually if you paid a few extra Euros to see the Caravaggio and Bernini exhibition currently showing in a Vienna Kunsthistorisches Museum near you, then you could go straight in any time after 9. Well, I have to be honest, while I appreciate the consummate skill of Bernini, I can’t say that I would have paid extra just for him – if I were tempted to let my inner philistine out he’d probably say that if you’ve seen one statue of a naked man with his meat and two veg hanging out, you’ve seen them all. However, Caravaggio, now that’s a different matter. It was a

terrific exhibition, and very informative too, and when I came to the end of it, two hours had passed. I was tempted to move on to pastures new at this point, but I’m so glad I didn’t. The actual gallery itself, on the first floor, is exceptionally good, and I was taken by the Brueghels (ouch). Sorry, last genitalia based quip for the night, I promise. No, but seriously, probably the best work of Peter Brueghel the Elder is on display there, including the peasant wedding, and my own favourite, The Tower of Babel. Looked at the watch and another two hours had gone, and so I left the gallery. 

The original plan for the day had been to visit the Kunsthistorische Museum first, and then the Natural History Museum which was immediately opposite, after. However having tomorrow and Thursday in Vienna as well, I didn’t want to risk being all museumed out before I’d had a good look inside it, and so that’s on the agenda for Thursday now. This left all the more time to sketch the two wallies wearing animal heads who were playing the accordion outside the museum. I think they were meant to be horse’s heads, though I’m not sure, and if you look at the sketch I made at the time they look more like dogs. Cue joke about them playing Bach. I’m here all week, ladies and gents. Well, anyway, I would have to say that they were by far the best annoying-instrument playing animal impersonators I saw all day (the ferret playing the kazoo was rubbish).  

So, following that, I walked to the nearest tram stop and took a ride to nowhere in particular. Why? Hmm, have you never read any of my posts before? A) because it was a tram, and b) because I bought a 72 hour travel pass yesterday and I like getting my money’s worth. I eventually ended up by the Schottentor U Bahn station. That’s Stubentor and Schottentor, but sadly there’s no station named after Skeletor. So, back to the Stephanplatz to tackle the big one. I knew that sketching any part of the Stephansdom - Cathedral of St. Stephen – was going to take time, and only having a couple of hours of decent daylight left, if I was going to do it today, then I was going to have to get on with it. Now, when you look at the sketch at the bottom of the page, you might be thinking – where’s the rest of it? – I deliberately picked on the small tower since I thought that there was the possibility I would be able to finish the sketch in a reasonable amount of time. If you consider that this is the smallest tower, then you might just get an idea of just how huge and intricate the whole cathedral is.  

So I picked my spot, sat down and started. Along came a spectator. I believe that she was Japanese, and I’ll explain why in a minute. A spectator who was just one of a large party, so it turned out. For the first 20 minutes or so it was okay, since there was nothing much on the page for anyone to see.

However, as the sketch began to take shape, Nice Old Dear San began calling over other members of the coach party to come and have a look. And when they did in their dribs and drabs, they invariably reached the conclusion that the best place to stand and look at me sketching was between me, and my view of the cathedral. And the worst thing about it was that they were so nice and polite about it, through the universal language of the thumbs up, that I didn’t even have the opportunity to curse them all under my breath in case one of them did speak (rude) English. I said that I deduced that they were Japanese, mainly through the rhythm of their speech. I don’t understand Japanese or any Chinese language or dialect, but in my experience the sound and the rhythm of the languages are very different. So when the party finally left, I showed my relief by acknowledging their waves with ‘Arigato’, and none of them looked particularly askance. 

It’s not impossible that they were driven off by the cold. If you look at the records it will doubtless tell you that the temperature in Vienna late this afternoon was maybe just below 10 degrees. (Yes, I have checked). Not really at all cold. Well, the wind chill factor must have been high, because by the time I’d done all I felt I could reasonably do with the light now fading, I realised that I was absolutely frozen. That’s the thing with sketching, you see. I can get totally absorbed while I’m making my sketch. While I’m making the sketch, I won’t notice anything, not cold, not hunger, not thirst, in fact nothing except very polite Japanese tourists standing in the way. That’s okay when you’re making quick sketches. But my sketches have got slower and slower over the last couple of years. So the upshot is that when I stopped sketching, I started shivering. Badly shivering. In fact, I probably looked like the two kids I drew who were dancing outside the museum to the strains of Eine Kleine Krap Musik. Which is why I headed back to the hotel, where I am now. I’m fine now, but very foot weary so I’ll probably not go out again tonight.  

