A great pleasure to meet Michael and Tania Hanna on the tour. Tania's uncle Nuri Rufail was of two Iraq's to fight in the International Brigades, and among the ~800 Arabs to fight against Franco. Last week they put up a plaque to him at Hill 705 at the memorial to the Ebro battle

Interesting map showing pre-Roman plain of Barcelona (Taber is where the Roman city was centred). Extraordinary presence of water. The Llobregat cuts along edge of Montjuïc while the Besòs mouth almost at today's harbour. Coastal marshes+lagoons, eg bottom of La Rambla, teeming with wildlife.

French issued version of People's Olympiad poster, Barcelona's 1936 antifascist, anti-racist response to the Nazi Olympics, with instructions for sportsman and women to participate and tourists to travel to watch the games.

Remains of late 1st CE Roman aqueduct which brought water to Barcelona from the Besòs river 13km away. Abandoned in the C6-7th. maps.app.goo.gl/4hpr8NNqppMA...

A quick set of recommendations I've put together of Spanish Civil War sites and memorials for people visiting the Basque Country. Any more suggestions? thespanishcivilwar.com/tour-themes/...

Fideuà and arrós negre for lunch in Barceloneta, thunder rolling over a calm Mediterranean and a light rain. Can't complain.

My family visiting from England were momentarily concerned by the St Jordi flags innocently decorating the streets of Barcelona for the upcoming Mercè festival

Madrid. 10 December 1936 front cover of French magazine Regards. Robert Capa

Roman Barcino, 985 CE superimposed on map of Barcelona in 2022. Note. Barcino was pronounced "Barkino" with a hard K. By Jorge M Corada for @despertaferroed.bsky.social magazine

Here's another shot of Joe Strummer in Granada in, I think, 1984. Juan Jesús García 📸

Just finished up this tour with Nick and I can say it is absolutely worth it! One of the best travel experiences I've had. His knowledge, passion, and friendliness are unsurpassed. Thank you, Nick! @spaincivilwartours.bsky.social

First page of 18th century Basque-Icelandic dictionary. A Basque-Icelandic pidgin was spoken between locals and Basque whalers from ~1600 including the well-known expression "Fenicha for ju" meaning F**k you! en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque%...

Tragic image of Barcelona zoo during the Spanish Civil War. Nine emaciated lion corpses and a hyena are laid out on the ground, their keepers kneeling distraught behind them. They had to be shot; no meat left in the city for wild animals, malnutrition now in 1938 rife among people

The paw print of an Iberian wolf somewhere in the wilds of the Sierra de la Culebra, Zamora on a cold morning some time ago. My next book?

Famous shot of anarchist leader Buenaventura Durruti in charge of column named after him at Bujaraloz on the Aragón front, 14 August 1936. By Cologne born Juan Guzmán

Brits (and other northern Europeans)! The name of the capital of Catalonia is Barcelona. Barça is a football club. It's like calling London Spurs. :) And "Barca" which you also hear a lot means boat in Spanish and Catalan.

Striking memorial in Sartaguda, Navarra to the victims of Francoist repression in the region. Part of the Sartaguda memory park. Sartaguda is known as the "village of the widows" after the terrible violence unleashed here by General Mola, the so-called director of the 1936 fascist coup. Image Wiki

Antoni Campañà. Aftermath of an Italian fascist bomb raid on Barceloneta, 29 May 1937. No difference. Same hate. Same pain.

"Regarding #LaVuelta2025, this will be my only comment: In 1936, Jewish organizations urged a boycott of the Berlin Olympics. Only one country responded to that boycott, organizing a popular Olympics against the Nazi state's whitewashing instead. That country was Spain." Via Ciclática on twitter

The flower of the wild garlic is a marvellous and beautiful thing. This one from el Vall de Lillet, Catalonia one July. Ajo and All in Spanish and Catalan, Baratxuria in Basque.

Swiss volunteers in the International Brigades in the defence of Madrid. Switzerland had the highest proportion of volunteers in terms of population from any nation state. ~800 came. 200 died. (Actually I think Luxembourg was higher)

People from elsewhere in Catalonia have several nicknames for Barcelonans including "Pixapins" (Pine pissers). From 1960s more could afford cars and started to explore the coasts and inland, typically relieving themselves against this common tree by the roadside.

Carnivores of the Iberian Peninsula including very recent naturally arrived Eurasian jackal. Via Iberianwildlife on FB.

Everyday scenes in Plaça de Catalunya, Barcelona, September 1936. Anarchist militia and others.

Façade of part of the old Karl Marx barracks, headquarters of the International Brigades in Barcelona. Pitted with shrapnel marks from the fascist bombing of the city. C/Wellington, behind the zoo.

The British Tom Mann Centuria, predecesor of the British Batallion, at the Karl Marx barracks, HQ of the International Brigades in Barcelona, 89 years ago, in September 1936 - today's Pompeu Fabra university opposite the zoo.

