So...a few weeks ago Paul and I spent 11 days traveling around Spain with 4 other very awesome teachers and a gaggle of kids from Arlington High. It was just indescribably beautiful. We went to Madrid, Cordoba, Sevilla, Estepona, Granada, Valencia and Barcelona. It was kind of a crazy whirlwind, with
only one or two nights in each city, but we saw a TON. 
To the right here is Madrid. Totally amazing city - I could move there tomorrow. Practically the second we stepped off the plane, we were herded i
n to the Prado museum, and the next day we toured the Royal Palace. This next photo is our group in Plaza Mayor. This plaza is OLD...they used to burn witches in the middle of it. Today it's a nice place for tapas and tinto verano.Now, a person can be a vegetarian here and still eat really well, but they generally eat a LOT of pork. The Spanish really like their jamon. The view below is pretty common - yes, it's says Museo del Jamon.
El Palacio Real, to the right. Below, an awesome statue of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.
The next picture is of me and Paul standing in the Plaza Mayor, post tapas.
We were sad to leave Madrid, but we were off for more adventures. Day 3 was a bus trip to Coroba to see the great Mosque of Cordoba, La Mezquita-Catedral. This is an incredible structure that was once a mosque...during the Reconquista a cathedral was not-so-culturally-sensitively built right inside of it. The orange trees planted throughout its courtyards smelled amazing. Sort of like really strong jasmine perfume. This is the entrance to the mosque - the bridge crosses over the Guadalquivir river. Check out the sky. The interior is full of amazing tile mosaic and painted walls in incredible detail.
After touring the mosque, we boarded the bus again and went down to Sevilla. We visited the Alcazar, the Cathedral, and the Plaza de Espana, clockwise below:
The cathedral is this totally massive Gothic thing that lights up at night. The bats that are always flocking around it really completes the picture...And the picture below shows the view of Sevilla from the top of the cathedral. It's much bigger than I'd realized.
After two days in Sevilla, we boarded the bus again and headed down to Estopona, near the Costa del Sol. This is the southernmost part of Spain, and we could see the Rock of Gibraltar on the way to our hotel. This was a point at which most people going on this trip (it's a package tour run by EF) go to Morocco for the day, but our tour gui
de skipped this part, which we were sort of glad about, since we were pretty exhausted by now. Though seeing Morocco would have been incredibly cool. Anyway, we took it easy in Estepona for two nights, spending the day at the beach. The water was like the Cape in June, but everyone swam anyway except for me. The beach was hot, though...it was lovely. There were all these beachside restaurants that serve fresh seafood right there, and we had lunch there that day.After Estepona, we were back on the road to Granada. Like Sevilla, there was beautiful Moor-influenced architecture everywhere. We visted the Alhambra, below:
After Granada, we left Andalucia headed up toward the northeast. Valencia was our next stop. The scenery along the trip was pretty amazing. Outside the cities, there really is no development with the exception of a few tiny mountain villages. Mostly, all you see is farmland. There were lots of solar fields and wind turbines in the open areas between cities too. As we approached Valencia, all you could see were orange and lemon orchards.The city itself is really interesting. It's the third largest city in Spain, after Madrid and Barcelona. It's a combination of gorgeous old baroque and gothic architecture, with a really modern part. In the seventies, flooding of the river became such a problem that they decided to divert it around the city; the old riverbed is the site of a massive modern redevelopment into a series of museums, an aquarium, a new opera house, and a greenway. Reflecting pools are there to symbolize the river that once defined the space. The picture at the above left shows the old part of the city. Below is the new:
And just when we were starting to get comfy with our Spanish, we enter Cataluna, where everything is spelled with an "x." Anyway... Barcelona was our next and last stop. I had been to Barcelona once, 10 years ago, and it has a very special place in my heart. It was amazing to go back. We visited are a few of my favorite sites...La Boqueria, the madre of all outdoor farmer's markets; Las Ramblas, a touristy but nev
ertheless really cool and beautiful avenue; the harbor; and a bunch of modernista buildings, a really wacky neo-gothic style that sort of defines the city's architecture. The Gothic quarter was a beautiful tangle of narrow, dark streets full of Arabic-style tea houses and cafes. I didn't really get pictures of it because my camera was out of batteries by then...but here's a photo of Las Ramblas. All the photos are here:http://picasaweb.google.com/paulmcknight69
/Spain2009?authkey=Gv1sRgCJLr1qbqiPuGuAE&feat=email#
Anyway...hope all my buddies are well...post soon!!
