In which I eat snails

First the health update. Jean is back in her care facility, has forgotten the whole hospital thing ever happened, and is absolutely fine apart from being a bit tired. On our brief stop in Madrid, Bob – my wife’s mother’s son (yes that’s how far he has been downgraded in my personal brother-in-law grading system) managed to pass me his cold. That and jetlag have contributed a degree of misery to the last couple of days.

Anyway today’s highlight was a trip to Triana. Seville is split into two by the huge river that was it’s lifeblood in the past. On one side is the old town where I am living on the other is the hip district of Triana. In the past this area was home to ceramicists – mostly making the ubiquitous southern Spanish tiles. There are still some potteries but mostly it’s cool bars and restaurants.

We had an interesting walk around the little streets and ended up in a very authentic local bar. The seasonal specialities on offer were snails and fried grouse. So I took my tastebuds, and natural food conservatism, firmly in hand and tried them. The fried grouse was great. Nothing wrong with the snails but it was a lot of effort for a hint of garlic. I thought the snails would be larger, but they were the little ones we had seen beside every path as we walked the Camino.

I came a little unstuck as my new classmate friends from Holland, Germany and Austria insisted on just one more round. Several times. I had a lovely time but the gap between going to bed and my jet-lagged 4am waking was only three hours and I am feeling significantly worse for wear this morning.