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Chipiona
As was feared the sea water wash had killed Alex's laptop, there was no sign of life at all after it had dried out. It was buried at sea between Mazagon and Chipiona. Alex gave a short speech to mark the occasion, then broke it in half and threw it overboard, so his secrets are at the bottom of the sea. Chipiona is a picturesque town with a nice marina much better than Mazagon, with a supermarket and shops fairly close by.
Seville
William and I caught the bus from Chipiona to Sevile 50 miles away. It took 2.5 hours each way as the bus goes all round the houses. Seville was well worth the journey, being a very beautiful city with numerous splendid buildings many of which were built for an exhibition the city hosted in 1929. The most splendid building of all is of course the huge cathedral which must be one of the largest in Europe. Seville has two rivers and the old city has narrow streets opening into huge plazas. There is a bullring, with a bull fight scheduled for the day we visited but we passed on that one. Two places of note to visit are the Plaza America and the plaza de Espana, the latter being an enormous square surrounded by very ornate buildings with tied plaques representing all the countries which participated in the expo. We took the tourist bus round but it was a waste of money, 15 euros each and very few buses running.
Rota
We moved a bit further down the coast to rota. (We had wanted to go to Port America at Cadiz but the marina was full). Anyway Rota is a much nicer marina than Port America which is in the middle of an industrial area. There are lots of flies now that the weather is warmer and during a swatting session the fly swatter (one of my leaving presents from work with great sentimental value) broke. Alex and I tried to fix it with superglue but as usual the top was stuck on the glue. We opened it using the pliers on William's gerber and another set of pliers, however the tube split and glue went everywhere. I was struck to the tube, the pliers were stuck together and Alex's belly hairs got stuck to his belly and he had to shave them off, a very painful experience!! The only thing not to be stuck together was the fly swatter. Anyhow the story has a happy ending (but not for the flies), we managed to fix the swatter with string and duck tape.
Cadiz
We all caught the ferry, a high speed catamaran, from the marina at Rota to Cadiz, a 30 minute journey across the famous bay of Cadiz (no armada though, just yachts and fishing boats). The old city is mediaeval with very narrow streets (you can almost reach across) and overhanging balconies. Part of the city wall remains, the ornate main gate and a few castles from the time when Cadiz was heavily fortified. There is a medieval cathedral. There were some huge weird trees in the park, a picture of one is in the images, I would be interested to know what they are.
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