Write about then...
  • The Background
  • The Diary
  • About This Site

Jan 31 1963

1/31/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Houses built into the hills on the way to Granada
We left for Granada and the drive was beautiful.  We saw the strangest houses just before reaching Granada.  They are caves dugout into the mountain sides.  But some have doors and windows and fronts of stucco.  Others just have holes in the rocks.  Sometimes you only see a chimney and smoke above the ground. 


0 Comments

Jan 30,1963

1/30/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Thatched roof and mud buildings near Valencia


Today we walked around Valencia.  We drove out to Albutera and saw the fresh water lake, the rice fields and the mud huts with grass roofs. 

Picture
Valencia's main square and fountain


We also went to the main square and the open market then to an amusement park where we rode the bumper cars and shot a rifle at targets. 

0 Comments

Jan 29, 1963

1/29/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Louie, the car, packed and ready to go


We got up early and packed the car. 

Drove first to Tibidabo.  Really a beautiful place but the view of the city wasn’t good because it was too smoggy.  Then headed for Valencia via Tarragonia. The drive was beautiful – mostly along the sea with its lovely beaches. 

Picture
rock wall and donkey powered well
Most of the near 300 kilometers we drove through orange and olive groves.   The land in this area is very rocky.  To clear it, they pick the rocks up by hand and stack them like fences.   For every car or truck on the highway we saw at least 3 or 4 horse drawn wagons.  Even Barcelona (1.5 million) has few cars – mostly taxis.  Arrived in Valencia and finally ended up at the Hotel Bristol. 

0 Comments

Jan 28, 1963

1/28/2011

1 Comment

 
Picture
This morning we were informed that the American Navy had arrived.  We went down to the dock and there were at least 10 ships.  We walked  back to The Cosmos and then to the Kit Kat Club for hot chocolate.  There the excitement began.  We watched a guy go out in the street and talk to two American sailors.  He brought them inside and suddenly there were two girls beside them and it dawned on us that he was a pimp.  The first words exchanged were “you got any cigarettes?”  He was in and out a dozen times and every 5 minutes a new girl came in.  Inside he kept playing with one of the girls, rubbing her arm and pinching her butt, all the time talking to the sailors.  We were horrified that when they left they went straight into our hotel.  Juan and Jesus told us that the girls cost 200 – 300 pesetas for the Americans and 6 for the Spaniards!  Our street was full of them, they come out from everywhere when the sailors come to town by the boat full.   Finally we left the Kit Kat to buy some food for the trip and were really surprised that the sailors never gave us a second look.  (Maybe it was the knee socks, the penny loafers or the sun glasses.) 


1 Comment

Jan 27, 1963

1/27/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Had breakfast then ventured into Barcelona.  Went to the docks, Montjuic and the Palau Nacionale.  Along the way, a bunch of guys started following us.   We stopped for a Pepsi in the funicular station and they talked us into going with them to a place where they practice bullfighting   Juan and Jesus got the horns and cape and showed us how it was done. They told us that they fought bulls in the ring in Malaga. 



In the evening they went with us to a grubby little bar across the Ramblas from our street - Flamenco music  and dancing.  Later we walked back down the Ramblas and  went to the Cosmos for dinner at 11pm  That's dinner time in Barcalona. 


0 Comments

Jan 26, 1963

1/26/2011

0 Comments

 
PictureBoys in - Barcelona
As we were leaving the hostel at Perpignon, the man at the desk handed us a broom and said "sweep."  So we did.  It was our first hostel duty.  

We arrived in Barcelona determined to find a place with heat and hot water.  After checking a couple of places we took the Hotel Cosmos in the Gothic Quarter, near the docks just off the Ramblas.  It was on the narrowest street we’d ever seen, barely wide enough for our car.  We took a bath and washed hair.  What a relief. 


0 Comments

Jan 25, 1963

1/25/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture




Today, we drove through the vineyards to Perpignon by way of Cannes and Marseille.  We found a hostel in Perpignon.but it was so cold that we are sleeping in our levis and ski sweaters.  and there was no hot water.  After 10 days we have got to find a place to take a bath. 

