Three

This last weekend was a weekend of threes, it seems. Three days off (Friday was a saint’s day), three girls traveling together, three Spanish provinces, and three amazing cities!

Since we had a long weekend, Kristen M. and Lauren and I decided to take advantage of the extra time to take a weekend trip to Madrid, Toledo, and Segovia. We had traveled the weekend before and again on Wednesday for the class trip, so we weren’t necessarily excited to spend another ten hours on a bus. But we put a good face on it and decided it’d be worth our while, and this weekend was a good time to go. It might have been nice to spread it out a bit, but that’s just how the dates fall sometimes.
Anyway, we had a fantastic time and were so glad we went! On Friday, we left on the 7:00 a.m. bus (erg…so early. It was really entertaining, though, to see all the young people coming back from their night of partying) in order to get to Madrid in a decent amount of time. We got there at close to 1:00 and set off to find our hostel. This proved to be rather tougher than we thought it would be, because our hostel was in the old part of town. And we all know how great the Medieval Spaniards were at making streets that follow any sort of logic…ahem. So after about an hour of walking around and a couple of phone calls to the hostel, we found it. It wasn’t so bad, though…one quickly learns that these things just happen with European travel. I’ve learned to roll with it; we always get there eventually. No pasa nada, as we say here.

Our hostel was nice; one of the best we’ve stayed in so far (which is a grand total of three, but whatever). The staff was super helpful and nice, and we got a pretty good breakfast the two mornings we stayed there. And as we found out later on Friday, what we thought would be a room that we were going to have to share with two other random people turned out to be a private triple. As I’m sure you will be glad to know, Mom and Dad :-P But yeah, we were so happy! What a blessing to not have to worry about potentially sketchy people staying with us/causing us to worry about the safety of our luggage. God is so good to us, as always.

Anyway, on Friday afternoon, we headed off on our first side trip. We had been planning on going to Segovia first, but since it was nearing 4:00 by this time and since we wouldn’t be able to get to either town until 5:00, we ended up deciding to go to Toledo at the last minute, because we felt like we wouldn’t have time to do the sites of Segovia justice before it got dark, or before they closed. So off to Toledo it was. Incidentally, this turned out to be a simply brilliant decision! We couldn’t have imagined a more perfect way to spend an evening than in that city. Our first impression of the city was a fantastic one – the old bridge, murales (stone walls, like those of the Ciudadela) and rocky hills were so striking and beautiful! The whole place looked so darn Spanish-y to me…just the sort of place where I could picture Don Quijote and Sancho Panza gallivanting about on some harebrained adventure. Well, we were in Castilla-La Mancha, after all.

We set off right away to explore the city. We fell more in love with the place with every step! We climbed up the walls and saw a wonderful view of the city (as well as some gorgeous flowering trees! In March!). From there, we came to the old part of the town, where we were enchanted by the typical narrow streets and antique surroundings. We saw the gorgeous cathedral, bought some very delicious marzipan – or mázapan, as it’s called in Spanish (Toledo is apparently famous for this, which I didn’t know before going there), and did some shopping in the best tourist shops I’ve seen so far. It was here that we finally found authentic Spanish merchandise, the likes of which we’ve wanted to find ever since we came. Needless to say, we all found a number of items that we couldn’t live without. And I had a great time looking at all the medieval-style swords and daggers that were sold in practically all of the shops. Apparently, Toledo is as famous for metalworking and sword-making as it is for marzipan; which is something else I learned for the first time that day. I was fascinated by it all! I wanted to buy a dagger soooo badly. But then I remembered that I should spend my money on stuff that’s actually useful/isn’t going to weigh down my suitcase unduly. I had fun geeking out over it though, at any rate. Oh, the joys of having read Lord of the Rings and the like way too many times. And I couldn’t resist having Kristen M. take a picture of me with one of the Monty-Python-esque suits of armor. Umm…what obsession?

