This trip to Barcelona must have been significantly better than the last as even Deep really liked the city. We spent two days exploring the architecture of Gaudi, walking around on our tours of Modernism with knowledgeable, cute, and friendly hostesses, and visiting museums and parks in Barcelona. From there we went on to Madrid where Deep finally got to drop off his large suitcase with his bike. That made us a lot lighter and our travels went much faster from that point on.

We spent the day walking around Madrid despite the stifling heat. The next morning found us at the Prado, which was a splendid museum. We did not have time to see it as we would have liked as it was time to go to Seville in the afternoon. If we thought Madrid was empty and stiflingly hot during the day, Seville was doubly so. Not a soul in sight, and temperatures in the mid 40’s (that’s Celsius, boys and girls!). It was worth the suffering though, as we got to see a spectacular Flamenco show at Los Gallos in Seville that night. That show was truly memorable.

We got rather little sleep that night due to the heat and the fact that we had to catch a very early train to Granada. Granada is home of the Alhambra, a Moorish castle and garden complex that we would have enjoyed much more had we not been so sleepy. After staying in Granada for the night, we came back to Seville to actually explore the city (last time we were too late to do anything but see the Flamenco show). After Seville, we took an evening fast train back to Madrid and then an overnight train to Lisbon, Portugal.

Emerging from Portugal in Vigo, in the north, on July 27, we took a morning train to Santiago de Compastella and spent the day wondering the town along with the crowd of pilgrims that had come to hug Santiago de Compastella (Saint James). The church of St. James is large and pretty impressive, so we could complete our mini-pilgrimage there. After another overnight train, we found ourselves back in Madrid.

This time in Madrid, we got to see the Prado much more in depth, as well as seeing the Thyssen museum, which was an unexpected gem. These museums are large and our appreciation of good art had increased, so exploring them took pretty much the entire day. Jothi parted ways with us at this point to go to a friend’s wedding in northern Spain and then on to India. Deep was experiencing cinematic withdrawal (he’s from Westwood, the home of the world’s best movie theaters), so we went to see Armageddon with subtitles in Spanish that night.

The next day we caught an early train to Toledo. Toledo turned out to be a beautiful town full of famous arms and armor (I could not resist purchasing some swords and a full suit of armor for back home), the art of El Greco, several Sefardi Jewish sites, museums, churches, and an alcazar. It was a wonderful day and next morning exploring the town before heading back to Madrid and then on to El Escorial.

El Escorial is the Spanish answer to Versailles, and having seen both on the same trip, I like El Escorial better. Unfortunately, we did not see either completely (parts were closed, lack of time), but they are both quite grand and impressive. The main thing that swung me more towards El Escorial is that the art seemed a notch better and it did not seem as ridiculously overboard; though close.

After El Escorial, we returned to Madrid where Deep stayed to catch his flight the next morning, and I took a night train to Paris, France.