Having spent slightly longer than we’d intended in Spain and with grand plans to eat vast quantities of tagliatelle al ragù in Italy, we spent just two days and nights crossing the South of France.
Our first stop was the city of Montpellier. After a delicious late lunch of Vietnamese food (we deemed this legitimate local cuisine given the long history between France and Vietnam), we spent some time wandering around the old town and commercial centre of the city.
Intense games of chess in the park
Later, we headed to the Place Royal du Peyrou, which we’d read was a popular spot for an evening stroll and also housed Montpellier’s Arc de Triomph (with a little less traffic than Paris’ version).
The park itself was the terminus of the Aqueduc Saint-Clément, which was built in the 18th century to bring water from the surrounding hills into the city, and the end point was marked by the beautifully ornate Chateau d’eau du Peyrou.
The aquaduct
The water tower
As night fell, both the aquaduct and the water tower were lit up and looked even better than before. Trust France to turn something as functional as city plumbing into something so beautiful!
Our favourite part of the park, though, was the perfect summer-evening atmosphere. Lots of people were out playing their musical instruments or had set up speakers to accompany them practising different styles of dancing, from breakdancing to swing – but this wasn’t busking, they were just making the most of the good weather and outside space to do something they enjoyed. It was so lovely to watch!
As usual, we had an early start the next day, so we tore ourselves away from the action and headed back through quiet streets to our room, ready for a new city tomorrow.
Bright and early the next morning, we boarded a tram and then a long-distance bus to Aix-en-Provence, a quintessential Provençal town with an intimidatingly unpronouncable name. At least, I’d always wondered how on earth to pronounce the Aix part, but it turns out it’s simply ‘X’. Endearingly, they had made use of this in various puntastic ways around town, including naming their buses L’Aixpress.
The entire centre is pedestrianised (unless you are very brave, very stupid or a local resident), which made exploring on foot a real pleasure. We are very glad to be back in Europe where not having a car can be a help rather than a hindrance!
As we wandered around town, we discovered lots of the fountains that are something of a local speciality. It was incredibly tempting to dive right in, but I suspect that wouldn’t be quite the thing to do here…
Instead, we headed to Maison Weibel to try the local delicacy, the Calisson d’Aix. These are delicate, marquise-shaped sweets made from a paste of ground almond and candied melon, topped with icing. You’re probably imagining that we wafted into the patisserie and ate them from beautiful china accompanied by an espresso (or maybe not, actually, if you’ve read any of our previous posts), but what actually happened is that we purchased a gift-wrapped bag and then raced to one of the pretty squares and scoffed them all at once because lunch was many hours ago. We did at least pause to make some tasting notes, which are probably best summarised as that I thought they tasted like iced marzipan and Oli didn’t agree. We did both enjoy them, though!
Aix-en-Provence was architecturally quite reminiscent of what we’d seen the previous day in Montpellier, but there were many more visitors and it was more gentrified, with less of a ‘real-city’ feel. We both liked it, but I imagine it would really come into its own on a quiet autumn day. Based on what we saw so far, I think it’s 1-0 to Montpellier, on the merits of the outstandingly convivial local atmosphere in Place Royal du Peyrou, but to give them a really fair trial we’ll have to pop back for a weekend at some point. And this is actually feasible, given both towns are a quick Eurostar and TGV from London – this is the closest to home we’ve been in a very long time!
From Aix-en-Provence, we boarded an eight-hour bus into Italy, the first hop of a very long travel day.
As the sun rose, we boarded a train and reluctantly left the magic of Salamanca en route to Zaragoza, the capital of the autonomous region of Aragón (and yes, that is from where Henry VIII’s first wife, Catherine of Aragón, hailed – I knew my primary school history would pay off one day).
Once we reached Madrid, we crossed the city ready to board our first high-speed service since Japan – it’s been a while!
On our arrival in Zaragoza and after an unexpected round of Public Transit Roulette when our local bus suddenly diverted from its route, we began our exploration at the humongous Basílica de Nuestra Señora del Pilar. This enormous church was constructed around a pillar upon which the Virgin Mary was said to have appeared to St. James the Apostle, leaving the pillar behind as a token of her visit. We were a bit confused, to be honest – why was she on a pillar? And why was the pillar all but covered up by a shroud except on 2nd, 12th and 20th of each month? We never did find out, but it was an impressive building nonetheless.
View across the roof of the huge Basilica
The pillar is on the right, mostly shrouded under a cloth
Our next stop was something totally different: the Museum of Origami. It began with an exhibit on the history of origami and explained how paper came from the east to the west via Samarkand around the 8th century, and then paper folding appeared to develop in parallel in both regions, with differences in style (typical angle of the folds) and function (most symbolic and ceremonial in the east; mostly functional to create things like wrappers and boxes in the west).
Differences in style between East (top) and West (bottom)
We then learnt about the different styles of origami (including organic, modular, hyper-realistic and sculptural) and saw some truly astounding examples of each.