Later, we even found some turrón in one of the nice little chocolate shops there. Kristen M. took advantage of the opportunity and bought a big bar of it – I hadn’t heard about it much before this, but apparently it’s a type of chocolate that is super hard to find except around Christmastime. And boy, is it yummy! This experience was made even better by the fact that we had a great conversation with the store’s very kind, grandfatherly proprietor. While we were eating the sample of the turrón he’d given us before we bought some, Lauren asked him if he’d lived in Toledo all his life. He said yes, he had, and said, “But you ladies have lived in America for all of your lives.” We affirmed this, and then he said, “You’re from Minnesota, aren’t you?” We were shocked! We asked him how he knew that, and he said that, last year, he became friends with a Minnesotan girl who was studying in Toledo and who used to come to his shop all the time. She had left for home in May, and the shop owner told us that they had both cried buckets when she left! He even had a text from her still saved on his phone. But yeah, we’re guessing that he asked us if we were from Minnesota because he probably doesn’t know many other states besides that one. But still! What are the chances? It was such a cool moment. How wonderful to meet such an amazing person!

After finishing up our shopping, we climbed back down the hill and took our time enjoying the beautiful city lights (it was dark by this time) and the warm weather. We then headed back to Madrid to look for an inexpensive place to eat not-bocadillos for dinner. We were quite successful in this endeavour – we found a neat little place not too far from our hostel, and right on the edge of the famous Puerta del Sol. It was even right by the hotel that Kristen M., Lise, and I stayed at on our first night in Spain! That sure brought back some memories. Anyway, the restaurant was great, and pretty reasonable. We shared a pitcher of some amazing sangria (gosh…I’m gonna miss that stuff), and I had a vegetable sandwich that was piled high with lots of lovely things. I always seem to crave vegetables like a sailor with scurvy whenever I’m on these trips. After that, we headed back to the hostel to rest up for another big day.
On Saturday, we got up early again to catch the bus to Segovia. We headed straight to the acueducto (the Roman aqueduct, for you English-speakers) and took lots of pictures. After that, it was off to the cathedral (we didn’t feel like spending 3 euros to see the inside of yet another gothic cathedral, so we looked around the outside, which was pretty darn cool anyway), and then to the Alcázar, Segovia’s castle, after which Sleeping Beauty’s castle was modeled, I’m told. We liked it a lot – it was a lot more decorated and interesting inside than the castle at Olite. After this, we did a little bit more shopping, stopped at Eroski to pick up some provisions, and rushed to catch the 12:30 bus; all while trying not to get blown away by the sudden gale-force winds. It was a fun morning, and Segovia’s a neat little town. I have to say, though; I was more struck by Toledo, for some reason (no offense, A.J. and Leanne…). Though, in Segovia’s defense, it was a very quiet Saturday morning, with few things open and not-so-nice weather, so that may have had something to do with it.

Once we got back to Madrid, we went to see the Palacio Real, the huge palace where Spain’s royal family used to live (Rey Juan Carlos and his peeps live in a different, smaller place now). Lauren wasn’t feeling the whole go-in-and-look-at-old-stuff thing just then (which I can well understand…a person just becomes arted-out after a while, with so much to see), so she ended up going on a walk instead. Kristen M. and I decided to go for it, though, and went to look around for about an hour. We didn’t feel the need to stay and ponder anything, but it was cool to see it. It was an extremely luxurious place, as you may well imagine, and we enjoyed seeing the huge crystal chandeliers and the opulently furnished rooms.

