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A trip to Sunny Spain (May 7 to May 16, 2004 )

   by David W. S. Liu

Spain national income per capita is about US$13,000 per person, similar to Taiwan annual personal income.  However, the infrastructure in Spain is better than Taiwan.  Both Barcelona and Madrid are modern metropolitan cities with lots of 19 century buildings, a mixture of new and old cultures, very fascinating and very attractive.  I am particularly impressed of the pretty color outlook of the buildings, I saw some buildings painted in light yellow color, in pink color, white color, sky blue color, green grass color, … etc, very beautiful and very colorful.  I like it very much.

There is no direct flight from Taipei to Spain, therefore, we took British Airways via Hong Kong, London to Barcelona.  While transit stopover in London, U.K. was raining, 2 hours later after we arrived Barcelona, It was sunny with warm sunshine.  What a sunny Spain!!!  July, August will be too hot (about 40 degrees) and May or June will be the best season to take trip in Spain.  I noticed that a lot of tourists from northern, central or western Europe to take holiday in Spain to enjoy the sunshine and much more economical travel spending in Spain.  You probably do not know that Spain is the second largest tourist country in the world (only next to France).  Life is kind of relax here, usually lunch at 2 p.m. and dinner starts from 8 or 9 p.m.

We know that Spain used to be the strongest sea-power country (the Invincible Espana) back to 16 century; gradually it was taken over by Dutch and Britain in 17, 18 centuries.  Like a noble family with glorious history but declining nowadays.  Nevertheless, plenty you can see if you visit and close to explore her, such as Spanish history, Spanish culture, architectures, arts museums (Picasso Museum, Gaudi, Miro, Museum del Parado, …), religions, catholic churches (Cathedral, Façade Barcelona, Gaudi Temple de la Sagrada Familla) as well as Islam mosques (Iberian Peninsula was conquered by Arabian for 800 years), … etc.  And so many historical spots are in the World Heritage List by UNESCO (聯合國教科文組織 the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organiza tion).

We traveled from Barcelona (Northeast Spain; Park Guell, shopping at Las Ramblas is very enjoyable) by Talgo train to southern Spain Granada (La Alhambra), stayed one night at Ronda, Sevilla (Plaza de totos, Plaza de Espana Catedral), Cordoba (Andalucia, Southern Spain; Mequita Catedral, Puente Romano), then to central Spain Toledo (Plaza Zocodover, Toledo Cathedral), Segovia (Vista nocutrna del Alcazar castle, Plaza Major), Avila (Patrimonio de la Humanidad, Cathedral, Retable Main Altar) and Madrid (Central Spain; Puerta del Sol, Royal Palace, Plaza de Toros Arenes Bullring, Flamenco dancing) – a long trip across over most of the whole Spain.   I too

k ten Fuji Color films by Contax N1 camera and two Kodak Black &White films by Cannon A1 camera and few digital photos by Sony T1 digital camera.  Again, I will edit it to a dedicated album for Spain and share with my colleagues, my friends and my students at NTU.  Spain is the 23^rd countries I traveled up to now.

We Chinese have an old saying "It is better to travel 10,000 miles than to read 10,000 books".  Yes, I did learn a lot from this trip and Espana (Spain in Spanish) is much better than I thought before.  And I would like to travel in Spain again to take another look of the beautiful sunny Espana.

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font face="Times New Roman"> Note was taken on my way back to Taipei, May 16, 2004 劉偉澍