I’m sorry I haven’t blogged in a bit. Let me bring you up to speed and I’ll try to resume posting every 2 or 3 days.

This past Saturday, we went to Segovia! It was beautiful. We arrived shortly after 10 - it’s a little over an hour from Madrid. We had 15 minutes before the tour began and found a pastelería for coffee and croissants. The tour began and we spent time walking on the streets before we arrived at the castle. This is the castle that inspired Walt Disney: 

Alyssa, Kelsey, Emily, and I saw a shield upon entering. We’re fierce and frightening: 

The corridor with the shields led us to a courtyard where we learned that this castle was more of a summer/vacation home for the royal family. We then went into a room with suits of armor for men and children. I found my knight in shining armor. The Spanish rituals work!

We toured the rest of the castle: the throne-like room, the bedroom, the meeting room, the Queen’s bathroom, and we excited from the church which is surprisingly attached to the bathroom. Try to grasp that one. From the castle, our group tried to take some cute “Hey look!  I’m in Segovia and I made friends!” pictures. We got this one instead. It’s awkwardly adorable :]

We then went into the Cathedral which is the last Gothic-style cathedral constructed in Spain. It was interest that there are people actually buried within the cathedral. it was anything spectacular for me. We’ve visited other more grand cathedrals. However, it did offer a nice cool escape from the scorching Segovian sun. It’s neat how these old buildings manage to stay significantly cooler without air conditioning. 

I ate lunch with Alyssa, Emily, and James. We wandered around the streets and found a bakery selling Fartons. No idea what they are, but they look delicious and are amusingly named.

We later climbed up a bit to see the Roman Aqueducts and I was awe-struck. They’re beautiful and it’s incredible how they’ve lasted all these years. The stones are held together through gravity and balance alone, there’s no mortar used.

At 3:30, we all hopped back on the bus to visit a church and the valley-like area around the castle. This was met with a collective groan (as all the churches/cathedrals start to blend together), but the views were worth it.

The second church was used for knights and soldiers. You were allowed access to different levels of the building depending on your rank. It’s also a burial ground, but some tombs were removed long ago. Look at how short the knights were! It’s smaller than me or about my size, and I’m 5'2"

Teresa, our guide, said that you can find bone pieces in the ground. She found a sliver, held it up, and continued to explain. Well me being me, I found something shiny on the dirt floor and picked it up. Turns out it’s a tooth! I shrieked and tossed it away. It was too slim and point to have belonged to a human, but it’s a tooth nonetheless.

We returned to the buses and journeyed back to Madrid where a sushi dinner awaited us. It was me, Alyssa, David, Emily, Mike, Sean, Nick, Brianna, Kelsey, and Katie. Dinner was AMAZING! We also had dessert sushi. I ordered the dulce de leche, David had the nutella and straberry, and Sean and Brianna had nutella and banana.Talk about a blend of cultures! We all traded pieces. My stomach was grinning and full at the end of the night.