Author:mena
In many of the European cathedrals, some castles and numerous civil buildings, fantastic and terrifying beings observe us and watch over us in silence from above. They are the gargoyles, terrifying stone creatures, with sinister, Dantesque expressions, which represent anthropomorphic figures of tormented souls, grotesque animals, demons, witches, harpies, dragons, unicorns, basilisks, griffins, lions… monstrous beings, infernal and with a very defined functionality, and that reached the churches during the twelfth century. They were consolidated in the Gothic and then […]
The conical shape of the hoods of the Nazarenes evokes an approach of the penitent to heaven, interpreted by many Christians as a place of salvation. This symbolic value is analogous to the one that the cypresses have, trees with a pointed crown, in Christian cemeteries, which bring the deceased closer to heaven, a place where, according to some beliefs, life after death takes place. For American culture, the most representative thing of the Nazarenes is their hood, a kind […]
Is it true that there is a carnivorous plant in the Valencian mountains? Well yes, as it is also true that today I went to photograph it, on a day when it really did not meet the conditions to travel to the abrupt place where it lives, since in recent weeks we have endured an intense storm of heavy rains, leaving the mountains with the flooded ravines. It has been a very difficult route, avoiding innumerable ravines with water up […]
THE LAST TRIP OF THE GALLEGO BROTHERS Jose Mena Alvarez On January 15, 1838 at seven in the morning, what is considered the first accident of a Spanish train took place, a convoy paradoxically dragged by the Villanueva locomotive, which derailed after colliding with a bull. It happened in Cuba, at that time a province of Spain and which covered the 28 km that separate Havana from Bejucal. There were no fatalities. To find the first serious accident with deaths, […]
Text: Vicente Aupí ( estrellasyborrascas.com) Photography: Jose Mena The great cold tends to make Teruel news in many winters, since it is the Spanish capital where it freezes the most. In December and January it is common for the temperature data to be highlighted in the national press and on television news, but this facet does not do justice to the true profile of Teruel’s climate, which is certainly extreme in some aspects, but much more benign and environmentally healthy […]
I feel that when something ends a new thing is always born. I love autumn because in that announced death there is peace. (Manuel Julià). Autumn brings us closer to the cold winter, that subtle change in the sunset light, the chills produced by that slight blow of cold wind that shakes the trees that start to change their leaf color… small hints in the surroundings that announce the flow of the days. It always seemed to me a very […]
A grey and foggy morning. I arrive at the Red Fountain’s Sanctuary (Santuario de la Font Roja) early in the morning to start the route, through the mixed mediterranean forest of Carrascal, and following a path where deciduous trees and shrubs, such as the maples, ash trees and others that colour the forest grow in the shade, it will take me to the top of Menejador at 1356 meters of altitude.
Albarracín huddles, sprouting from the rock, in a thousand incredible forms of popular architecture. The capricious flow of the Guadalaviar River, that deep sickle to which it embraces, explains the surprising urban structure of the city, in the shape of a “Y”, encased between the deep escarpments laboriously worked by the river. Declared a National Monument since 1961; it holds the 1996 Gold Medal for Merit in Fine Arts, and is proposed by the Unesco to be declared a World […]
Villarroya de los Pinares is the first town coming from Teruel, it takes us into the Maestrazgo turolense, north to the Gúdar mountain range, next to the Guadalope river, at 1337 meters of altitude. The Maestrazgo region, located to the east of the province of Teruel, includes fifteen towns in a vast and today uninhabited territory that is heir to a remarkable historical legacy and a rich architectural and cultural heritage. Its identity, forged through the passing of centuries, is […]
The common or mediterranean chameleon A great percentage of the population except the Andalusian are unaware that there are chameleons in the Iberian Peninsula. There are 202 different species in the world, the great majority of them being discovered during the last 20 years. They live in Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, India, Madagascar and Ceilan. They have the ability of changing colour at will and catching their prey, exclusively insects, shooting with great precision their long and sticky tongue at […]
