Category: Travel by the Book

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A Toast to Papa

Ernest Hemingway was born 115 years ago today which makes it an excellent day to raise a toast to the intrepid world traveler, genius author and robust cocktail enthusiast.

Growing up, I wasn’t a fan. I blame having to spend hours analyzing “Hills Like White Elephants,” in 10th grade. (Followed by Steinbeck’s ultra-depressing “Of Mice and Men,” I mean, are they trying to put kids off reading?)

But then I started traveling and suddenly I found myself following in the footsteps of Hemingway, most of which led to bars.

I went to Madrid and found this restaurant:

 

Botin's restaurant, Madrid
Botin’s restaurant, Madrid

We lunched upstairs at Botin´s. It is one of the best restaurants in the world. We had roast young suckling pig and drank rioja alta. Brett did not eat much. She never ate much. I ate a very big meal and drank three bottles of rioja alta.–”The Sun Also Rises”

Side note: I drank a great deal of rioja, although not three bottles, and then made the fatal mistake of following it up with my first (and last) shot of Jack Daniels. Lord, what a sorrowful morning followed as the old hymn has it.

I saw my first bullfight and looked up Hemingway’s 1923 newspaper account of his first time.

[The bull] came out all in a rush, big, black and white, weighing over a ton, and moving with a soft gallop. Just as he came out the sun seemed to dazzle him for an instant. He stood as though he were frozen, his great crest of muscle up, firmly planted, his eyes looking around, his horns pointed forward, black and white and sharp as porcupine quills. Then he charged. And as he charged, I suddenly saw what bullfighting is all about.

I’ll be honest, my reaction was more: I suddenly saw what being a vegan is all about.

shadows 2

I went to Venice, and, naturally, stopped in at Harry’s Bar where Hemingway used to drink the dry martinis (as in basically no vermouth) and the Bellini, a cocktail of sparkling wine and peach puree. The Bellini was 18 euros. Which is crazy expensive. So I just watched other people drinking theirs. Because I am cheap.

Harry's Bar

 

The Hemingway Bar at the Ritz in Paris where he drank still more martinis has been undergoing renovations for the past two years so I haven’t been there yet but I did go to Harry’s New York Bar in Paris, another Hemingway haunt. (Yeah, they’re two different Harrys.) I actually had a modern-day celebrity sighting, the guy who plays Jimmy the cute blonde footman on “Downton Abbey.” But I did not get a photo. Because I am bashful.

Harry's Paris bar

When I went to Peru this year I thought, Well, this is one place I won’t find the “Hemingway Drank Here,” sign.

Not a bit of it.

I strolled around Lima doing a “Best Places to Drink a Pisco Sour” story and what did I find? The bar at the Hotel Gran Bolivar where Hemingway is said to have set the record for drinking that very same cocktail. In fact, they still have two sizes of glasses, the regular and the oversized “Catedral” glass that Hemingway favored.

bolivar

If you want to learn more, cocktail historian Philip Greene has gone to the trouble of researching Hemingway cocktails in his cleverly titled book, To Have and Have Another.

Now, maybe if they’d given us that to study in 10th grade I would have developed a literary taste for Hemingway much sooner.

 

 

 

 

 

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Travel by the Book: Steinbeck’s Positano

Amalfi coastI’m typing this on a leather-inlaid writing desk while listening to the Tyrrhenean sea slap against the craggy rocks beneath my open window.

It’s one of those pinch-me moments.

I feel as if I really should be pecking out the final chapters of my Great American Novel on a Royal typewriter, but since all I’ve got is this blog entry, let’s go with that.

I am, if you haven’t already guessed, on the Amalfi coast of Italy, which is a very cool place to be _ fantastic scenery, nice people and some very tasty food.

The Amalfi coast is famous for making limoncello, lemon-infused liqueur, and hand-made paper. I’ll let you figure out which industry has brought me here.

My hotel, is the Best Western Hotel Marmorata, or as our group has already dubbed it, the Bestest Western. It’s set in an old paper mill and is simply awesome, from the nautical-themed decor _ Hello portholes! _ to the aforementioned cliff top setting.

I can’t quite decide if I want to go all Hemingway _ and I sat and listened to the crash of the sea waves, and it was good _ or emulate F. Scott Fitzgerald and liberate the minibar. Or maybe I should just listen to Steinbeck, who really nailed the ambience of Amalfi in an essay he wrote about the nearby village of Positano,

It is, he wrote, “a dream place that isn’t quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone.”

