The Principality of the Thing

Spent some time in Asturias last weekend. It is situated in the very dramatic Picos de Europa and has a long industrial history with many signs of the medieval past. There was recently a big strike in which the miner's union marched to Madrid to protest coal subsidy cuts. The EU is a Kyoto Protocol signatory with specific greenhouse gas emission targets, so it is not possible for them to continue burning coal and still meet emissions goals, and yet a major cut to that industry has been catastrophic to this region's economy. Tricky, tricky. Thanks to some generous friends, we spent a night in the Narnia-esque Snow Palace.

The museum of steel and ironworks. Reminded me for all the world, of well, this. Sounds boring but actually...kind of cool. At least if you went to grad school for metals.  

Like a lot of the Spanish state, Asturias has an indigenous language that is not Spanish. The Asturian language is Latinate, like Spanish, but it has a heavy Portuguese influence. Very few people speak it, and it does not enjoy the same legal status as Catalan, Galicia, or Basque. Of course, that doesn't stop some Asturian speakers from expressing a desire to secede from a Spain in crisis.

A coat of arms in the city of La Felguera.

Another example of the Asturian language.

A view from inside the museum of iron and steelwork, which was originally a cooling tower for a factory.

An arch in an Oviedo park. Oviedo is the capital of Asturias.

View of the Picos de Europa in La Felguera. Real estate is incredibly inexpensive for reasons that may be obvious.

One of the best bird names ever in Spanish: pavo real (royal turkey). See?

Cathedral of San Salvador, Oviedo.