So, what’s on the agenda for tomorrow? Oh, please, dearly beloved. Tomorrow is Mittwoch! Tram Museum! Yay! Well, I’ve enjoyed this episode – somebody had to, after all. Shall we do it again tomorrow? Same time? See you then.

August 16th Elche

John is better than he was yesterday, I’m very glad to say. I went with Jen to see him this evening, and he’d got his colour back, and was talking a lot more easily. He’s still being kept in the hospital for observation, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see him home tomorrow, or possibly Saturday.

I offered to go to the hospital with Jen this morning, but she didn’t want me to, so I thought that under the circumstances the best thing I could do was to carry on just as I would have done in other circumstances. I didn’t fancy a long excursion today though, so set my modest sights on Elx/Elche. That dual name business is easily explained – Elx is the name in Valencian. I’m not going to upset any of the my friends in the area by getting involved in the discussion of whether Valencian is a dialect of Catalan or not.

The first time I ever heard of Elx/Elche was actually 11 years ago, which was when Jen and John bought their first home in the Alicante area. When you drive away from airport on the motorway past Elx/Elche you pass a large brown (cultural, same as in the UK) sign with a face wearing a curious headdress and the words – Elche – Patrimonio De La Humanidad. Which intrigued me, and which I’ve since learned means that Elx/Elche is a World Heritage City. This has as much to do with the huge palm groves, of which the city is very proud, as anything else. However it does have quite a lot else going for it.

Once again I took the Smart Car to the station, and then the Cercania train towards Alicante. It was only three stops, and the price of 2 Euros 80 was an absolute steal in my opinion. Mind you, there was a certain amount of frustration as I was waiting to buy my ticket at the machine. The couple in front of me just couldn’t work it. What made it somewhat worse was the fact that as their frustration level was rising, they began to curse the machine in the native tones of my own home town. I helped sort them out, anyway, and we all of us made it onto the platform in time.

So, Elx/Elche, then. Getting from the train station to the centre of the older part of the town involved crossing the Rio Vinalopo. In August, crossing a river in a large town or city in Spain is an interesting experience. Usually there’s a vertiginous drop from the bridge to the surface of a tiny little stream or trickle which runs underneath. I would imagine that it’s a different story in the winter. The tourist office was just a couple of hundred yards from the bridge. Normally I like tourist offices. They give you helpful maps, and all they ask is that you tell them your nationality for their statistics. Not this one. I asked for a map, and the lady put it on the counter, and then insisted on making her own personal recommendations, circling them on the map for me, recommending hotel accommodation, launching on 5 minute monologue about the delights of the land train sightseeing tour, and finally giving me a blow by blow account of the Misterio de Elche, or the Elche Mystery Play. Now, don’t get me wrong, UNESCO has declared this a Masterpiece of the oral heritage of Humanity. But it is performed on the 14th and 15th August. Today is the 16th. The words stable, door, horse and bolted did come irresistibly to mind.

Finally she momentarily let go of the map, and I grabbed it, said bye, and got while the going was possible. Across the road and round the corner was the magnificent Basilica de Santa Maria. Perhaps not quite as impressive as the Cathedral in Murcia, it was beset by pretty much the same problem , namely that it’s hemmed in by other buildings making it extremely difficult to find an angle where you could comfortably attempt to make a sketch of it. I did manage to sketch part of the back of it, but didn’t find any suitable angle to sketch the main dome and the tower until later in the day.