After that, we got on the metro and headed to the other side of town, to the bullring! We decided that we couldn’t go to Madrid and not take advantage of the opportunity to go to a bullfight. And of course, it was something we’ve all wanted to do since coming to Spain. And we definitely weren’t sorry we did it! For 2.20 euro, we got a two-and-a-half-hour show in seats that were rather high up (but we could see everything just fine, so that was alright). It was so cool! There were three matadors, and they killed six bulls in all. I thought I would be bothered by the violence involved, but I was too busy being fascinated with the whole affair. I guess I’m more bloodthirsty than I thought. Anyway, it was so cool to finally see something I’ve heard so much about. There are actually a lot more people involved in these things than I knew. After the initial procession of all the different guys in the bullfight, they let out the first bull, and a group of toreros waved around their capes and taunted the bull for a while. Next came two horsemen with long spears, and they poked the bull a few times and made it start bleeding a bit. After that came another torero with a couple of short sticks with hooks on the ends that he stuck into the bull’s back. The bull had about four or five of these hanging from him by the end of that part. And finally, the matador came out with his red cape and sword. He threw his cap on the ground and proceeded to do a very dangerous sort of dance with the bull and strike a few manly poses to draw cheers from the crowd. Then, at the opportune moment, he drove his sword as deep as he could into the bull’s back. Once the sword is in, the bull generally dies in a couple of minutes (the last one took rather longer, and it took a lot more tries before the sword went into it…that was rather weird), and a couple of other toreros come to finish it off if need be. I could have done without the times when they stuck a sharp object into the bull’s brain and jimmied it around for a while, causing the bull to twitch rather dramatically. I felt rather less desensitized at these moments. But whatever. After the bull is dead, some men lead some mules with belled harnesses out to drag the bull’s body away, and then the next one comes out shortly after and the whole process begins again. The most exciting one was the fifth bull – one of the toreros definitely got gored by the bull – he was tossed in the air like a rag doll. O.o We rather feared for his life for a moment, but he made it out okay and didn’t seem to be bleeding. I’m sure he didn’t feel too great in the morning, however. Also, with this bull, the matador was the most daring and did some pretty tricky and skilled moves. It was a lot of fun to watch! The whole experience was definitely one of the most unique I’ve had. I really liked it! It was fun to do something so uniquely Spanish. I really wished that my dad and brother could have been there, though. I think they’d really like it! Someday, perhaps.

So, that pretty much wrapped up our Saturday. After another delicious dinner at the same restaurant as before (same waitress, even), we were done for the day. We had yet another early morning on Sunday, during which we went to El Rastro, the gigantic market that Madrid has every week. It was a neat experience – tons of booths with all manner of interesting things. We found a few little things to buy there, and then went to do the art museum thing. We saw some of both the Prado and the Reina Sofia. They were very cool, though, as I’ve said, I’m pretty good to go as far as art is concerned, so I wasn’t as into it as you might expect. It’s sad…I’m starting to feel like such a snob. I mean really, who gets bored with great art? Leave it to me, I guess. Really, though, I did enjoy it. My favorite part was seeing Picasso’s famous Guernica painting. So huge, and very compelling.

After this, we ended up in the huge Parque del Retiro. It was a beautiful place – a nice, quiet piece of nature in the middle of an enormous, bustling city. It was nice to relax there for a while and enjoy the springy-ness. We spent rather longer there than we should have done, though…when we started to walk back, we realized it was already after 3:00, so we’d have to book it to make our 4:00 bus. We walked sooo fast over rather hilly ground, and I felt like I was going to collapse by the time it was all over. Just when I thought I couldn’t gain any more leg muscle…anyway, we made it in time to catch our bus, thankfully. Since everyone and their abuela was trying to get back to Pamplona at the same time we were, we couldn’t get onto our (very packed) bus until about 10 minutes later than scheduled. So it all worked out in the end. After yet another five-hour bus ride (they played Cyrano de Bergerac during it, which I’m sure I would have enjoyed had I not lost track of the Spanish dialogue about halfway through), we were very ready to be back in Pamplona. It’s weird, though…I always feel like I want to be in my real home (wherever that is…) after these trips, and not just Pamplona. But for now, Pamplona is home enough.

And I’ll be plenty happy to spend the rest of the week here, enjoying this town to the fullest. After Semana Santa, I’m gonna be pretty O.D.’ed on traveling. But oh well, I’ll get to see some more amazing things, regardless. And I daresay it’ll make my last three (or so) weeks in Pamplona all the sweeter.