Today the lights are out, at least the ones that shone in all their splendour a few days ago. But I have done so many walks in the past year and the first days of the year that I find it hard to believe that this beautiful time is already in the past. I think I really enjoyed this year walking the streets and looking for lights and decorations.
It all started more than a month ago with an initiative about collecting lights in the city and I don't think I stopped walking the streets on several nights. I went to many different places, repeated some of my favourites and enjoyed the night street photography and better photos.
Calle Larios is a must, it seems that everyone has to pass there or their legs carry them by inertia, because every time I passed by there it is always full of people. I have visited that place, accompanied and alone, and in all circumstances I was thrilled to hear the songs and to see so many people together and happy. I think there is a lack of that in the world. This year the decorations surprised me and I can't stop looking at them.
But most of my walks were in small, narrow streets where the decorations were not so eye-catching, but still worth seeing and giving them the attention of a photo.
Pay attention to the illuminated corners, the balconies, the windows, the lights and decorations that hung like garlands. The streets were so bright that looking up was always a novelty.
I wandered the streets around the main street, and I was always on the lookout for more and more lights and decorations as if it was a great exploration and I loved every find of something different.
The main streets, even the busy ones, sparkled everywhere and the hotels each had their own style, from trees of lights to balconies delicately decorated with flowers alluding to the holidays.
I don't just take walks to take pictures or as simple strolls, but to think, and many of the ones I have taken in the last few days have really moved me. After a hard year with many complications of all kinds, I think it has ended very well, a year that seemed to have no end. But the lights give hope and brighten the soul.
I liked to go out as if I were on a hunt for lights, as if it were a game and to find more and more beautiful things. But at the same time I thought and felt, I also received messages, inspirations. Walks are not only that for me, they are like food for the heart. You never know what might happen on an unscheduled walk, what signals you might receive. I would go without expectations and find great things and let my soul be surprised and amazed as if I were a child.
I would cross the streets, cross them again, after a turn, trees, lights on them, lights hanging like a rain, shows and stalls selling sweets in the middle of the walk.
The streets looked like a fantasy city and every alley showed me something I hadn't seen before. But I also looked at the shops, the shops and many of them had beautiful decorations, others sold products related to the Christmas theme and others like the fans never fail to be protagonists and how beautiful they are, especially the hand-painted ones.
Candy shops, characteristic of this place and I don't know if they are typical of the whole of Spain, can be found in different parts of the centre. Sometimes when I pass by there is an employee handing out sweetened pipes to taste, I assure you they are delicious. Enjoying every detail as if it were the first time you see it or hear it or taste it, that is what beauty is all about.
My walk today ends in a narrow street, but with a lot of life, restaurants, lights, lampposts and people strolling along it. A street that took me almost to the starting point without wanting to. I close my eyes and relive that walk and everything I felt while doing it, wonderful.
Thank you very much for joining me on this Wednesday walk, I send you a big hello. See you soon.
Amonet.
All photographs are my own.
