Segovia

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This Saturday I went to Segovia with two friends from the Hamilton program, Annie Baja (short) and Ryan. Segovia is only about a 1 hour bus ride from Madrid, so it was a nice little day trip. The final projects are starting to pile up, so we couldn’t really spare the time for a bigger trip.

In Segovia we were able to see the very well preserved aqueduct, which was cool. We also toured an old Synagogue, which of course had been converted into a church at some point in its history during one of the times the Jews were persecuted in Spain.

A nice day trip

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Next, we headed over to the Cathedral. Large, cold, beautiful and dark. The run of the mill Spanish Cathedral.

Our third tourist stop was Alcazar, the old castle. It was once owned by the moors and was then used by the local Kings and eventually by the Spanish King as a home and fortress. I heard that same old rumor that it was the model for the Disney castle, but I could see where the rumor came from since it did have a resemblance.

After testing the local pastries we headed back to Madrid.

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Just a side note, I had a dinner with a small number of students from the program, our director and his wife last Thursday. Every week a different group of students has this dinner, which is on the fancy side in a traditional Spanish restaurant. During this meal, ladies and gentlemen, I tried and liked both blood sausage and fried bull’s testicles. Yum yum yum!

In general though, I’m kind of touristed out. I have no desire to see another Cathedral or museum for a while. And that’s ok because in about 2.5 weeks I’ll be heading up to Galicia where I’ll be working on a farm for my room and board. I’ve talked with the owner and he has given me this info: It is more of a community with a couple families living there. There are horses, pigs and other animals though the farm is more of just a self sustaining project instead of producing 1 big product. It’s organic. At some point we’ll be making hay and at another there will be a children’s camp for 1 week. There will also probably be other people working through the same program I am using. If you can’t guess it, I’m very excited!