... and Ávila, oh my!

There was a smaller group that was continuing to Ávila, so there was some bus-swapping action as we reboarded in Segovia. The English-speakers skipping the next leg moved to the black bus (allowing us to improve our position from the back row where we started the day), some Spanish-speakers moved to the white bus to proceed to Ávila, and the black bus returned directly to Madrid. Despite the name on the buses, there fortunately didn't seem to be any chaos - get it?

Luís, our friendly & informative guide did a masterful job on continuing the tour bilingually - and sometimes within the same sentence.

It was raining (as the day had started) as we got off the bus at the visitor center. We'd been lucky that the weather had cleared earlier for the first two stops of the day, and was mostly sunny up until now. But no worries, and the sun eventually broke through as we proceeded.

Laurie had been intrigued about going to the home town of Santa Teresa. We enjoyed another walking tour through the town, though not a lot of info on Teresa- except she was from there.

Similarities in all the places we visited today included a discussion of the progression of architectural styles through the ages - so much to absorb. Each had a "plaza mayor", effectively the local town square, and an ancient walled enclosure that had been built as protection in earlier times, and a cathedral, along with churches & monasteries. In Ávila, the back of the cathedral was actually incorporated into the walled section. We didn't visit inside any of the churches or cathedrals on this day's jam-packed tour (something that would change in the coming week - stay tuned).

Interesting also to observe that these are not solely tourist destinations - they remain active & bustling for the people who live there. Laurie noticed some people rehearsing for a procession - turns out the festival of St. Mary of the Cows was coming up.

We checked out the gift shop in the visitor center (where we returned for another toilet visit opportunity before our return to Madrid). Laurie overheard a lady ask the cashier if they had any relics for sale. Her first thought: "not in the last thousand years," was followed by a second: "This one probably didn't go to Catholic school."

This had been a long, and most enjoyable day, with four thumbs-up for the tour. Back in Madrid around 8 pm, it was still daylight. We took the Metro from the "Ventas" stop back to our hotel, to make plans for the next day.Read more