House of Doves

This past weekend we drove to Rota for Jay's next set of immunizations. After a frustrating bout with Spanish officials we finally got mom on base and even had the chance to eat Taco Bell! Mmmm, Taco Bell. It's amazing what you miss when you can't get it as easily. Anna definitely misses some of her favorite restaurants: Cafe Rio, Mac Grill, Chevys, Olive Garden and Round Table Pizza. Don't take those places for granted! Mike misses being able to see major sports events live and at a normal hour. Alas, we missed the live showing of the Super Bowl last night because it didn't start until 11:30 pm here and Mike has to go to Madrid for meetings today. So you better not go blabbing about who won to us until we see it rebroadcast! :) Baby Jay was pretty sad after getting his shots on Friday. He cried and cried and was only peaceful when sleeping. He's better now and it's good to know he's a healthy, growing boy! He now weighs 15 pounds 2 ounces and is 26 inches long. That makes him in the 45th percentile for weight and the 85th percentile for height! He's already his daddy's boy. Everyone who sees him seems to think he looks older than four months. He's pretty average in size but he is definitely very aware of his world. He's always looking around trying to figure out what it all means. Sometimes it's hard to keep him entertained because he's constantly trying to see more. He's definitely his happiest on a walk in his baby Bjorn. What a great invention!

After getting Jay's shots we drove in circles around Rota trying to find our way out of town and on to a small town called Barbate - near Cadiz. It's pretty typical to drive twice as long as you need to in Spain since it's so difficult to figure out your way around. We asked several people for directions and every time we told them where we were going to they said, "Oh, that's so far away!" After we finally figured out our way out of town we found that the only reason it's so far away is because it's impossible to know how to get there. Once we were on our way it only took us about 40 minutes to drive to the town. Once we finally got there, we were absolutely awed by the beauty of the small, rural town. We drove through a national park to the small hotel called El Palomar de La Brena (the doves of Brena). The hotel itself was used as a dovecot in the 1800s. Thousands of doves were raised there for food and ammunition (the ammunition was made more explosive when dove poop was added - who knew? And how did they figure that one out?). The dovecot still stands in one section of the hotel and you can walk through it, seeing numerous holes the doves used to nest in. The hotel is actually in the Guinness Book of World Records for being the biggest dovecot in the world.

The land surrounding the hotel is spectacular! We felt like we had left southern Spain and entered into Ireland. The area was very green with umbrella pines and grassy fields spanning the countryside. Saturday morning we took a long walk through the area. It was wonderful to just be in nature and breath the fresh air (no cigarette smoke out there!). We stumbled upon a field of bulls, one cow and a few baby calves. They just sort of looked at us but they were pretty intimidating and only a short wooden fence separated us so we moved on quickly. As we were leaving a few large dogs came running up to us wondering who we were and what we were doing there. They too were cautious of the bulls though and left us alone, if only to not draw attention to themselves in front of the bulls. All was pretty serene and quiet until a few Spanish teenagers with skunk Mohawk mullets came zipping up the road on their moto bike. They almost ran over the dogs and were very apologetic to us, thinking we were the owners. Gotta love the teens here! Overall it was a wonderful morning and Jay enjoyed seeing the country just as much as we did.

Lastly, we have to mention the food. We had a wonderful dinner at the hotel - it was more like a late night snack actually since the restaurants in Spain don't even open for dinner until 9:00 pm. We had fresh fish and a tropical chicken salad. It was incredible! One of the best dinners we've had here so far. The food just keeps getting better and better. The presentation was beautiful too. In Spanish they say, "Tiene buena pinta." We had the opportunity to sit next to a nice British couple at dinner and we talked about everything from world politics to education in America. It was interesting to hear their opinions on life. We definitely recommend staying at El Palomar de La Brena. Thanks Gitnz for the suggestion to look on the casa rural website! Check out the view from our room: