Castilla y Leon is a region just the the west/northwest of Madrid. It's green and is abundant in trees, both of which are lacking here in Andalucia and I just wanted to hop off the train to go have a picnic where I could lay in the grass reading my kindle. We had this past Monday off so I went to Salamanca Friday, well Friday evening, and Saturday. There is a girl who is studying at the University of Salamanca, one of the more popular universities here in Spain where the city has a large student population, who I had never met, but semi-knew through one of those people who know someone situations. I had e-mailed her the week before to see if she would be there and luckily she was. We met Friday evening and she showed me around the city, telling me about the university and some old facts. We went to a local tapas place that used to be an old horse stable and later we watched the main square, Plaza Mayor, light up. The next day I went back to some of the places we visited, like the university, and went to a couple museums. On one building of the university is a hidden frog in the facade and if you find it it is supposed to bring you good luck. I went by three different times and finally found the darn thing. I secretly listened to other people explaining to the people they were with where it was at, but I could never exactly see it until the third time I was there. I had seen many skulls with a frog on top of it in the different shops and finally understood why since the frog is sitting on top of a skull on the building. Sneaky thing. That evening I met back up with her and we went for some drinks and tapas. We met up with her boyfriend and a couple of his friends and later on the three of us went to see the Roman bridge lit up. It's one of the most famous sites in Salamanca and at the end of the bridge you can see the Cathedral too.
On Sunday I headed to Madrid where I was staying, but took day trips from. I tried to go to the Escorial, an old palace, and when I got on the bus in the city the driver said, "Oh I think it's closed today." Seriously? I still got on the bus since I had taken the train to get there and when I got to the palace sure enough it was closed since it was Mother's Day which I had completely forgotten about.
The next day I went to Segovia. It's famous for it's Roman aqueduct which has 166 arches. It's also famous for it's Alcazar, a palace/fortress, and the supposed inspiration for the Disneyland Castle in Anaheim. I'm pretty sure the palace in Disney looks a whole lot prettier and I wasn't as impressed with it (afterall, I was hoping it lived up to Disney expectations). There really isn't a whole lot to see/do in the city besides these two things, but it was a nice little getaway.
I would post pictures, but my internet is super slow so maybe this weekend.
