Easter

We took a tour of Mérida this morning, to get the lay of the land. Merida is all about ancient Roman culture and ruins. It was founded, among other reasons, as a retirement community for Roman soldiers who had finished their service. The archaeological joke is that it was the Florida of the Roman Empire.

Right off the bat we ran into an Easter procession. It was definitely less formal and more of a small town event than the processions we saw in Càceres. But those involved were serious. It appeared to be an important and emotional event for this community.

Saw a relatively well preserved Roman villa that showed some detail of daily life in the day and had some beautiful tile work. Saw some bathes, the circus (racetrack), amphitheater (gladiators), and the incredible theatre.

It is a custom here to dine out on Easter. Of course we had no reservations and everything was full. We found a nice restaurant that allowed us to sit at one of their tapas tables and dug into a long lunch of interesting dishes and local wine. Afterwards we walked down to the park along the river, saw more historic things, went home and went to bed.Les mer