Places we're not moving to . . . just because.

What’s in a name?  It’s often a curious question and sometimes you’re surprised when you find out.  Then again, some names you really don’t want to know the background of and, because of some residual juvenile hang-up (some may say juvenile inner personality), you really have no desire to visit.  Take for instance, every time I’ve seen a “Mosquito Lake” on a map, I’ve had no desire to explore there.  Well, Ann and I have been spending a lot of time on YouTube and Google Earth (as well as paper maps) exploring potential places we’d like to live (well, more scout out in January to see if we would like to live there).  And it was during one of those sessions that I was reminded of just how juvenile I can be.

Maps are interesting.  Really, no one map can do it all (even electronic), and why should you expect it to.  Some maps are great for showing connections (how to get from point A to B), other maps are great for showing topography (and potential exciting photo locations) and other maps are really good for showing the inner makings of a place.  But even when a map is exceptional, there always seems to be one or two things that are missing, which is why we tend to have multiple maps of locations (our count of paper Portugal maps is now up to 3 - all at a national level).  The inspiration for this blog post (and the ultimate relief) derived from the inadequacies of the electronic map Ann was studying at the time.

Ann and I had been watching a series of vides in the area north of Vila Real, not far from the Spanish border on the central section of Portugal’s northern border.  The location is particularly appealing because it sits half way between Portugal’s only national park, Parque Nacional Peneda-Gerês, and a mountainous nature reserve, Parque Natural de Monteshino.  In one of our videos they showed several towns that looked interesting such as Chaves, and Vila Verde da Raia.

It was when Ann was looking at the area around the latter town that Ann said, “Ok, so Dan, how would you like to live in a town called ‘Feces.’”  “What?”  “Look here . . . Feces de Abaixo!”  “No Hon, I draw the line at Feces.  I am not moving to a town called Feces.”  “ Look, here’s another one, ‘Feces de Cima.’”  “No.  I don’t care if it’s Abaixo, Cima or Lima, I am not moving to Feces!”  “Ok, then . . . .”

Now, it’s nothing personal.  I mean it’s all a part of the natural world, and we all do it.  And if you’ll recall our first trip to Yellowstone, I even found a bison feces field to be a source of photographic inspiration. 

But to photograph it is one thing; to live in it is, . . . well, an entirely different thing.  Now, I know (well, I’m very confident) that the place (either of them) is not actually built with feces, or that feces is flowing down the streets, or that it rains feces.  But I know myself and I know the juvenile in me just would never get over the name.  It would be the butt (like that one?) of jokes for years to come.  I might never get over it.  So, no, we are not moving to feces.  And, as it turns out, for more reasons than one.

You see, the map Ann was looking at had a deficiency, a major deficiency.  There happened to be a very thin dark grey line that happened to get lost in all of the green on the map.  That line just happened to be the border between Portugal and Spain.  So while Feces de Abaixo may only be a mile or so away from Vila Verda Da Raia, it’s in a whole other country.  Feces de Cima is a bit further away but given the change in direction of the border, it too is right on the border - just on the wrong side.  They’re both in Spain.

So any temptation I might have had (if not simply to have an instant joke to pull up at any point in a conversation) to actually move to Feces has been quashed.  That’s probably a good thing!

But that won’t keep me from using Feces as an inspiration for making shitty photographs!