Funnily enough, it was in my next port of call that I actually found that angle. When you cross the bridge, at the old town end you’re struck by quite a striking castle tower, and on the remains of the castle the MAHE – Elx/Elche Museum of Archaeology and History has been built. When it comes to History, Elx/lche certainly has a lot of it. Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans, Byzantines and Moors have all left their mark. However that wasn’t the most interesting thing for me. No, the most interesting thing was that it answered the 11 year old question of who or what the strange head on that brown motorway sign was. The lady in question, for a lady it is, is La Dama De Elche – the Lady of Elche. It’s a very well preserved bust of a woman – maybe a goddess – wearing ceremonial headdress and robes, probably dating from the 4th century BC. It’s a striking piece of work, albeit that the strange headdress has probably made other people than just me nickname it Princess Leia’s granny. The museum hosts a couple of replicas. The original, incidentally is housed in the National Arhcaeological Museum in Madrid, which I visited last week. I cannot, in all honesty, say that I noticed the Dama in there thought.

I could in all honesty have stayed a bit longer. However, you remember that I mentioned there was rain yesterday? Well, after I came out of MAHE a huge, filthy, angry looking grey cloud covered the whole town. All I had with me in the way of wet weather gear was my sun cap. Jen did mention yesterday that on the rare occasions that they get summer rain like yesterday, it does tend to happen across three days. When it clouds over like it did, it means one of two things. A) It is going to rumble and make all the noise of a thunderstorm, but not do much else. B) You are going to get drenched very, very quickly and very, very thoroughly. So, to cut a long story short, I decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and headed back to the station.

Well, that’s today’s sketching expedition. The rain followed me back to San Isidro, and I’m not unhappy that I came back when I did. We nipped over to the hospital to see John, and as I said, he seemed a lot better. And if that’s not a positive note on which to end for now, then I don’t know what is.

Murcia (13th August)

Hello, good evening, and welcome to another episode of An English Fool Abroad with his Sketchbook. Now, I’m sure that you’ll have been paying attention so you’ll know that today was scheduled for a trip to Murcia. I was surprised to learn that Murcia is actually Spain’s 7th largest city. It was actually founded in the 9th century by the Emir of Cordoba, and I saw a couple of traces of the city’s Islamic heritage.

So, I promised you some foolishness, I think. I made sure that I was by the station with some time to spare, so I nipped into the nearby Hiperber supermercado to buy a large bottle of water, and a smaller one. The idea was to drink the smaller one, then refill it and use it if I was going to make a painting. Clever huh? Well, actually not really. You see, I opened it on the platform a minute or two before the train was due. Now, bearing in mind it was called something like Gaseosa I did expect it to be fizzy. Not that fizzy, though. It practically exploded on opening, and the top third of the bottle showered me, just as the train was pulling into the station.

To be fair the little Cercania train to Murcia passed through some quite interesting scenery. Now, I’m a city boy, myself, and I often find scenery to be a bit like wallpaper – I don’t really notice it’s there a lot of the time. The hills, which we passed quite near to, were impressive. In fact, colour and shape wise they were kind of like I’d imagine the surface of Mars to be like.

It took about 40 minutes to get to Murcia. Now, a little bit of research beforehand had told me that I really wanted to see the old town, and that the railway station was a bit of a walk. When I had researched which bus to take me to the Royal Casino – more about that later - - it gave me two options. Well, when I asked the drivers of both,- Casino Real – they both gave me the kind of reaction they might have done if I’d asked them for a cheap day super saver return to Ulaan Baatar. So stuff it, I thought, and started to walk. I had seen the tower of the Cathedral as we’d puled into the station, so I knew the right general direction. I hoped.

No, I’m not going to try to keep you in suspense. I did get there. And the centre of Murcia is really rather impressive. First port of call was the aforementioned Casino Real. It was built in the 19th century, and is still the HQ of a private club, but in 1983 it was declared a national monument. Oh, and if the word ‘casino’ is conjuring up mental images of slot machines and roulette tables, I’m sorry to disappoint you. Open to the public are some rather grand public rooms – ballroom, a hall of mirrors, and an Italianate patio meant to conjure up images of Pompeii. After I’d taken the audio tour I was pretty much ready for a sketching break, so I walked to the Plaza San Domingo at the end of the street where the casino was located, and made the ink sketch you can see of the corner of said street.

