Farewell to Andalucia, Spain, the land of Flamenco.

Hello all!

Well, my 5-week Grand Tour is just about over, and very soon I will be winging it home, ready to face lots of work and the challenges of a new year. I am spending the last week in Spain, visiting Morocco, then 2 more days in Paris, then I fly home. Thank you to those of you who followed my travels both here on my blog and/or on facebook.

In honour of Spain where we've spent a total of 2 weeks this visit, I thought I'd post about flamenco. Andalucia, the region where we've been staying, is credited with being the birthplace of flamenco. I caught a wonderful show in Madrid on a previous visit, and this time I was fortunate enough to catch a show here at the resort on the Costa del Sol. The music is wonderful, the costumes are so unique and colourful, the dancing is so energetic, made more so by the throbbing, thrumming guitars and boot slamming. It brought back memories of a story I wrote for RomanticFridayWriters for a prompt in 2012 - The Perfect 9.5, which I decided to re-post today with a few edits. I hope you enjoy my story, inspired by a visit to Madrid in 2011.

The Perfect Dance

The women danced. Their dresses, bodices decorated with jewels, shimmered in the semi-dark. The movements began slowly, the dancers moving like fish floating across a luminescent ocean. Soon the slow dance became a crescendo of whirling, twirling patterns across the barn-like room. This was excellence, the best of the best.

Jose cast his eyes to the stage. The musicians stood tall, their faces gleaming, sweat dripping from their black curls. They played the trembling guitars, stroking the strings with a thrumming like a thousand fluttering winged birds, softer now, then louder. Their white shirts were blue under the light, their tight black high-waisted trousers gleamed and shone. Cowboy boots were glittering glass as they stamped to their own beat.

Mirrored lights swirled over the dancers, silvering the sequins on the flounces of skirts as the frills vibrated with the dancers’ steps. It was a kaleidoscope of red, purple, yellow and white, checks, polka dots, stripes. Jose counted the heavy, clacking beats as the black dancing pumps met the timber floor, shaking the room. A hundred shoes in perfect time as the dancers followed the thrum of the five flamenco guitars.

But there was only one dancer on the floor who set his blood boiling.

Her auburn ringlets, her lithe body clad in a slash of brightest red, her waist an invitation for a man to span with joined fingers. His Angelique. Her lower body kicked yards of frills, revealing slim legs in satiny black stockings. Her arms held above her head, the clicking fingers, were a perfect sculpture of beauty and tension. His eyes followed her every movement. How could the judges fault her? Did she miss a beat? No, every call of the sobbing guitars was met, every whirl perfection, every stamping foot in perfect timing.

Source*

Soon it was only a competition between two – Angelique and a fiery redhead who looked imperiously at the judge’s table each time she shimmied by, daring them to eliminate her. She was perfection herself, her body screamed. Find a fault if you dare! I’m the perfect 10!

Angelique was asked to leave the floor. How could they send her away? Only he saw the tear she brushed from her eye. He half stood in his seat, mortified.

‘9.5!’ The judges score his Angelique.

‘They might give you a less than perfect score,’ he thought to himself, ‘but to me you’re the perfect 10’.

Photo my own, taken in Madrid 2011.

Please join me and several other enthusiastic writers/authors, who will be posting to the NEW BEGINNINGS prompt at Write...Edit...Publish on January 22 - a bit earlier or later is fine. Sign up in my sidebar, or visit Write...Edit...Publish.

What I did on your Summer Vacation - September 23. I went to South Korea, Madrid, San Sebastian in Spain and Biarritz in France, just for starters...

If you're looking for my #RomanticFridayWriter story, it's here today.

Well I know you guys in the Northern Hemp are saying goodbye to summer's tornadoes and floods and saying hello to winter's snows and winds, but down here in the Southern Hemp we're just saying goodbye to winter's beautiful weather and hello to spring which is actually like summer already. So I had to do a think about Michael's Summer Blogfest, but then, aha, I remembered I actually visited the Northern Hemp this summer, so let's grab out a few of the, ahem 30,000 or so pics and post them! Done!

My followers would know that during the southern winter, northern summer, I travelled to Spain, France - (country and Paris), Andorra and Morocco. I'll post a few pics from each country. I must say except for Spain and Morocco, summer seemed to be strangely absent. It was the same temperature in Paris' summer when we flew out as it was in Australia's winter when we landed at Brisbane airport.

First stop, Seoul, South Korea. Always strange not to see bright blue skies. Here is Songdu City, a new satellite city out of Seoul, where everything is new, green, and strangely empty. I was intrigued how they prop up their trees. Must be a story to that, maybe simply very strong winds.

One of those lucky breaks - happened on The Walk of the Royal Family at Incheon Airport. The South Korean national dress is gorgeous. Pity I can't show more, but...

Welcome to Madrid, Spain, the gypsies sang! They were just so great I stood for ages and listened, clapped and smiled. And yes, Alex, I gave them money!

Blue skies again you'll note! We just happened on a multicultural food and music festival in the Grand Square of Madrid. Here a Bolivian band struts their stuff. Madrid is alive with music! All day, all night! The people own their city!

Did I tell you the Bolivians are tres colourful? We were really blessed to be part of this festival with like a million or so others. Was very hot summer weather so these guys must have been frying. We enjoyed strolling around drinking real cidre (cider).

Watching the flamenco dancers in sumptuous settings and eating sumptuous tapas and drinking sumptuous wine was a treat just up the street from our hotel in Madrid. Went on into the early hours of the morning, then we had to pick up a hire car and get ready to drive north to San Sebastian , heading into France via Biarritz and Bordeaux.

I think I've used up my quota for this 'fest and I didn't even get out of Spain. Never mind, you can always check them out on my other blogs. I've left links to more below, but really, I haven't even started yet!

Ah, what the heck! One more. It is a summer blogfest after all, so I'll leave you with a photo of the carpark at the stupendous hotel we stayed at in San Sebastian, looking north to Biarritz and France. Woo hoo, here I come!

And in case you're too busy/lazy/uninspired to check out my snaps on my travel and Paris blogs, I just want to tell you Biarritz, France, is drop-dead gorgeous! Can see why it used to be a surfie mecca in a past life. It's just being regenerated now and regaining some of its past glory.

And we haven't even gone to Morocco  yet! Well it's hard to beat this for a summer pic. On top of the Sahara Desert in Morocco looking towards Algeria (7 hours by camel) with my 2 Berber guides and smelly, snorty camels who're no fun really to ride, but boy is it a great experience to see the sunset after the climb! I've already posted some Morocco pics on L'Aussie Travel and have just posted more on my Saharan Desert climb. I've just downloaded this memory stick and are there ever some stunners here!

All photos are private. Please enjoy but don't steal. See my copyright warning! 

If you've really enjoyed my pics, I've been posting photo essays on both my L'Aussie Travel Blog and Pichets in Paris blog since returning from my travels. Go there for more deliciousness if you wish.