Puerto de Santa Maria

Saturday Afternoon in a Small Town in Andalusia

Saturday and time to get in the car again and extend our horizon beyond Conil. I wanted to visit Decathlon, a sporting goods store about 50 km from here, but I couldn't justify driving 50 km to go shopping if I couldn't combine the excursion with something else - and that was a visit to Puerto de Santa Maria, usually just called Puerto, on the periphery of Cádiz.

The historic center of Puerto is pedestrianized, there were a few bicycles too. As we discovered, Saturday afternoon is a time for sitting outside and socializing, meeting for a drink or a meal or both. It was a wonderfully vibrant scene. The weather was perfect, children were racing up and down the streets, groups of women, groups of men, families sat at tables and enjoyed life. Who knows what their worries are, where the shoe pinches. I suspect the people of Puerto aren't less vulnerable to the vicissitudes of life than in places that have a more somber look on a Saturday afternoon.

Iglesia Mayor Prioral

On top of the church were the nests of dozens of storks. I took dozens and dozens of pictures but they were all actually out of the range of my zoom lens. Here are not just one but three pictures from the lot that I have to share - quantity being the indicator of my enthusiasm for these birds.