You may have seen my photos already from where I’ve traveled, but perhaps a few words could help. I didn’t intend to squish both weekends together into one post, but I’m tired of feeling guilty for not writing about either so this will have to do.

Andalucia
Within 24 hours of landing here, I was already beginning my European travels with a SLU-sponsored orientation trip to a region in southern Spain called Andalucia. Since Madrid is centrally located in Spain, I am always relatively close to travel destinations and the pueblo of Cazorla was no exception at about a 4.5 hour bus ride away. The SLU philosophy on making new friends abroad and quickly immersing into Spanish culture is to ignore whatever jetlag or travel-induced exhaustion you may be experiencing (not very much for me, but my roommate on the trip had a 11 hour time change and a 25 hour journey) and do as much as possible involving the aforementioned. I think they succeeded in achieving that for all 31 of us who participated.

On the bus ride, I met a girl from a small, Midwestern town (and therefore is very sweet and has small Midwestern town values, unlike the other students I “met” at the airport gate) who I think I will be my travel buddy, though we have yet to plan any of the trips we have in mind. Through our 8-hour hike and extreme sport activities, we all got to know each other and little cliques of friends were formed by the end of the trip that still exist on campus now.

Our guide was a crazy Spaniard who spoke a bit of English and seemed to know more about hiking than the basic skill of telling time. We definitely experienced some awfully long “5 minute” stretches on the hike through the trees and up the mountain sides. While I was busy snapping pictures and soaking-up the landscape, people were grumbling in the back of the group about blisters and bathrooms. It was quite a workout, but I wouldn’t have expected anything less from the trip description: “rigorous hiking adventure.” I guess they didn’t read it or thought that meant walking on flat, paved roads for an hour or two each day.

The hike on Saturday began with a 45-minute bus ride up into the mountains (the driver was amazing, maneuvering these windy often un-barricaded roads that would’ve made me nervous in a Mini Cooper) and included a cool-morning ascent to our lunch stop destination above the clouds at the top of the highest peak we could find and a 1750m descent that somehow ended back up at our hotel. We walked for about 9 miles, but that statistic doesn’t include the vertical distance we subjected our poor knees and feet to. The worst part was actually finding your footing on the rubble-scattered paths–especially when descending–even more so than the time we spent going up and down. Throughout the hike we would catch glimpses of the clustered white buildings of Cazorla before they were again concealed by clouds, a patch of trees, or another mountain. It was sort of like we were tracking it, never believing we’d ever make it back down to that little white dot that was our hotel at the end of the day.

I also enjoyed meeting the town’s infamous sheppard, Pedro, who was walking his sheep with his dogs while watching us scale the steepest and largest hill in town. He, and anyone else who was admiring the skyline that day like we did the next day, must have been laughing at how crazy we were to do that (…they never said the shortest distance between two points was the easiest…) and waiting for one of us to pull a “Jack and Jill”.

The Hill. Imagine a cluster of colored dots slowly inching down the hill and you will get an idea of what we looked like. Note the hill keeps going off the right-side of the frame to El Castillo (that’s just a lookout in the upper left).

And finally, the town’s main feature is El Castillo de Yerda, lit-up at night and towering above everything but the mountains themselves. We made a pit stop there at the end of our hike and we were all surprised to find that the castle itself wasn’t anything spectacular. With all the glamor we give castles in fairytales and Disney movies, I was expecting a bit more than a few rooms and a dungeon, where legend has it that an Arab King locked his daughter in there when the Christians were coming and had the guards feed her by descending plates of food through the gates (but somehow they ran out of food and she ate a few too many bugs, turning into a monster that will get little children if they’re up too late on Dia de San Juan!). Granted, it had a tall tower with about 4 levels to it, but really not like the stereotypical mansion of luxury that I was expecting, especially with respect to the size of the walls protecting it. I guess I will have to wait until this weekend for my visit to Segovia, a town known for its spectacular castles and aqueducts.

The extreme sports we did in the mountains on Sunday were ok, but more low-key than all the hiking so they paled in comparison. I did surprise myself by not being afraid of the zipline (put on a harness and hook-up to a cable that stretches between two cliff and then off you go!) and, in fact, did it twice because I wanted to get a better look at the view. It was kind of like riding a slow swing, but without an actual seat. Really, not that bad. There was also rappelling, rock-climbing, horseback riding, and a mountain bike stroll. The company that hosted us took pictures throughout the day and posted a montage video that I highly recommend you check out, despite the poor streaming quality.

Toledo
When I said a “side of Toledo,” I meant it. Toledo was another SLU-sponsored trip that I couldn’t resist because it was so easy to do (no planning, just show up) and cheap. Our guide was a professor at SLU and was quite a TrailBlazer, often leaving much of the group behind without seeming to even try to walk their slow pace. Unfortunately, he kind of had a problem with spitting, so the huddle when we got to a point where he wanted to share something with us ended up being people slowly backing up or inching a bit behind someone else for–at least in my case–fear of dirty glasses.The town is divided into new and old sections by an ancient wall. There’s a lot of history here, especially with respect to religions. We visited a synagogue turned museum and got both an outside and inside view of the town’s Cathedral. It was stunning and I am so glad they didn’t allow pictures because I wouldn’t have known where to begin to capture the paintings (on the walls and hanging), stained glass, wood carvings, arches and gigantic columns, tombs, or organs. It was massive and overwhelmingly beautiful. No wonder it took them over 250 years!

The northwest tower of the Cathedral, once the sun came out in the afternoon.

I was also fascinated by the Damasquinado plates and jewelery. We were lucky to walk past a man who was working on a small plate (like an ashtray size) and who showed us how it is made. You start with an iron base and scratch the surface to adhere very thin gold thread by hammering it into whatever design you like. Then, if you want, you can hammer on thin bits of gold to fill-in any patterns you may have outlined with the thread. It sounds simple, but everything is at a small scale and it’s all freehand (so no etching a design beforehand). Sometimes it would be random intricate designs, other times there were birds or flowers. All very beautiful, of course.

I can’t end without mentioning Toledo’s tie with the famous painter, El Greco. He’s quite famous worldwide and one of Spain’s greatest prides. We saw a bunch of works of his and I believe there are even more in Madrid’s art museum, El Prado, which I plan on visiting soon. Again, no pictures (though quite a few people thought it would be ok to take pictures “without the flash” that often fired, against the clear indications to not do so…let’s say a few people had to be escorted out and our poor guide was threatened a bunch of times throughout the trip for our group’s ignorance).