The Casino is the most visited building in Murcia. However, probably the most impressive is the Cathedral. Again, I had the same problem with it that I’d had in Madrid – when you’re in the Plaza where you can see it’s detailed and ornate façade, you just can’t get a good sketch of it. You can’t because a) you’d hurt your neck, and b) the whole plaza is bathed in sunshine and you’d go doolally in the heat before finishing your sketch. On the same plaza is the tourist information office, and all I had to do was ask and they gave me a lovely detailed map of the centre of the city. Incidentally this revealed that I had actually gone in a fairly impressive circular detour on my way from the station to the Cathedral. Such is life.

Using the map then I visited a nineteenth century market, just as it was closing up for siesta time, and crossed the Rio Segura on a different bridge from the old bridge I’d used earlier. Walking back along the side of the river towards the old bridge I came upon a good angle showing the bridge, and the tower of the cathedral, with, more importantly, a bench in the shade to sketch it from. This is the second sketch I made today.

I had two things left by this time. The first was to sort out some sustenance. I’d bought a couple of queso y jamon boccadillas (aka cheese and ham baguettes (aka cheese and ham long crusty rolls) ) earlier before catching the train. Having polished these off I was looking for a little more. I passed a pasteleria and saw what I took to be a tray of cheese pastries in the window. I bought one, bit into it, and found that what I had taken to be light yellow cheese was actually custard. Gotta be honest, it was delicious, for all that. Then it was a gentle walk to the station, incidentally passing by tpday’s winner of the Most Unusual Name For A Museum Award – Museo de la Ciencia y Agua de Murcia (The Museum of Science and Water of Murcia). I’ll be honest, I was tempted to have a look inside, but time was getting on, and so I headed back to the station.

Nothing particularly interesting to report occurred on the way back to the Casa Me Duck, but something interesting happened when I got there. I was sitting in the living room, minding my own business, reading my kindle, when the sofa started to shake from side to side. Honestly, it was an earth tremor, and it went on for it must have been about half of minute. Apparently it’s not uncommon here, and the houses have been built so that they can withstand any amount of tremors of this strength – which I believe from reports locally to have been about 4. Well, I can promise you all that it is the only time that the Earth has moved or will move for me on this trip. (Oh, be fair, you can’t say that you didn’t expect that one, surely.)

So that was the trip to Murcia – nice place and I enjoyed. Tomorrow it’s Alicante. More foolishness? Can’t promise anything. Watch this space. Adios.

Madrid - Day Three

When last you left me I was trying to come to terms with the fact that I’d be sleeping on a sunburnt neck. How did that work out for me? Well, not too badly as it happens. I didn’t notice it frankly, until I woke up at 6. Then it was giving me gyp, you’d better believe it, but never mind, soldier on.

First port of call was actually the Mercado de San Miguel – or St. Miguel Market if you prefer. This is in a renovated Edwardian style wrought iron building, and rather appealing. I made a quick sketch of a guy who seemed to be combining a butchers and a bakers on his stall. That’s cheating, isn’t it?

Back from there into the Plaza Mayor, where I made today’s equestrian statue sketch. Mindful of what happened yesterday I sat in the shade where there was no way the sun could possibly get to me. I’ll be honest, what with the ruff around the neck I thought this guy was Phillip II. Actually it’s his son, Phillip III. Apparently he turned out to be a bit of a disappointment, but then that’s what you often get with sequels, isn’t it?

From there to the Museo Municipal – or the Museum of Madrid. This building used to be a convent I think, and in a city full of baroque buildings, the façade of this one, which I sketched, pretty much out-baroques all of them. I enjoyed the museum itself – and whoever thinks – of course you did, it didn’t cost anything to get in – knows me too well. However the attendants were a little bit, well, let’s put it this way, they really didn’t want you deviating from the order you were supposed to look at things. I earned myself a telling off in Spanish for trying to go into room 8 before I’d gone into room 7. Fair enough.

Not yet museumed out I walked from there to the National Archaeological Museum. Bearing in mind that the British Museum is buckshee, I wouldn’t say that I was overjoyed at having to pay 3 Euros, but if you have to pay, I’d rather pay 3 Euros than 4 if you know what I mean. It’s a hell of a collection, impressive, and it’s a beautifully laid out modern museum. Still, somehow it didn’t quite strike me as being as good as the afore mentioned British Museum, or the Museums on Museum Insel in Berlin which I visited last year. Just my opinion and feel free to disagree.