_

0 Comments

Jan 24, 1963

1/24/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Jeannine, Dede and Pat - Promenade des Anglais
Left Milano very early.  Drove to Genova and along the Italian Riviera to Nice by way of the Riviera - beautiful beaches.  There is a lovely tree lined walk along the sea in Nice called the Promenade des Anglais.  We went to American Express and picked up our money and mail from home.  Found the Auberge de la Jeaunesse on top of the mountain.   It had a lovely view but no heat or hot water.  Talked to some boys who informed us that in Tangiers we could have a room in the hostel with or without marijuana.


0 Comments

Jan 23, 1963

1/23/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Lake Lugano
We left Lugano early to go to Locarno amd drove to the medieval village of  Ronco     In Locarno, we saw Anna Maria Banfi from the Sunadele., then on to Milano and the hostel.   It was a beautiful new building  but no heat or hot water - only every third day and, of course, we were there on the wrong day.  But we met an Irish girl who was bicycling to India.  She told us that she thought it would take her 5 months and complained about getting her tires stuck in the trolley tracks all the time.

0 Comments

Jan 21, 1963

1/21/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
Arosa horse races
We left Arosa and went through San Mortitz to Lugano driving along Lake Como.  It was sunny but still quite cold.  We are now in the Italian sector of Switzerland and the only thing Swiss is the money.  A man at tourist bureau helped us wrap our packages and fill out the customs papers.  

0 Comments
<<Previous
    A daily diary of a journey in 1962.  Please post comments about where you were then on the Background  page.

    Currency Converter

     1962 was pivotal.  This is the background:

    It was a year colored by the Cuban Missile Crisis, an escalating involvement in Vietnam, the Berlin Wall and the Cold War with Russia, Civil Rights issues, a nascent space program, Nelson Mandela in prison, Betty Friedan's, The Feminist Mystique, the Beatles, Rolling Stones and the death of Marilyn Monroe. 

    In the face of all of this, Pat, Judy and I  blithely took off for Europe with the intention of traveling through Europe and North Africa until our money ran out.   We had a travel guide and a book titled Europe on $5.00 a Day.  Since we had all read The Ugly American in preparation for the trip, we thought we were very smart to buy a used Volkswagen with Dutch license plates.  We dubbed the car "Louie" since a cute guy from Switzerland named Louie had helped us acquire it.

    There was no such thing as a cell phone, a computer, Twitter or Facebook.  Our parents didn't hear from us for weeks on end.  We wrote regularly, but letters took forever to deliver and we only vaguely knew where we would be next.  It was a very cold winter and we followed the sun.

    Archives

    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010

    Categories

    All
    1957 Vw Beetle
    1962
    Acropolis
    Alhambra
    Arcadia
    Arlberg
    Arosa
    Austria
    Barcelona
    Beer
    Beja
    Belgrade
    Berlin Wall
    Bregenz
    Bristol England
    Bull Fights
    Byron
    California
    Canada
    Casablanca
    Catacombs
    Check Point Charlie
    Christmas
    Cortina
    Dec 1962
    Delphi
    Dolomites
    East Berlin
    Easter
    England
    Erlangen
    Expresso
    Fatima
    Fes
    Flamenco
    Florence
    Frankfurt
    Freighter Travel
    Generalissimo Franco
    Germany
    Gibraltar
    Gondola
    Granada
    Grenada
    Hadrian
    Hashish
    Horses
    Hostel
    Italy
    Jugendherberge
    Jugenherberge
    Kenitra
    Kif
    Lake Tahoe
    Lancers Winery
    La Scala
    Leaning Tower Of Pisa
    Lift Ticket
    Lindau
    Louie The Car
    Madrid
    Maladie Internationale
    Manheim
    Marrakech
    Milan
    Morocco
    Morracan Food
    Munchen
    Munich
    Netherlands
    Nice
    Obergurgl
    Opera
    Packages
    Palm Sunday
    Paris
    Parthenon
    Perpignon
    Piazza San Marco
    Pizza
    Pope John
    Portugal
    Postcards
    Post Office
    Reichstag
    Rome
    San Moritz
    Snake Charmer
    Souk
    St. Peters
    Switzerland
    Thessaloniki
    Valencia
    Valley Of The Fallen
    Vatican
    Venice
    Verdun
    Vienna
    Volubilis
    Wauvil
    Wauwil
    West Berlin
    Where Were You?
    Winterthur
    Yugoslavia
    Zell Am See
    Zeus
    Zurich

    RSS Feed