The Great Spanish Adventure

View from the wall

Portal of the Cathedral

Avila!

I’ve decided to upload a couple pictures one by one, seeing as when I upload them all at once they don’t listen to me.

Anyway, Avila is another charming town outside of Madrid. The train ride took almost 2 hours, but by bus its a little over one. It’s enveloped by rolling hills and mountains, nestled in a slightly cooler climate and entirely surrounded by a medieval town wall. We took the walk around on the wall, which afforded us unforgettable views of the surrounding countryside and rooftops of the old town in Avila.

The Cathedral in Avila is also beautiful, made of lots of different kids of stone, and very old (begun in 1091). I simply can’t over how beautiful cathedrals are. Every single one I walk into is amazing and different. I love seeing the high arches and the organs and gold alter-pieces and thinking about how much work went into building it and how much life its seen.

Segovia is a beautiful medieval city set upon a rocky outcrop with its old city mostly enclosed by walls. It is rather similar to Toledo, about an hour away from Madrid and filled with narrow streets and old stone buildings. However, it’s a little smaller and a bit more picturesque. The temperature  in Segovia was also much more manageable than Toledo. Perhaps due to the mountains and the strong wind the blew through the town. Visitors to Segovia, including myself, follow the same general trajectory from the bus station to the Aqueduct, then up the hill to Plaza Mayor and the Cathedral, and over to the other side of town to visit the Alcazar. It’s amazing how picture perfect the whole town is, with its layers and layers of history building upon each other from Roman times up to present day. I think that is part of what makes the town so charming. It just has so much living history paired view of the countryside is simply gorgeous.

Took a little trip to Segovia today! Gorgeous town. Unfortunetly, I took so many pictures that I don’t quite have the time to sift through them right now. Instead I shall upload a few from my wonderful walk on Saturday that took me all across Madrid, over to Campo del Moro, down Gran Via, and across town to Retiro for some late afternoon relaxing in the park. It was a very peaceful day getting to know some new parts of the city, and fondly returning to the familiar. In fact, while driving back in from Segovia today I had the thought, “Ah, how nice it is to be back home. So beautiful here.”

Too bad it’s not actually home. Haha.

I feel like this just needs to be up here.

Back from the night when Spain won the World Cup. Most hilarious/disgusting dancing ever. I’m surprised they even made it up that statue with all that alcohol in their system. Hah.

Here are some pictures from various adventures from the past couple of days. It’s been a little hectic here. I haven’t really been at home too much, and I am so exhausted when I finally do get back. But, it’s okay because it’s a happy tired. I’m trying to make the most of my time here, because a day without going somewhere and seeing something feels like a wasted day.

Friday, I just want to add, I made it to the 3rd and final big must-see museum on Paseo del Prado, the Thyssen-Bornemisza museum of art. It was fantastic. I recently had a conversation discussing the collection there, and we came up with a pretty accurate asseement of the Thyssen. It has the perfect amount of various time periods and styles of art. It allows you to spend time focusing on what you really love, and letting you skim things you don’t really like, without coming out feeling completely overwhelmed.

There was also a special exhibit on Florentine Renaissance art and I saw this gorgeous painting by Domenico Ghirlandaio: