Spain Travel News 02/24/2011

So far we’ve covered a couple venues where you can see Flamenco in Valencia. But if you’re a fan of Tango, it’s a bit tougher to find. If you know of a place, please leave a comment.
We went for the Tango night at the Magarota (location), which they do every Thursday night starting a 11pm. Magarota is a neat little bar on Calle Murillo worth visiting if you get sick of the same old places on Calle Caballeros.
In the video above you can enjoy Carlos de la Peña from Argentina.

The future Queen of Spain is a carbayón. The beautiful and glamorous Letizia, Princess of Asturias, was born in Oviedo in 1972 and married Prince Felipe in 2004. And when he ascends to the throne, she will become the first Spanish Queen who was born a commoner

The level of the Mediterranean Sea will rise by up to 60 cms by the end of this century, according to a study carried out by the IEO, the Spanish Oceanography Institute.

The study shows the impact of climate change on the body of water from 1943 until 2008, El Mundo reports

BOARDING PASSES – The Spain Scoop is to get a preprinted boarding pass.  One time, in a rush, I did not print my boarding pass at home.  “Oh well,” I calculated, “I will just get it at the airport kiosk.”  I always take carry on for the obvious who-wants-to-stand-in-line-to-check-your-baggage reason.  I arrived at the airport, breathless from a wrong terminal run, and there were 187 Japanese teens trying to figure out how to use the computer kiosk.  And of course they are taking pictures and giggling which added to their efficiency.  Ok, it is now modern Spain.  I always remember to preprint my boarding pass.

A CRACKDOWN on Britain’s most wanted criminals on the run in Spain has seen the arrest of two fugitives within two days.
Within hours of the new Operation Captura campaign being launched in Alicante, Everardus Wijtvliet from the Netherlands was caught in Puerto de la Cruz, Tenerife.
The 39-year-old is wanted for organising the importation of drugs into the UK after a lorry in Dover was found to contain 100kg of heroin and 6kg of cocaine.

The natural park Sierra de las Nieves (36.6771, -4.99606) is located in the hills behind Marbella and to the east of the Ronda-Marbella road as it winds up the mountain along hairpin bends. The park centres on Mount Torrecilla (1909m) and covers an area of 30km by 20km or 18,530 hectares.

The district of the Sierra de las Nieves is bounded to the south by the western Costa del Sol, to the east by the Guadalhorce Valley, to the west by the Sierra of Ronda and to the north by the district of Guadalteba.

I’ve eaten a lot of strange foods since I’ve been in Spain: cow tongues, squid cooked in their own ink, blood sausage…and the list goes on. I stand by my own personal mantra that I need to at least try the dish, before I turn my nose up at it, (though that gets more difficult all the time.) I don’t know why I allow this mantra to continue to exist, because when something sounds weird and/or slightly disgusting to me, in my experience, it usually is. But hey, there’s no shortage of people who have tried garlic-fried grasshoppers or pickled pigs feet in exotic places and their taste-buds fell in love. I’m just not one of those people.

Jerez's theatres snap awake to the clack of castanets and the stomp of tacones (heels) during the annual Flamenco Festival. The event has gained global recognition and its performance programme features world-famous masters of this feisty  dancing.
As well as colourful shows with singers, guitarists and dancers, the Jerez Flamenco Festival also features dance courses, concerts and exhibitions.

SUITELIFE WERE LUCKY ENOUGH TO BE GIVEN AN OPPORTUNITY TO PLAY A GPS CITYGAME IN BARCELONA AROUND THE GOTICO.

30 years ago today a mustachioed Lieut Col Antonio Tejero, proudly wearing the uniform and a shiny tricorne hat of the Guardia Civil, burst into the main chamber of the Spanish parliament brandishing a gun. Thus began what Spaniards refer to as 23-F, the attempted coup of February 23rd, 1981.