Don Ernesto once said that Madrid was the most Spanish of all cities and even referred to it as the Capital of the World in one of his short stories. And who is this Don Ernesto? None other than Ernest Hemingway himself, we planned to follow his footsteps on Friday afternoon on the unofficial "Hemingway Pub Crawl" visiting all his old haunts at our own pace, but as two of those bars were not open at this time we put it off for a later date. We did knock the first one out, which to our surprise was an old cerveceria we had stopped in during our first or second weeks in Madrid for lunch.
Luckily, even though though the pub crawl was a bust the weather was not So we spent the day wandering around the main squares and shopping while taking in he beautiful weather.
Saturday, we woke up bright and early to catch a bus to Toledo, a historic town just an hour north of Madrid that is a local favorite and a tourist's paradise. Lexi and I decided to go into this trip with an open mind and minimal plan, so it became a day of getting lost... a lot. It took a couple circles of the station before finding the bus, an then once in the Toledo bus station we couldn't find Toledo (hint: it's the giant city on the hill that is surrounded by castle walls), once we located the city we couldn't really find the entrance, and once we were in we had no clue where we were. Playing it safe we decided to head for the Cathedral, it is a must see in Toledo and contains it's own museum filled with beautiful artwork. Once we found the Cathedral (we managed to go in the wrong door at first) we were sent to go up the belltower, but apparently you have to go out this big doors that don't look like they are supposed to be opened to get to the tower and it took a bit for us to realize we weren't actually doing anything wrong. The bell tower was absolutely amazing, it is the only belltower I've been to that you can actually touch the bells. Once we returned back down to the main Cathedral we took about two hours to tour the entirety of it's naves and museum, including a visit to see El Greco's "Disrobing of Christ". This is by far my favorite Cathedral in Europe that I hae ever been to, and that says a lot. The history of it fascinating (a cathedral has been there sine the 6th century and has been under Jewish, Moorish, and Catholic rule) and the entire thing is absolutely breathtaking.
Following the cathedral we decided to make our way to the El Greco museum, or so we thought. We ended up in the saint Tomes church, which just happens to also be the place that houses "El Entierro del Senor de Orgaz" one of El Greco's most famous and impressive pieces. It was quite stunning. We grabbed lunch at a local tapas place and had the best croquettes I have eaten, and that is impressive since I am slowly becoming quite the ham and cheese croquette connoisseur. We then headed to the El Greco museum for real, ending up in a Jewish Synagoue esque museum.
Finally, we actually made it to the museum and the old home of El Greco, and it was well worth it. His home is absolutely wonderful and the paintings that fill it are quite impressive.
We then went to see an alter piece at a Church on the north side of town near the exit, only to find that the church wasn't open and we had actually already seen the famous piece as it was being shown in the main Cathedral. So we laughed it off, walked around the alleys a bit lost until we finally made our way back to the bus station and headed to Madrid.
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| Toledo |
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| Getting Lost in the Cathedral |
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| Disrobing of Christ |
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| El Entierro del Senor de Orgaz |
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| The Belltower |
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| Greco's Bet Piece |
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| El Grecos Toledo Home |
Sunday we decided to take in the great weather at a bullfight, I was so excited to go, despite all the controversy that surrounds them. In my opinion, I couldn't not go to a bullfight in Spain, especially when they probably will not be around for much longer. We had amazing seats, three rows up on the sunny side of the stadium. There were six or seven fights total and three main bullfighters. The bulls get progressively bigger and more difficult to fight, so the first small bull came off as cute to me so I was a little scarred when it was killed right in front of me (literally directly in front). But as the bulls got less cute, the fights went on, and honestly I had beer I became fascinated by the fights. I went in knowing nothing about bullfighting and how it worked but by the end I knew what each horn signaled for, how the fight would go down, and whether or not things were going as planned. I am so glad that I took the time to go and loved the summer weather we enjoyed it in, but it is probably best that I don't return. You can only see so many animals killed in a semester.
