Ruth’s Excellent Adventure..............

In Córdoba!

This may not sound like a big deal to you, but I’ve tried going to concerts on my own before, and they can be quite lonely, but I enjoyed the concert in Bournemouth so much that when I found out Joe Bonamassa was going to be playing at the Córdoba Guitar Festival, only an hour up the road, I thought I just had to go!



I took the train from the end of my road, 5 minutes walk and tried to buy a ticket (honest!!), but I have a feeling that the station master doesn’t like his computer. After much looking at his screen, going backwards and forwards to the switch panel on the wall, no doubt telling him where the incoming train was, tapping away at his keyboard, then going and rummaging around in his rucksack, finding a piece of paper, probably his password, tapping away at his keyboard again he eventually sighed and said ‘buy it on the train!’, or rather ‘¡Cómpralo en tren!’

I settled myself down on the train, had a whole carriage to myself, enjoyed the view and waited for the inspector to arrive so I could pay. He never showed! I got off the train and hour and 15 minutes later and left the station. Nobody followed me demanding payment, I got away with it!

I then retraced my steps back to the station as I hadn’t come armed with a map, and asked the way to the Mesquita.

Map in hand I set off for my hotel, the street temperature display showed 39 degrees!

The walk was an easy one, with the option to walk pretty much the whole way through the parks that run down the centre of the multi carriageway ring road. Once I found the old city wall I knew where I was, and a few minutes later I was checking into my hotel – right next door to the Mesquita!! Fabulous location!



The receptionist drew a line on a map for me to show me how to get to the venue, 10 minutes walk away.

After freshening up and checking the internet connection in my room, I headed out. This was about 6pm, so still hot but I found a bar down by the river and ordered a tinto de verano, (red wine, soda and ice) which probably sounds sacrilegious to all you wine buffs, but only young wine is used and it makes for a long refreshing drink, without knocking you off your feet!

So after a second tinto, feeling a little more chilled out I walked down to the Puente Romano and watched the river for a bit. The River Guadalquivir flows from the mountains of Cazorla, north of Córdoba into the Atlantic via Seville and thanks to the winter’s rain is still running pretty high, and fast.



Then I headed into town to have a look at the shops, I’m not much of a shopper but thought something might catch my eye, but by now it was 8.30 and places were starting to close down. It’s a habit Mick got me into, going shopping when the shops are shut!

I ended up at a little bar outside the Mesquita and settled at a table, I overheard my neighbours on the next table asking the waiter about sherry, and as this is my specialist subject couldn’t stop myself from butting in! And before I knew it I was boring them to death with ‘Pedro Jimenez’, palominos and finos, the sherry triangle and the special addition of the salt air in Sanlucar de Barameda to the flor to make a perfect manzanilla!

Córdoba also makes a fortified wine called Montilla-Morales, very similar to sherry, but because it’s not made within the sherry triangle (Jerez-Sanlucar de Barrameda-El Puerto de Santa Maria) it cannot be called sherry. The locals like to say because it is a finer wine you never get a hangover – I haven’t put this to the test! ........See there I go again!

Thankfully they took kindly to this and invited me to join their table.

They were Canadian doing a tour of Andalucian cities and I spent a very enjoyable time in their company.

The concert started at 11.30, and as I wasn’t entirely confident of my bearings and it was free seating, I thought I’d head off for the theatre. After a Spanish farewell, kisses on both cheeks, I made my way down some very dark alleys but I got there.

Teatro La Axerquia is an open air theatre, modelled on a Greek amphitheatre (how this differs from a Roman amphitheatre I’m not entirely sure) and a fantastic venue for a warm Spanish evening.




I guess the place was about ¾ full, really relaxed, plenty of space for everyone – I could have made my way to the front, but I’m not very tall and was worried I’d end up with someone’s armpit and lose my seat to boot! So I found a seat in the tiered arena and stayed put.

It goes without saying the concert was fantastic, somehow he manages to make everyone in the audience feel as though he’s there just for them – it had a real intimate feel. And I wasn’t really alone, as always, Mick was in my heart and in my head, there with me. Oh, how he would have loved the whole experience!



At one point he played 'Palm Trees Helicopters and Gasoline' leading into 'Woke up Dreaming' on his semi acoustic with such virtuoso that the audience broke into spontaneous ‘¡Olé!’ five or six times, I’ve only ever experienced this once before at a flamenco concert, where the singer held the note to spectacular effect. JB looked pretty pleased with that reaction – at least as far as I could tell!

Having said that, into ‘Ballad of John Henry’ and the back came off the Hammond organ, and at the end of the evening, after the encore (Bird on a Wire and Just Got Paid), JB switched off the amps very emphatically! A few equipment problems – but if it hadn’t been for his comments on facebook I wouldn’t have registered anything was amiss!

So I wandered back to my hotel a very happy bunny! Down those same dark streets, but I could at least follow a few people heading in the same direction, in fact the three people in front of me were actually staying in the same hotel.

My hotel room was a study on the economical use of space, but as I only wanted to sleep so what, actually I was a little too hyped to sleep so raided the mini bar (g & t) and checked out the morning papers online, as by now it was around 1.45am!

The morning brought blue skies and sunshine, not that you could see much of it from my room, single rooms are always at the back, down the far end of the farthest corridor!

I checked out, and headed out for breakfast – I thought a pavement cafe would be more interesting than the hotel restaurant.

My train was at 12.45pm, so I had a little time to kill. Looked in on El Corte Ingles (sort of Spanish House of Fraser) summer sale, treated myself to some new sunglasses and headed for the station – now I knew where I was going only about 15 minutes walk away.

At the station way too early, but I bought a ticket, a beer and a new suitcase!

After all that I got home in time to head off for a swim before it got too hot.

A fabulous time and as I said before Mick would have loved every minute of it!