Day 16 | A Stop in Toledo, Spain

Well, it's travel day once again. However, this time we are making a little pit stop in one of Chris' classmates, Jesus, hometown of Toledo, Spain. So, we hopped on the train and headed from Madrid over to Toledo where we had about 4 hours to spend so Jesus, and his girlfriend Tanja, took us on a very quick tour.

Toledo is a city 44 miles south of Madrid set on a hill above the plains of Castilla-La Mancha in central Spain. The city was built in Roman times (192 BC) and is extremely well fortified, with walls and the Tagus River nearly surrounding the city. The city has a 150° panoramic view of the surrounding areas. It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1986 for its extensive cultural and monumental heritage and historical co-existence of Christian, Muslim and Jewish cultures. Toledo also has a history in the production of bladed weapons. Moviemakers in Hollywood often get the swords used in movies from the artesans in Toledo. For centuries, the metal-smiths of Toledo have made swords and knives, and numerous shops in town attest to the craftsmanship. I just had to buy a sword from Toledo; however, mine is only about an 4 inches long. Haha. It is good for a souvenir though. What a very interesting and neat little town covered in so much history. 4 hours is just not enough, but might be for now considering we walked a lot of hills in almost 100 degree weather! Shew! I'm sure we'll visit again. :)

We hopped back on our train and headed on to our next destination/country: Lisbon, Portugal. We arrived late in the evening and had enough time to check into the hotel, walk around a little and find some dinner. We decided on a little restaurant outside of the Museum De Cerveja (Beer Museum) that had some nice ambiance and music compliments of the guitarists on the street. After dinner...we headed on back for some decent shut-eye.

Goodnight Lisbon. See you tomorrow.

Temp: Hi 98 / Lo 75
Pedometer: 9 milesRead more