Pamplona - June 21st (Part 1)

Brian had meetings at the plant all day, so Ian and I were on our own.  I had planned to get up and have breakfast with him at the hotel before he left, but I ended up sleeping in.  It took a bit for Ian to get used to his hotel bed:

So he slept with me for a while.  But it all worked out.  After we had breakfast, we headed out to explore.  In the lobby we saw the wife of one of Brian's co-workers.  We asked her to join us.  I'm glad she did!  So, Becky, Ian and I headed out.  We decided we wanted to go to the museum listed on the map the hotel gave us.  It was the Museum of Navarre.  Pamplona is in the kingdom of Navarre.  The tourist map had this to say about the museum:

This is the most valuable museum in Pamplona, installed in the former Hospital of Our Lady of Mercy, the facade of which still remains.  The museum stands over the lower part of the Cuesta de Santo Domingo.  It contains archaeological and art collections relating to the history of Navarre, outstanding examples being capitals from the cloister of the Romanesque Cathedral of Pamplona and an ornamental chest from the Monastery of Leyre, an exceptional example of the Hispanic-Arab ivory work.  From the Roman era there are notable mosaics such as the Theseus.  As for paintings, the crowning work of the museum is Goya's Marquis of San Adrian.


Here is the outside of the museum.  It is the building at the top of the hill.

From the edge of the street in front of the museum, we could see this palace.  I intended to return and take a tour, but didn't make it.

We saw lots of interesting things here.  I took a few photos (my camera had a low battery and it ran out before we finished at the museum).  Here are some of the things I found most interesting.

I liked the jewelry.  It think this was from the Roman display.  All the signs were in Spanish, so we sometimes didn't know exactly what we were looking at.  Anyway, I thought that these necklaces looked very similar to what we could buy and wear today.

This little pile of balls reminded me of golf balls.  They all had little dents in them like golf balls!  I'm not sure what the block with holes was supposed to be.  Maybe a pencil sharpener?

Here is Ian in the courtyard.  He is thoroughly enjoying his trip to the museum.  He ended up sleeping the entire time we were there.

I loved these windows! 

I think this is another view of the back of the Royal Palace I wanted to come back to.

I liked this stone carving.  It was in a room with a bunch of others.  There were carvings of what looked liked children playing - but were probably warriors or something.  Again, we couldn't read the signs.  This bird reminded me of the pigeon in the Mo Willems books that Abby likes to read.

I think this is the ornamental ivory chest mentioned in the museum description.  I thought it looked like a treasure chest or jewelry chest.  When I showed the picture to Abby and Elizabeth, they wanted to know what was inside.  I couldn't tell them because I don't know.  It was very pretty and has amazing details.

There were several "Madonna" statues in the museum.  Here are some photos of a few:

 There was lots more interesting stuff in the museum, but I couldn't take pictures of it all.  There was also a lot of religious art that was pretty interesting.  There was a small chapel attached to the museum.  Here is a photo of the inside of the chapel and one of the organ up on the balcony.  The ceiling was amazing!

After we had finished touring the museum, we headed back to the hotel.  Ian was waking up and we all needed lunch.  I started charging the camera battery, hoping it wouldn't take long, but it didn't finish before we were ready to go again.

In the afternoon, we wandered around town for a while and had an ice cream at the square.  It was very warm and the ice cream was good.  Then we headed back to the hotel to wait for the work meeting to be done and see what was planned for the evening.

One of the local plant managers (I think that's what he was!) named Javier, had arranged for someone to take the group on a tour of the path of the Running of the Bulls.  But those photos and descriptions will have to wait for the next post.