This next one is especially for Dad, I've put all the pictures of the Roman built El Acueducto in just for you.
So the next few posts will mostly be about the Spain adventure.
It all started on a sweetly cool summers evening with an amazing mediterranean meal in Lund full of MEAT. This should have been an indication of what we would encounter in Spain and prepared us for our new dietary food groups, meat and bread! How naive we were.
After packing late into the evening we got up bright eyed and bushy tailed at 5am for our train then plane to Spain (no 'my fair lady' pun intended). Since I had not been awake at that time in Lund before I thought it worth mentioning that the small city waking up is quite lovely, although we felt sorry for the market stall set-er-up-er-ers already well under way.
Ok, train, plane, Hola hot, sticky, muggy, Madrid. Once we navigated the metro and found ourselves in Plaza de la Puerta del Sol - "Gate of the Sun" we found our hostel was conveniently located between two tapas bars. This was the beginning of the end! Beer, bocadillos, pintxos, tapas, montaditos, beer, every type of cured pig meat you can think of, did i mention beer, bread, tapas etc. this cycle went on for the entire trip and tapas became more than just food, but a mantra we lived by.
Our lovely patient, problem and argument solving guide the lonely planet pointed us in the direction of the 'Cerveceria 100 Montaditos' where we filled ourselves with mini bocadillos of all different fillings and flavours, even a dessert one of white chocolate and fruit jam (sounds weird, tastes great). Most of the choices of fillings were lovely surprises as our abysmal knowledge of Spanish was failing us. We ended the evening with some beer at Plaza Mayor, which is a grand square full of restaurants, buskers and pretty lights. It is here that our second mantra was born "dos cervezas? ummm.......por favor". Also, Jochen developed a great fear of scary devil goats! Shiney, sparkly devil goats that make weird clicking noises and jump up at you if you donate money to them, they were altogether very disturbing.
The next day we made our way to Toledo, a small walled city set up on a hill where broadswords, shields, morning stars, daggers and suits of armour are sold. They set our fantasy book reading hearts aflutter. Toledo was settled by the Romans in the 6th century, Muslims conquered in 711 and became the centre of learning and arts in Spain. It is now known as the capital of the province Castilla La Mancha (once having been considered for the capital of Spain). During the 11th century, Christians, Jews and Muslims coexisted relatively peacefully until Alfonso VI conquered the city with Christian forces and forced the Jews & Muslims to convert or bugger off. So there's lots of history and old stuff to see. Definitely worth a look for the buildings, the wall, the Rio Tajo, the small winding streets and the view.
Next we made our way back on the fast train to Madrid and picked up our hire car which we affectionately named Jose. He got us through thick and thin, especially thin as small towns only believe in a road big enough for one car. Luckily for me I didn't have my aussie drivers licence so Jochen was the designated driver. Woohooooo! Getting out of Madrid without a city map or a working GPS was an adventure. As the Navagatrix I chose a random direction which proved to be the wrong one. This of course is one of the only times I have ever been wrong! So we took the scenic detour out of Madrid to the south-east when we wanted to go to Segovia on the North (slightly west) side of the city. Oh well! Lucky I wasn't driving. One very important lesson was learnt on this detour: never eat Racciones Calamares from a truck stop restaurant! Ever!
We finally got to Segovia behind schedule to spend a few hours gazing at the amazing El Acueducto. As time was of short supply we only saw the El Acueducto and the Catedral. The Romans occupied Segovia for a while from 80BC and they decided to build a huge f*&^ off aqueduct in the 1st century AD. The aqueduct was built to transport water from the Fuente Fria River 15km away to the city at a grading of 1 percent. At its tallest it is 28.5 metres tall, is 894 metres long and has 167 arches (from it's entry to the city) all of which were built out of granite blocks without mortar. Various restoration projects have made it one of the best preserved aqueducts and an important historical monument.....this is why we took lots of photos!
Then we went to the Catedral which is an amazing Gothic building. First construction was in 1525 and then took about 200 years to complete. It has two massive amazing organs and the choir stalls are a big cage where all the seating and inner walls are carved walnut. However they do like to lock up their musicians and priests with lots of grilled walls.
And that was Segovia, or what little we saw of it before heading off to El Burgo de Osma.
Have a look at the photos if you are interested. Apologies if this was too historic for your tastes, as the story continues there will be less history and more drinking.
(Not really sure what these are, teapot? bong? Spain definitely has interesting souvenirs)On a more recent note: we are not homeless anymore and will be moving to our new place next week.....all very exciting!
Seeya later alligators.
