Weekend in Madrid

Hey!

This past weekend I went to Madrid.

Thursday night while I was packing my things together for the trip I realized that I had miss placed my camera. I was thrown into a slight panic. I called my school because I thought I left it there, I called my friend to try to remember the name of the bar we had gone to earlier to call them to see if they had my camera, but I couldn't remember the name of the restaurant, and the receptionist at school said that he could not find it. So, I went to Madrid without my camera, oh well right.

The school here took us on a field trip on Friday and we were taken by bus, about an hour ride, to the royal palace and to the museo de jabon (ham museum). This is actually a restaurant, but we ate chicken. The field trip officially ended later on Friday, but we chose to stay for the entire weekend. We then wondered through the streets of Madrid until we found our hostel, MAD. It was actually really nice. For my first hostel I was really impressed. We then went to a supermercado near by and bought our food for the weekend which came to a grand total of 15Euro for the three of us. I went with two new friends from my school here in Toledo: Jeff and Ben. We went out later that night, about 11pm, and explored the city. It was a great night that lasted until 4am.

Saturday I woke up for the free breakfast at our hostel. Ben and Jeff were pretty tired, so I wandered around Madrid, exploring its wandering streets, and countless historical locations. It was nice to have some time alone to explore. I think that I noticed a lot more things that I would have rushed through. Later that afternoon I went to to museums for free. The archeaolgy museum and the museum of modern art. It was really neat to see some of Picasso and Dali's most famous work in person. Later Saturday night we went out for a more relaxed evening. We ended up at a place that we nick-named the Orange Zebra. Everything in side was Orange or had Zebra print on.

Sunday was really relaxed. We didn't go out and explore this morning because it was raining really hard, and the streets are not good when it rains. We ended up watching Oceans Thirteen, in English, with a good number of people at our hostel in the lounge. Afterwords we took the metro (subway) to the stadium where we watched Real Madrid play a game of futbol (soccer). The stadium is huge! I think it holds about 100,000 people. This was such a fun experience. We found out that we actually sat in the wrong seats. We bought the cheapest tickets, 25 Euro, and thought that we were in the right place, but turns out we were not. We ended up siting in the best of the 40 Euro seats. The front row of our level. This game was such a fun time.

Monday morning we got up early. Took the Metro to the bus station and took the short 1 hour ride home. Monday was a difficult day. I had not goten a lot of sleep all weekend. I got to school at about 11 am and found my camera waiting for me. What luck!

PS. I will try to put some of my friends photo's of Madrid up soon.

Until Next Time,

More Pictures

Hola,
Here are the rest of the pictures that I have taken so far. Enjoy!

We took a tour on the second day that we were in town. This is a place on the side of a cliff that overlooks the Old Toledo.
Me, with Old Toledo as a background.

This river, called el Rio Tajo, goes around the Old Toledo on three sides, making it one of the most protected cities in Europe.

Julia, Melissa, and me. We all go to the University of Minnesota.

A view of a wider than normal street across from Old Toledo on another bluff or mountain.

Old Toledo is very protected because of the river and because it is built on a high point in the region.

This is a view from Old Toledo looking out over some of the new barrios or neigborhoods.

This is the first picture from the walking part of the tour.

This is a monestary or convent I can't remember. There are many of them in the northern part of Old Toledo.

There are no leaves on the trees here as well. However look at the ground. No snow.

This is a more modern building of Old Toledo, you can tell because of the red brick. When this one was being built it was very expensive to use all red brick so that is why some parts have coble stone.

There are some different plants here.

This is the Cathedral, so beautiful!

A museum under renovation and a plaza full of students.

Another view of the Cathedral.

I think this is a government building, but I'm not sure.

Starting with this picture, the rest are from another day. This one is a view from my bedroom.

This is also a view from my bedroom. You can't really see it in the picture, but the mountain in the background has an olive orchard on it. The state Castilla-La Mancha, Spain is known for its olives and olive oil.

A view of the street as I wait for the bus to go to la fundacion (the name of my school). I live in a neigborhood that is about 20 to 25 minutes outside of Old Toledo where I go to school. The neigborhood is called Peligrono.

Peligrono.

Peligrono. There is a lot of construction here. A lot more than in the states.

Finally, me waiting for the bus in front of my apartment building. I live on the 4th floor which is the top floor. It is small in comparison to the apartments in the United States, but I like it.

Hola,
Spain is beautiful! I didn't have a lot of time, so here are just a few of my latest photos. I will add more tomorrow. Miss you all.

Ready to leave for Spain, at my house in Wisconsin.

The airport in Madrid!

It is amazing.

A feat of modern architecture.

Until Next Time,

I'm in Toledo, Spain!

Hey all,
I just wanted to let everyone know that I made it safely to Toledo. The trip was an adventure and I will tell you about it as soon as I have the time to write it up. All is well. Toledo is beautiful. I will have to get some good pictures over the next few days so that you can get an idea of what its like. I meet my host family later this afternoon.
Until next time,