Nostra Signora del Pilar – i.e. an origami representation of what we saw in the Basilica
Our final stop of the day was the Aljafería, which began as an Islamic palace in the 11th century, had a Catholic palace added in the 15th century, served as a barracks in the 18th century and now houses the regional parliament. We spent the vast majority of our visit trying to make sense of the utterly useless app that would supposedly give us an audio tour of the complex – in the end, we were the last people in the building at 8pm and had to be escorted out by a security guard! So, we weren’t always entirely certain what we were looking at, but the buildings obviously had a very interesting history and it probably would have been a great visit if we’d not still been faffing around making plans for the day when the daily English-language tour departed at 11am…
The gorgeous Patio de Santa Isabel
The oratorio (prayer room)
Part of the Catholic Palace
Presumably where the regional assembly sits…
We’d read that Zaragoza had one of the best tapas scenes in Spain, which of course sounded right up our street, so we spent both of our evenings in the city trying to perfect our tapas strategy. This proved…tricky. We had many questions about the right way to do things, but in the weekend chaos, it was difficult to follow our usual strategy of just copying what the locals do – they were always on the move! Anyway, we managed a bit of bar hopping, ate some great food (although possibly not with the correct technique – pinchos are tricky to eat delicately!) and soaked up the brilliant late-evening atmosphere in the tiny lanes of El Tubo.
Torreznos, guilt-inducing but delicious!
We ordered based on food envy from some other diners so had no idea what this was until it arrived – it’s sherry potatoes topped with egg and lamb
A beautiful array of pinchos
Pinchos
Croqueta
After this, it was time to keep heading east as we had a schedule to keep. Our next (and very brief) stop was the city of Girona, which we reached thanks to two more high-speed trains. This is the life!
We had just one afternoon in lovely Girona, which we chose to spend exploring the city on foot.
The narrow lanes of the Jewish Quarter were beautiful, but they hid a long and sad history. In the 13th century, Girona was home to one of the largest Jewish communities in Catalonia, but over time the people suffered persecution, slander, violence and forced conversions to Christianity. By the 15th century, those who had survived but not converted were expelled from the country, ending 500 years of Jewish contributions to astonomy, mathematics and medicine in Spain.
In the evening, we climbed up onto the city walls to get a different perspective on the city. I do love a free activity with a good view!
Our time in Girona concluded our traversal of the Iberian Peninsula, and our next stop was Montpellier, France. But first, we had to locate the mysterious undergound station in order to catch our bus out of the city…
We arrived in New York (by bus from Philadelphia) feeling pretty accomplished, having completed our traversal of the United States. We’d both visited the city previously, so were happy to skip most of the main tourist sights in favour of eating as much good food as possible while spending as little money as possible (our budget is in TATTERS)!
We began our visit with an attempt to witness Manhattanhenge, a twice-annual phenomena where the sun sets in line with the east-west direction of Manhattan’s urban canyons. Unfortunately, it was cloudy around the horizon so we didn’t see it in all its glory, but we did still thoroughly enjoy getting involved in the rabble who had gathered to photograph it.
The Pastrami on Rye
I knew that there was a legendary deli in NYC that was known for its pastrami sandwiches, but the fact that it took all of about 3 seconds of Googling to remind myself of the name did get me a little worried – was this just hype? Many of the reviews I read suggested otherwise, so we made our way to Katz’s Deli to join in the lunchtime chaos.
Our pastrami was hand cut in front of us, and the chap added mustard to just one half of the rye bread (me being a lover and Oli a hater of the yellow stuff). Then we settled down and dug in – one sandwich between the two of us due to its very generous size! We were also given a whole plate of pickles, which I happily took care of. They were pretty chunky, so I’m not sure if I was supposed to poke them into the sandwich but I went for chomping them like a rabbit with a raw carrot. To be honest, these were the weak link – more salty than vinegary, but it was still good to eat something green with my lunch.
We loved the hectic atmosphere in the deli, but the meat was the real star – smoky, salty and melt-in-the-mouth. It was also the thickest-cut pastrami we’d ever seen and reminded us more of smoked brisket, which got us wondering – what was the difference between the two? (Short answer: it’s complicated!)
To help us digest our feast, we took a walk through Chinatown and the Financial District, and then hopped on the (free!) Staten Island ferry. This gave us a great view of the Statue of Liberty and back towards Manhattan without spending a cent, so it was the perfect activity for us.
The Xi’an Feast
That evening, we headed back to Chinatown to pay a visit to Xi’an Famous Foods, a small chain that serves food from western China and had appeared on a couple of best-in-NY lists. We ordered the spicy cumin lamb hand-ripped noodles (left) and the spicy and sour pork and cabbage dumplings (right).
Yes, the presentation on paper plates left a little to be desired but that just reflected how low-key and casual this place was – just as we like it. And it was evident how much they cared about the quality of food they served, because there were long-winded posters on display imploring customers to reconsider ordering food to take away.