Lovely poster. "Health and social assistance". The old world of charity fading in the background. By Valencian artist Vicente Ballester Marco for the CNT, 1937

For me one of the most beautiful posters from the Spanish Civil War: "A sailor: a hero". CNT. By the Valencian artist Arturo Ballestero, 1937.

Children's drawings made in Barcelona during the Civil War found last year in a box of 1000 drawings at the Arxiu Històric de Barcelona and displayed in an exhibition last year. Note Popeye, a highly popular figure as a proletarian hero in 1930s Barcelona, member of anarchist CNT

Orwell on the fear he felt as he approached the front in Aragón. “War, to me, meant roaring projectiles and skipping shards of steel; above all it meant mud, lice, hunger, and cold. It is curious, but I dreaded the cold much more than I dreaded the enemy.” Homage to Catalonia

Bat weather vane-lightning conductor by Antoni Gaudí on the roof of Palau Güell, Barcelona. The bat as a heraldic symbol of the old Crown of Aragón is a common motif in architectural features in Catalonia (and Valencia). Image Wikipedia

Memorial in Oxford to the 31 volunteers from Oxfordshire who fought for the Republic in the Spanish Civil War, 6 of whom were killed:. In stone, the clenched fist crushing a scorpion, symbolising the poison of fascism +the 3point star of International Brigades 📷 BulgeUwU (Wiki)

Wer eine Reise in die Jahres des Spanischen Bürgerkrieges in Barcelona machen will, ist bei @spaincivilwartours.bsky.social genau richtig. In seinem "Walking Museum" erklärt Nick Lloyd alles, was man über den Krieg und die Revolution wissen muss. www.alertamagazin.de/p/zeitreise-...

Beautifully executed idealised 1842 view of Barcelona. Striking to compare El Raval's factory chimneys with church spires of Old City (divided by green line of Rambla. Montjuic bare, cleared by military or trees gone for firewood. Walls still imprison city. Barceloneta incomplete

Esbardu. A lovely Asturian word meaning bear cub. Some 370 brown bears now live in the Cantabrian mountains on a slow but hopefully sure path to recovery. Photo. Fundación Oso Pardo

Barcelona, 8 July 1936, just over a week before the start of the Spanish Civil War. View of Montjuïc and the harbour, storm clouds brewing. 📷 Gabriel Casas

Happy International Vulture Day! 90% of all European vultures live in Spain, the only country where all four species: griffon, Egyptian, bearded and black are present as you can see in this excellent infographic by @fbiodiversidad.bsky.social

View from our back balcony, Poble-sec, Barcelona.

Oyster farm, Barcelona harbour 1899. The city's waters produced huge quantities of oysters in Roman times -archeological digs have shown a staple for poor in Barcino times. Industrial effluent did for industry. Surprised lasted as late as this photo by Josep M. Armengol i Bas / AFCEC

Illegally produced Samizdat edition of Orwell's 'Homage to Catalonia' published in Warsaw in the 1980s. "In the Lenin barracks in Barcelona..." Walking Museum of the Spanish Civil War

Armed shepherd in Aragón saluting Republican militias, 1936 by German antifascist photographers Hans Namuth and Georg Reisner

Yugoslavia first day cover and postcard (1986) commemorating 50th anniversary of the formation of the International Brigades. The stamp and card features a woodcut by Serbian painter Đorđe Andrejević-Kun who was among ~1700 Yugoslavians to fight in IBs. Walking Museum of the Spanish Civil War.

The horror never stops

Sense of time and place in this shot by Jewish Austrian photographer Margaret Michaelis. Arrival of British Medical Unit at Portbou on Spanish Republican border. Last week, 29 August 1936, apparently 5am in the morning. En route for Grañen on Aragón front and then near Jarama and elsewhere

Adult boy. Looks like he's walked straight out of Oliver Twist... Raval, Barcelona, 1959. Photographer Joan Colom took dozens of photos like this. Poor kids who had seen too much in a neighborhood of the defeated. Via Boig de Can Fanga on X.

"Bolton" (1937) by Julian Trevelyan. Collage shows mills and chimneys of Bolton, with the Pennines behind. Incorporated are newspaper and magazine cuttings of Spanish Civil War and rise of fascism across Europe, warning it could come to this Lancashire town. Bolton Art Gallery

Cover for 1922 first edition of Don Quijote in Mandarin by Liu Bangyi. Translated initially from English rather than Spanish as the "Adventures of a Crazy Hero".

Mila esker, Nick, for these kind words! You are among my ideal readers, so this means a lot. A thousand thanks!

Clint Eastwood, Eli Wallach, and Lee Van Cleef on the set of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966). Sad Hill Cemetery, Sierra de la Demanda, Burgos. Interesting short documentary in Spanish about its filming in Burgos. youtu.be/L7_3AhfBhd4

Chinese volunteers who fought in the International Brigades interned at Argèles-sur-Mer Concentration Camp (pre Vichy France) early 1939 in front of their banner. Some 60 Chinese fought against Franco in the IBs. (PS there was never a "Chinese detachment" in IBs as banner claims)