Leon and Burgos: Day 1

Just got back from a LONG 3 day trip to Burgos, Leon, and lots of pit stops in small cities on the way. Whew! What a trip. It was very fun and extremely memorable, but we're all exhausted! I can't even count the amounts of stops we made or how many castles, cathedrals, ancient churches, and quaint cities that we stopped in. Whoo! It's nice to be back at our house. Tomorrow (Thursday), I was supposed to leave with another group to go to Portugal for our free weekend trip, but my ticket got cancelled, and I had to buy a different ticket for Friday instead. Kind of a bummer! Luckily (well, not really lucky for her or for me!), my friend Courtney is in the same boat, so we'll both go together to Portugal on Friday instead. Tomorrow, I think we'll both sleep in, then go on a mini trip to Madrid or something! Our bus and train passes finally work because it's May now, so I'm excited! Anyways, about the Leon/Burgos trip... First, on the 30th of April, which was Monday morning, we left at 8 AM and drove for a couple hours, then stopped at Peñaranda de Duero, a way cool castle.

It was a bit of a walk/hike up a big hill to see it, but definitely worth it. The view was really awesome! It's amazing to see that there were buildings built before our nation was even born, and those buildings are still in good condition! I'm always in awe when I see these different things, because they're all over the place, so it starts to become commonplace. I noticed that as we were driving to the different places on this trip, little towns would spring up out of nowhere, but in the center of the town, there would always be some kind of ancient church or other building. AMAZING to see. Ok, so this trip was really really chilly! All of us were freezing, especially because no one had the proper clothes. When we packed for Spain, we all thought that it would be warm and sunny! It's summer for crying out loud! Or, at least it should be. Needless to say, it was cold and we often couldn't feel our limbs. Good times!

Next on our stop, we drove to a place called Covarrubias. This was another little town with a big church and retablo, or it's also called a medieval hamlet. This place was cool! First, we had some time to eat lunch and wander around the city for a few minutes, then we all gathered and went into the church. Again, this place was cool.

Ok, get ready for this... We listened to actual monks sing Gregorian chants in this church!!! It was so legit. They live in celibacy together in a monastery. It was so interesting to see that this was real life! There were even people there worshiping with the monks as their common routine. It was so interesting to see the different culture and lifestyle. They sang for about 25 minutes, then we went outside to look around. Just outside the church, there was a hill with a little house type thing and a statue of Mary at the top. We climbed it for the view, and, of course, for the picture taking opportunity! We take as many of those as possible... Silly American tourists! :) The view was beautiful, like every other view in Europe!

Next on our stop was a "nature walk" down this gorge (called La Yecla) that was really more like a slot canyon with a bridge that they installed on the side of the mountain.

It was pretty cool! I think we mostly just did it to kill time because we couldn't check into our hotel until later. But it was still fun! The hard part about this trip was that we had so many stops, and half the time we were all so exhausted that we just didn't want to get off the bus! However, I'm always glad that we do, because we see some amazing things. The thing I always say is "When in Rome!" except I usually replace Rome with Spain. That keeps me going! After the gorge, we drove a bit more and came to another small town whose name I've forgotten. I think it might have been a spur of the moment stop, again to take up some time. We just had the opportunity to walk around for a bit and to look at the buildings there, because apparently they were about 500 years old or so. Pretty amazing that things are still standing!

Also in this little town, we went to a cool old church, also very old. Oh, one thing I haven't mentioned about all the churches and cathedrals and castles that we've been going to is that they're absolutely freezing inside. I don't know how anyone could stand to spend any time in them when they were actually in use! Yes, it was cold outside which makes a big difference, but I couldn't even imagine what the temperature would be when it was winter! Brr...

The cool thing about this church is that this was the first time we saw tombs. It kind of caught me off guard, actually! I always knew that they put tombs in churches and cathedrals in the catacombs, but not in the forefront of the church where everyone goes to worship! It was so interesting. One of our professors was telling us the significance of the way they presented the tomb. If a sword was to the side of a man, that means he died in peace, but if it was resting on top of his body, that meant he died in a battle of sorts. At first it was a little eerie to see the tombs and know that there were ancient bones inside, but as I grew accustomed to it, I started to think of how amazing and sacred this was to so many people. Very cool experience!

Next stop, Burgos! Finally! It felt like a full day's trip before we finally got here. We pulled up to the hotel, unpacked our bags, then headed out again to see the city. No rest for the wicked, that's for sure! One interesting thing I've noticed about bigger Spanish cities is that they all seem to have a Plaza Mayor.

It's a central square plaza surrounded by many different tiendas, or shops, and restaurantes, bars, pasteleria's (sweet shops) and other souvenir places. They're pretty fun to go to, and tons of people are always hanging out there. It's funny, because no matter what we do, we always stand out in a crowd. Everyone knows immediately that we're tourists, and usually from the U.S. I guess we just have that look about us! I don't really like that we stand out so much, but there's not much I can do about that one. Oh well! A group of friends and I went to the square, then found a place for dinner. I ordered a Spanish tortilla, which is made with eggs and potatoes, not corn or wheat. Mine wasn't that great, but I'm over it. After dinner, we tried to go to the Supermercado (supermarket) to get some food for the next day, which was a holiday, but everything was closed. Almost all the stores in Spain close around 9 in the evening. It's such a bummer! We were told that Spain had an awesome night life, but apparently that's only at the bars. Bars are super expensive too, so I'm not a huge fan of eating there all the time. Overall, although it was an exhausting day, it was a lot of fun and full of lots of cool things!