There were even informational videos playing on a loop encouraging customers to try the noodles as they were meant to be served, rather than requesting a drop in spice level. We love a bit of spice so ordered ‘medium’ as recommended, and they were no joke – we were both crying with joy by the end! Oli loved the wide noodles, which had a satisfying bite and paired so well with the warm, cumin-spiced lamb and fiery chilli crisp. Meanwhile, I couldn’t get enough of the dumplings, which were less spicy but sat in a seriously tangy sauce.
It was the cheapest meal we ate in the city by some margin, but it was also our top pick for the food itself. My mouth is watering thinking of those dumplings 🤤.
The Coal-fired Pizza
To warm up (quite literally – it was baking hot) for our next feast, we headed on a Tourguide Oli-led walk around Greenwich village, which took us through the leafy streets past Monica’s apartment building from Friends (well, the exterior anyway, the interior was a set in Los Angeles) and the Stonewall National Monument commemorating the Stonewall Uprising of 1969, which marked the beginning of the LGBTQ+ rights movement in the United States.
Recognise this building?
Stonewall National Monument
Jefferson Market Library gardens
Jefferson Market Library gardens
Once we’d worked up an appetite, we headed to John’s of Bleecker Street, which we’d read was a good example of a NY speciality: the coal-fired pizza.
We really liked the decor of this restaurant, which felt very NY, with photographs of famous customers plastering most available surfaces and scratched graffiti covering every remaining square inch. But in the end, the pizza just tasted much like a pizza, really, regardless of the cooking fuel! It also has to be one of the least nearly neutral meals we’ve eaten on the whole trip 😬. Perhaps it’s for the best that new regulation will require these iconic New York establishments to install emissions control devices wherever possible, even if it has caused a bit of a stir amongst traditionalists (and proprietors)…
To help digest this meal, we took a walk on The High Line, a raised urban park set along the old freight railway line that ran through the Meatpacking District, Chelsea and Hudson Yards. It’s an ingenious design, with lovely planting and places to stroll, lounge and buy ice cream (don’t worry – even we couldn’t find space for this). It also has mini-amphitheatres that allow you to sit and admire the street scenes below. We loved this, and it renewed our hopes that the proposal to build a London version on the disused freight line that runs just past our place in Camden might someday come to fruition.
The Neighbourhood Favourite
When our friend Erin saw that we were staying pretty near her old apartment in Brooklyn, she told us that we had to visit Colina Cuervo for an Ecuadorian breakfast. “I still think about their breakfast all the time,” she told us. This sounded important, so we made our way there on Sunday morning even though it was raining so hard that there were rivers flowing down the roads. On the way, we received a flash flood emergency alert and had to shelter under the awning of a funeral home until the worst passed! But we made it there eventually and it was well worth the swim.
We shared an Ecuadorian fried rice (left) and a pork hash (right). Both contained generous helpings of crispy roasted and shredded pork, but the pork hash was especially intriguing, being centred around hominy rather than the usual potato. I’ve seen this on menus before but never really stopped to think what it was – cue a lengthy Googling session where we attempted to understand the differences between what we mean by corn and maize in the UK versus the US (yes, this is really what suffices as our mealtime conversations these days). I’m still not certain we can visualise from which crop this kernel came, but it was tasty either way!
Our post-brunch activity was a trip to Coney Island, an old-school beach resort with a boardwalk and several amusement parks. It probably wasn’t the best idea to make the trip on a rainy Sunday afternoon, but it sounded like the kind of offbeat attraction we might just enjoy, and it’s also known as the birthplace of the hot dog so we just had to make the pilgrimage. In the end, we simply couldn’t find space even to share a hot dog, but we reassured ourselves that we could guess how it would taste!
The Blast from the Past
Our final meal in New York was a long time in the making – in fact, I’ve had it planned ever since we were in Japan. We developed a bit of a taste for the ramen chain Ichiran, which serves up delicious Hakata-style ramen and allows you to specify exactly how you’d like your meal to be prepared using a paper form and then sit in a booth with minimal distractions to enjoy it. Upon leaving Japan, I was devastated at the thought that the constant flow of ramen was coming to an end. Most of the places we’d eaten were individually owned, but I discovered that Ichiran had three branches in New York, so it was inevitable that we’d find our way to one of them while we were in town.
If I’m being exceptionally picky, the broth was slightly oiler and not as spicy as it should have been based on my order form selections, but it still made me incredibly happy and I managed to burn my mouth in my enthusiasm, so I can’t complain too much.
Our final post-meal activity was a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, which is an iconic attraction but something we’d both missed on previous trips. Crucially, it is also free! There were no less than five 3D photography vendors on the bridge playing Empire State of Mind by Jay-Z feat. Alisha Keys – as if we needed any help to get that stuck in our heads (the sixth vendor, mercifully, hadn’t got the memo and was playing something different). Thankfully, the views more than made up for the slightly irritating music.
This excellent few days of eating concluded our time in the United States, so we took a long and convoluted journey on public transport to JFK and hopped on a transatlantic flight to Lisbon, Portugal.
