Bedrock

Archive for the ‘incense’ Category

I noted today at Yoga that our guide Brian uses a decent incense to help get everyone in the mood – I thought I’d take the time to show him which incense we use here at Bedrock – and in the process reminded myself of the vast range we’ve collected.

Since being a teen of the late ‘60s/early ‘70s and using incense sticks to put my mother “off the scent” as it were, I’d completely forgot about the delights of incense until a few years ago our neighbours here in Spain introduced us to something called “Precious Yatra” which they brought back from Dubai (and which remains one of our favourites along with “Nag Champa”).

Since then we’ve been on a journey of discover, in the process discovering that Chinese incense is largely rubbish – thankfully some of the better names over in India produce some of the finest scents in the world (IMHO). Fantastic places to get this stuff in Spain include Ronda (GREAT store on the high Street), Granada (including a little Indian store just across the main road from the Cathedral), Nijar (up near the top of the high street) and no doubt countless other places, I’m told there’s a store in nearby Huescar. Back in the UK we discovered a store just off the high street in Hexham (Northeast of England) which keeps a decent range of incense.

Here then, in imagery is a summary of just SOME of the scents we keep at home here in Spain and in the UK. This also gave me a chance to try out my newly-acquired photo package Luminar 3 from Skylum. No attempts here to demonstrate any photo skills – just straight off the camera and a spot of straightening up.

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One of the nicer things we’ve discovered when over here in Spain is Incense – that is burning incense. Nothing special about it being in Spain of course – it used to be on sale when I was a kid in the Kard Bar in Newcastle – but I didn’t take that much notice for some reason.

It has been a long learning curve since our friendly neighbours introduced us to the stunningly nice “Precious Yatra” which we all use constantly at get-togethers and even when having a casual drink inside or outside.

The only problem with the former is… it isn’t cheap and it isn’t easy to get.

And so it was that I started to look around to see what I may have been missing all of these years. First stop, the Chinese store.  Typical Chinese stores in Baza and Huescar sell MANY different kinds of incense sticks, cinnamon, Patchouli, ocean, lemon – you name it… and all cheap at under 1 Euro for a pack.

They look great and there is just so much choice. There is only one slight catch… they all absolutely smell of little more than… burning wood. Even the Patchouli, hardly a subtle odour, they smelled like burning wood with some added mint – yes, MINT. Considering the fact that they are always on sale I can only surmise that most of their customers have broken noses. I’m not kidding they just smell as if you’d taken the basic wooden base and burned it all on it’s own!

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