Buenas tardes familia y amigos,
Yesterday, Wednesday, it was anchors aweigh, the Spanish version, with an extended visit to the Museo Naval de Madrid. As I have related in previous incarnations of On the Flip Side, if a locale has a maritime museum, whether on land (a building) or on water (a ship), an aquarium, or a lighthouse, I’m there as I have a never ending fascination with seafaring related exhibitions.
The Museo Naval de Madrid was indeed impressive and as I have visited quite a few maritime museums over the years, I would rank it amongst the best. Its strengths, in my opinion, are its extensive collections of ship models and armaments. From wood to steel, sail to steam, swords to guns, the collections are extensive. At times, especially with the variety of bladed weapons, I found myself wondering why had there been a need for such variety? Was this a case of continual improvement of the weapon? Or design for specific scenarios of use of deadly force? Or just simple up-selling by armorers?
Spanish Galleon
While the history of the Spanish Navy was presented for the most part in a straightforward manner, there was the rather interesting approach to the Spanish Armada and its fate when it set sail to attack Great Britain. Very concise, as in the affair did not end well, nothing to really talk about, time to move on. 😉
A highlight for me, was the number of models of pre-dreadnaught era ships, including even the USS Maine. These ships were steel hulled, steam powered, but with a more dispersed approach to their main battery. They were the last warships to retain what I would call “decorative elements” both internally and externally. One way to identify them is by their bow – instead of the modern sweep upward, the sweep is downward. This is a vestige of the practice of being able to ram another ship.
USS Maine
Hopefully, that last paragraph didn’t put everyone to sleep, but that is what has been the order of the day for me, today, Thursday. Came down with a rather nasty cold starting yesterday evening and thus today’s only forays have been two trips to the farmicia. Hopefully tomorrow will see me on the upswing.
Hasta pronto,
Papi
Sorry you aren’t feeling well. Hope tomorrow is a better day.
You are missing all the snow.
Just to be clear – in no way missing the white stuff!
First of all…nice hat. Saw it in a reflection. Second of all…getting sick really? Does modern medicine exist in Spain (j/k :))? Can you read the label? What if you just took a laxative or worse? Third of all maybe the variety of weapons is the same reason there are so many kinds of guns today…personal preference, customizations so that the blade became part of the arm or something like that.
Boom!
el comisionado
Going into a farmicia in Spain works a little different than stateside. The shop space is devoted to non-medicinal products. Both prescription and OTC medication is handled at the counter with the pharmacist. So for OTC meds, one either tells the pharmacist what you need or what your symptoms are and they then pull the appropriate medicine from behind the counter. In my case, I would provide the stateside name plus the generic name which I would look up online beforehand. The pharmacist would then provide me with the local equivalent along with directions for dosage.