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Travel by the Book: Hemingway’s Botin Feast

 

BotinWe lunched upstairs at Botin´s. It is one of the best restaurants in the world. We had roast young suckling pig and drank rioja alta. Brett did not eat much. She never ate much. I ate a very big meal and drank three bottles [Ed. note: Three!]  of rioja alta.–“The Sun Also Rises”

Paris may be a moveable feast, but Madrid is the place to satisfy a literary appetite,

On a trip to Madrid, I read “The Sun Also Rises” as prep and was inspired to check out Botin’s restaurant after reading about Jake Barnes’ giant meal of roast pork at Botin’s restaurant. 

I set off bright and early at 8 a.m. and found the place tucked into an alley leading off one of the many impressive squares of the city. It wasn’t hard to spot, one window was decorated with illustrations of the works of Graham Greene, who mentioned Botin’s in his book, “Monsieur Quixote.”

Looks like the author of “The Third Man,” and “The Old Man and the. Sea,” both like their pork.

I did a little research and discovered that Botin’s was founded in 1725 and is listed as the world’s oldest restaurant by the Guinness World Book of Records.

Speaking of Guinness, while wandering back to my hotel, I came across a “genuine Irish pub,” with a tribute to James Joyce’s Ulysses. I never got past Chapter One of that book, but I was pleased to see another tribute to an author of renown,

If you’re interested in learning more, Elizabeth Nash has written an interesting literary guide to Madrid.

You’re probably wondering, did I try the pork? Of course not, it was eight in the morning and the place was closed. But I have done a good deal of eating in Spain, most of it carnocentric. This is what Hemingway had to say about Spanish cuisine. “The first meal in Spain was always a shock with the hors d’oeuvres, an egg course, two meat courses, vegetables, salad and dessert and fruit. You have to drink plenty of wine to get it all down.”

What he said.

TIPSY TIPS

Where: Calle Cuchilleros, 17, Madrid. Tel. +34 913 66 42 17

Website: http://www.casabotin.com/?q=en

Don’t miss: If you go and don’t order at least some pork you are dead to me.

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Seeing London by the Book

Looking for a novel approach to England’s capitol? Why not take a tour of literary London.

A good place to start is the newly refurbished Charles Dickens Museum at 48 Doughty St., once the home of the prolific author. If you’ve got the time, you nip around the corner to the The Foundling Museum which combines some works of art with a detailed history of what happened to destitute mothers and their babies in Victorian England. Dickens not only championed the cause of the poor and downtrodden in his books, he worked with the hospital to improve the lives of the real-life children as well. One of the exhibits is a copy of his essay, “Received, a Blank Child,” (blank was the space where officials would fill in male or female).

From the Dickens museum, head south on Doughty St. and turn left on Roger St. to get to Gray’s Inn Rd., which takes you past the Gray’s Inn law offices where Dickens once clerked.  Continuing past the offices you can turn left on Holborn, which becomes Newgate Street, and then turn left on Old Bailey, site of the infamous Newgate Prison, which was destroyed at the turn of the 19th century and now home to the Central Criminal Court.

Stay south on Old Bailey and you will run into Ludgate Hill, turn left and you’re in Fleet Street, once the heart of the newspaper business. Turn right and you’re headed for St. Paul’s Cathedral, featured in a number of Dickens books includingDavid Copperfield. Hit St. Paul’s at 5 p.m. and you can sit and listen to the beautiful evensong service for free. (But you can’t make the sightseeing rounds; that’s for non-worshipping hours and costs money.)

Staying on Ludgate Hill, which becomes Cannon St., takes you to King William St. Turn right and you’re on London Bridge, where Nancy met with Mr. Brownlow to conspire for Oliver’s safety. In the 1968 movie, “Oliver!” Nancy was killed on the bridge steps by the brutal Bill Sykes. In the book, she’s killed at home. Fair warning, this isn’t the London Bridge of Dicken’s time. To find that you’ll have to go to Lake Havasu City, Ariz., where it was relocated, piece by piece, more than 40 years ago. The bridge that currently spans the Thames is from ye ancient 1973.

Once you’ve crossed the bridge, look for the George Inn on your left. This is one of the many, many pubs that Dickens is said to have visited and is mentioned in “Little Dorrit.” This building, the last remaining galleried coaching inn in London, is a replacement, too, built after a fire destroyed the previous inn. But not to worry, history buffs. It’s new as in, built in 1676.

I won’t lie. The meat pie and beer that I had at the George were OK but not  gastronomically memorable. But sitting at an old wooden table in the room where Dickens and co. once had coffee and talked over the news of the day? Unforgettable.