Saturday, November 30, 2013

Spain, Part 1




The Crystal Palace

The cathedral

Hubby had a fascination with the ham!

The Royal Palace


A meeting of the minds in front of the cathedral

The crowds never died down

The building next to our hotel

Busy streets

 
Kids are kids no matter where you go



Such a beautiful city! Not ay all what I expected since a travel book I read said that the architecture there was not worth seeing! There were some magnificent buildings and the old town had a charm of it's own just like all European cities do. I started my trip here, teaching classes at Bambola Casa Creativa my first weekend. The store was wonderful and the girls were much fun. Sylvia was my translator and she did a great job.
 
I stayed at Sandra's ( the owner of the shop, home about 15 miles north of Madrid. It was a small town with crazy streets and I was afraid of getting lost but I did venture out every day to explore. My stomach did not do well my first week so I set out to buy bottled water and for some reason I craved orange juice which I bought daily. I lived on Bimbo (yep, they had it there too!) bread and juice for a week while my stomach settled in to my new surroundings. I did have a most delicious paella on my first Sunday. It looked like it should be on a magazine cover, it was so beautiful. I could not bring myself to eat the oysters or mussels however. I hope I didn't hurt Sandra's feelings, but I did eat the crawfish. I did draw the line at sucking the head out of the shell though!
 
Halloween was in the air here with Sandra's kids carving pumpkins. I was told that they didn't start celebrating this holiday until about 5 years ago. I suppose it's because of social networking perhaps.
 
I went on to Tarragona to teach and onto Barcelona for 3 days, ending back in Madrid for 2 days before flying home. It clearly was not enough time to do everything we wanted to do but we got in a small taste of the city. It was crowded everywhere we went since it was a holiday weekend there. Onto the second part of the trip later in the week.





1 comment:

  1. Hi Julie

    I realise this post is an older one - but I love Madrid - and Barcelona - so glad you got to experience them because who ever wrote your guide book must have gone around the city/ies with a blindfold on... They have magnificent buildings - one has to consider the rooflines and window mantles as part of the architecture there - you could literally walk around the city looking upwards at all the wonderfully sculpted facades - and not mentioning the statues and water fountaines - truly outstanding and memorable. I'd recommend the Del Prada Museum if you ever have the opportunity to go again... I love Madrid. Barcelona has it's Goudi architecture which is very different from anything I've ever seen. I'd recommend a city bus tour if in Barcelona again - you are taken past all of the Salvador Dali architecture... and if that's not worth looking at - I don't know what is! lol.... I think you may have had the wrong book lol!!

    Anyway - just to say I'm a massive fan of your dolls and have just enjoyed another great show on UStream for Prima 12/03/13. Can't wait to see the new releases you have hit the shops after CHA in January. Good luck with the release!

    Paula x x x

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