I gentle walk back towards the hostel saw me nipping in for a wee siesta. Look, I’m 54 now – that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. When I came back out I decided to see how long it would take me to walk to the Atocha railway station – where I’ll be catching the train on Thursday, and also pop into the Reina Sophia Gallery at the same time. Well, just 20 yards away from the door of the hostel I came upon a guy fast asleep, having his own siesta on a bench, while letting almost all of it hang out. I decided he could be my Madrileno of the day – the busker was yesterday’s – and made the quick watercolour sketch you should see with this post.

It took about 15 minutes to walk to the Railway Station – and about 25 minutes to walk back, since most of it was uphill. The Reina Sophia, it transpires, is shut on Tuesdays, so that will have to remain an option for tomorrow. Yesterday, when I sketched part of the Royal Palace, I also wanted to sketch the Cathedral which was right next door to it, but in all honesty it is so massive I just couldn’t find a place to sit and sketch it which wouldn’t have involved me straining my neck. Today though I approached it from a completely different angle, and found a lovely spot, shaded by trees, looking out and across to the side, and I used this angle to make the sketch you should be able to see in on this page.

Now, I know what you’re dying to ask – did you try another Madrid delicacy tonight for your tea? Yes, my friends, I did. Tonight I had arroz con curry – which funnily enough looked and tasted just like curry with rice. What were the chances of that happening, eh?

Kaunas Day Two

Thursday, day two, was always going to be a hectic sketching day. During my wanderings the bus station, outside which was a helpful streetmap which I photographed. I found another one on a wall in the town hall square, which showed less of the town, but had landmarks marked on it. Using these I had a rudimentary itinerary sketched out, should you pardon the pun.

Back to the Old Town to begin, where I made this sketch in Vilnius Street, which should hopefully give an example of what I meant about the architecture of the street and the way it is laid out.

Thence to the Vytautas Bridge. I crossed it and took the funicular railway, which I sketched on my required elements post.

Crossing the bridge back to the old town I stopped to make this watercolour sketch of the Vytautas the Great Church. Whoever Vytautas was, they thought a lot of him in Kaunas.

I needed to do some shopping, and so I walked along the riverbank to the Akropolis shopping mall. My map told me that this was close to the Archangel Michael Church, and so this also gave me the chance to do some unfinished business in Laisves Aleja. I made another watercolour sketch of a building I liked.

Along the Laisves Aleja there are several statues of what I presume were prominent former citizens of Kaunas. This chap was a former mayor of Kaunas, ad I believe quite instrumental in Lithuanian moves for independence following world war one.

It was a bit of a step from there to Kaunas Castle, but even thought only about a third of the original 14^th century building remains, it’s still quite impressive, and sitting on top of the dry moat I found it one of the calmest and most peaceful places in Kaunas.

Looking behind me I realised I could see the tower of the town hall, and it didn’t look far away either. In fact I was right by the Old Town, which enabled me to nip back to the town hall square, and make this sketch of the St. Peter and Paul cathedral Basilica.

6) Czech Republic - Prague - Castle area

Entrance to Prague Castle complex

 Read any guidebook to Prague and it will tell you that you have to visit the Prague Castle Complex. And it's certainly very impressive. If for no other reason, you should visit it to get a close view of St. Vitus Cathedral. I ended up queueing for about 30 minutes to get in - but thankfully this was just for a bag check - and cost nothing.

St. Vitus Cathedral

No cracks about the urge to dance uncontrollably here, please. It was a day when, while sitting on the steps across the square while sketching the cathedral, in the space of an hour there was bright sunshine, torrential rain, and then snow. A wonderfully gothic building, although not my favourite church in Prague

Prague Castle Complex viewed from the River

Once again, St. Vitus Cathedral, and this at least should give you some idea of the impressiveness of the castle complex as a whole. Prague was the first of these sketching trips of mine, and it established a certain protocol for me. Namely, that whenever on a sketching trip to a sizeable city I must: -
* Ride on a tram
* Ride on the metro/underground railway
* Take a sightseeing trip on a boat on the river
I made this sketch while waiting for the boat to set off down the Vltava. To be honest, it wasn't the most interesting of sightseeing trips, but still good fun.