London & Spain

LONDON
We are into our third week of travel. We have been in London for a week and Spain for the last two. London was so amazingly full of history. Like one tour guide said, "If you Americans had just paid your taxes, this history could all be yours!" We ran our legs off seeing museums, castles, historical points and attractions. Gail´s favorite was the Tower of London because of all the intrigue, deaths and important decisions about world history that happened there. Dan´s favorite was the Churchill Museum and World War II War Rooms. They captured, so well, the drama and sacrifice that went on in London during that time. The war rooms have been left exactly as they were as the war ended.

There is a computer catalogue of events which happened during Churchill´s life. It is on a table about 50 feet long which is touch sensitive. You touch a file folder for a particular date and it opens with text and photos which you can enlarge. If you happen to open a significantly exciting date something will happen the entire length of the table. For instance, when I opened the day of the Pearl Harbor attack a Squadron of Japenese bombers flew the length of the table with an attack sound track. Someone else opened the day of the first atom bomb test and all of the data was temporarily blown to pieces. I know, it was goofy kid stuff, but it was informative and fun.

The London Metro system was fantastic! You can get anywhere very quickly, very easily and very inexpensively. We rode the bus to see different neighborhoods, but an hour bus ride could be done in 15 minutes in the Tube.

SPAIN
We had planned to see a lot more places in Spain, but everywhere we go turns out to be the most beautiful place we´ve ever been and we spend more time there than planned. Rick Steves would be really mad at how slowly we are traveling, but it sure is nice to linger in beautiful gardens and museums.

MADRID
Madrid has a great Metro system also. We were warned about pick-pockets on the Metro and we were fortunate enough to experience one. We are carefull, especially in crowds, but walking down stairs between trains a lady came down behind us, matching us step for step. We waited for her to pass, but she just stayed behind us. I finally stepped aside to let her by as she was reaching into Gail´s bag. She quickly removed her empty hand and moved off. She had been able to unzip the bag both directions from the middle and reach in without Gail feeling it. Needless to say, we have learned that pick-pockets are not busy just in a crowd.

Our hotel in Madrid was fantastic. It was located near the Prado Museum with tons of restaurants, stores and parks nearby. The management is SO great. Javier, the owner´s son, is so helpful. We arrived late in the day to discover that he had given our room away. A teacher and several students from Italy had arrived and needed to be together, so he gave them our room. That was his first statement to us and you can guess we were a little excited about the situation. Then he told us that they had a nearby apartment they only rent for longer periods, but, as he had given away our room, we got to stay in the apartment for the same price as our original room.

We don´t spend a lot of money on hotels, so it was very nice to have a real one bedroom apartment with kitchen, living room, full bath with A/C for a budget price. It was located on such a nice, narrow street with beautiful apartment buildings, each with wrought-iron balconies.

While in Madrid we visited The Prado. It has such a collection of great art. I am a new enthusiast of El Greco. He does the best eyes and facial expressions! The Royal Palace was beautiful and, for some us, a great amount of money and energy just for a royal family. A day trip to Toledo taught us that it needs more time. Such a beautiful hilltown. It matches anything we´ve seen in Italy.

CORDOBA
Two days in Cordoba was not enough. The history there involves Chris Columbus. We visited the fortress where he negotiated his America trip with Isabella and Ferdinand. The night-life there is great. We´re getting into the land of Flamenco. We attended a Flamenco night in the park. The moon was up, stars were out on a warm night with stone towers as a backdrop to the stage. We need more exposure to Flamenco because it is a very intensely emotional production with the crowd yelling, "Ole!" at crucial moments in each performance while Gail and I just tried to figure out what was going on.

The Mezquita, originally the largest mosque in existence, turned into a Christian cherch, is a most interesting building. It is one story, with 800 columns supporting the roof. Each column is topped with a double arch of red and white striped stone. When we get the photos up you will see how amazing it is.

SEVILLE
This really is the most beautiful place we´ve been. HONEST! The cathedral is the world´s largest Gothic church. It´s bell tower is the minaret of the original mosque which stood there. There are not steps to climb it (except for the 17 right at the top, but they don´t really count when you´re climbing that high.) The top is reached by a 36 flight ramp along the wall of the tower. It was desinged so a rider could go by horseback fives times a day to make the Muslim call to prayer. A hard climb, but the wiew over Seville is marvelous.

We are goofing off today. After a two hour visit to the Alcazar, which was supposed to be a half hour, we´re catching up on the blog, followed by a visit to another garden. The gardens at the Alcazar we visited this morning are about the biggest we´ve ever seen. Besides the orange groves which are getting to be common now, there were pomagranate trees and so many kinds of palm. You could wander those gardens for days. And tonight, we are attending another evening of Flamenco. We intend to be asleep early, but people don´t start coming out until 10 or so and the night life continues until dawn. It´s Saturday and we understand people stay out very late because they don´t have to get up tommorow morning.

We´ll get photos on here as soon as we can.