Glorious Gaucín
Perched high in the mountains of southern Spain are the beautiful pueblos blancos, or white towns. One week ago a group of fifteen women from Australia, Canada, and the USA descended upon one of these pueblos blancos, Gaucín, for a writing workshop. I was lucky enough to be one of these women and it is an experience that I will treasure always. We stayed at the Molino del Carmen, a small hotel that was once a fully operational olive oil mill. The Molino del Carmen was a glory to behold, consisting of several small apartments as large as four bedrooms with views that extend as far as Gibraltar and North Africa. We would meet daily to discuss topics related to writing and to read our own work, and it was difficult not to be distracted with all of the beauty around us.
I was immediately charmed by this small town, and it didn’t take long to fall into a pattern of life there… writing workshop in the morning, followed by lunch, then a walk down to the town square to have a cafe con leche and/or a vino tinto at Bar Paco Pepe (which quickly became our unofficial meeting place), a jaunt about town, a siesta, and then dinner. Without all of the hustle and bustle of city life, the demands of work, and the distractions that always seem to materialize when you are not on vacation, I was able to slow down and enjoy the company of my fellow workshop participants. We explored the town’s castle, Castillo del Aguila, and also the cemetery that lies at the base of the castle. I was interested to discover that inside the cemetery is a small monument to a few people who died during the Spanish Civil War.
I was happy to meet two of the town’s residents, Janice and Anne, who own the local deli Bonissim. They were our caterers for the workshop, and it was a delight to walk into their shop and see their smiling faces. We feasted on a delicious array of their dishes, from pumpkin quiche to chicken curry to chocolate croissants. But by far my favorite (and I know that others will agree with me) was their lemon cheesecake. Now back in Madrid, I am still dreaming about that cheesecake, it was that fantastic.
We also visited two restaurants while there, Plantero & Co. and Azulete. I am not usuallly one to take photos of my food, but the dishes at Azulete in particular had me taking out my camera to snap a few pics before digging in. I’m not quite sure how I’m going to adjust to eating my regular (mostly boring) meals when I return home, so spoiled I have become by all of the wonderful food I have eaten in Spain. Between that and all of the tapas I have been sampling… needless to say I am a bit frightened to step on the scale again when I return. But when in Spain!
I will miss this town and all of the women who I spent time with while I was here. Hopefully our paths will cross again sometime in the future. I have been both inspired by their words and by my own experiences in this sleepy pueblo blanco.