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Toledo (Encantada)

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Toledo: 3/24/2017 Today Kristen and I took a day trip to Toledo.   In the morning, we bought gloves and long socks because it was so cold.   I put on a tank top, two t-shirts, the two long-sleeved shirts I brought, a sweater, my jacket and scarf, leggings, and jeans, and we headed out on a bus to Toledo, which is an hour or so from Madrid. Toledo is a quaint little town caught in a time warp. It was the capital of Spain originally because it is nestled in hills and surrounded by a river. The buildings are ancient, and the streets are all narrow and winding and made of cobblestones.   Needless to say, the views were amazing. We went on a walking tour and learned all about the history of Toledo.   We saw the cathedral (the second largest one in Spain), the Alcazar, and the largest marizpan Quixote in Spain (because, apparently, there is more than one marzipan Quixote in Spain). Toledo was/is known as the “city of th...
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Madrid ("Standard Europe")

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Madrid: 3/23/2017 In the afternoon, I headed to Madrid. The train ride was beautiful, through rolling green hills and cliffs, but   Madrid’s weather was completely different inland – it was cloudy, rainy, and only 40 degrees. I met up with Kristen, who had been in Madrid for a day or so and had already gone on a walking tour.   She and I went to El Retiro, a large park with beautifully manicured landscapes and statues.   We walked past El Prado, but didn’t go in because the line was long and neither of us is really a museum person. Kristen took me on a mini walking tour to the royal palace (birthplace of Charles II of Spain, my favorite Hapsburg).   If you are not familiar with King Charles, he was the last of the Hapsburg line, and after 8 generations of inbreeding, he was, frankly, SUPER f!cked up.   Here’s all you need to kno w about him from Wikipedia: "The physician who performed his autopsy stated that his body 'did not contain a single ...
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Barcelona (Or, the Ed Sheeran Song)

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Barcelona: 3/20/2017 The train ride to Barcelona was three hours long and entailed a ride up the coast along the water. It was very beautiful.   The weather in Barcelona continued to be perfect – 70 degrees and sunny – and the atmosphere in this town was more relaxed; more like that of a beach town than a city, the way Alicante and Valencia seemed.   I was alone for this leg of the trip, and so I got to spend the afternoon walking around alone, which was nice after the flurry of the past few days. The beauty of traveling alone is that you can do whatever you please with no one to accommodate.   I was tired, so I went to back to the hostel early and took a shower for the first time in four (!) days.   I met some other American girls – one from Alaska, one from California – and we made plans to see Barcelona tomorrow.   Barcelona: 3/21/2017 The first thing I did in Barcelona was to take a walking tour. I do these in every city, since my si...
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