The elaborate tiles are omnipresent in Southern Spain and Portugal: you find them as decorative elements on houes, but also as street sign, on park benches, in churches and many other likely and unlikely places.
The plaza des España in Seville is full of them and even the “Torre del Oro” (Golden Tower) gets its colour from gilded azulejos!
Usually, azulejos are mostly blue, as the name seems to indicate (azul=blue), but just about all other colours may be present as well.

As to the origin of the name azulejo: although the connection to the Spanish word for “blue” seems obvious, experts come up with a different etymology - from Arabic “Al Zulai” meaning brick.
Now, these tiles are neither completely blue nor bricks, but in any case truly photogenic!

A few days ago I had the privilege to see Machu-Picchu (Peru) and I burned lots of film!
One piece of advice: the light is truly magical around sunrise.
Also, there are hardly any tourists - the big buses arrive aeround 10 am.
So, I’d recommend to be in Aguas Calientes the day before visiting the ruins, taking the bus at 5:30 am. Even before sunrise, the sky was remarkably bright and I could easiliy take picture with my 50 mm lens (1:1.4) and shortly after with the normal zoom (Minolta 24-85).

Laurenz
PS: when I left the site, two Viszcachas were sitting on the main entrance, but none of the tours saw them! Watch out for little humming birds as well!

Whoever is following this photolog: I´m currently in Aguas Calientes, the village next to Machu Picchu. New photos will be posted once I come back from Peru - but possibly I´ll also add some personal impressions…

Laurenz