Day 9

Day Nine: Wednesday, March 30^th.

We woke up bright and dearly today to get on the bus to take us to the glorious city of Toledo. Everyone was still exhausted and the 2 hour drive only aided our sleepiness, but nonetheless when we arrived we were all excited. Before we began our walking tour, we took a quick photo stop over looking part of the city and some ancient ruins (possibly Roman Baths).
We first stopped for a sword making presentation. It was really exciting to see the whole process. Afterward we went down to the gift shop area and once again did some souvenir shopping.
We then began our walk through the city with the most wonderful guide, Carlos. He gave us a personal connection to Toledo (he lives in town) as well as a great, historical information. Toledo is meant to be walked and we headed into the upper part of the city by taking an incredibly large (and expensive-2 million dollar to build) escalator.
We also visited Santa María la Blanca, an old Synagogue that was built by Muslims that is now a Christian church (talk about Holy Toledo). :) We visited oldest churches in Toledo, Cathedral of Saint Mary of Toledo. They say it took over 200 years to complete. And we were even able to view the original The Burial of the Count Orgaz by El Greco. Crazy.
We split into groups and we walked around the city for lunch and some final Toledo souvenir shopping.
Brian and I both fell in love with the city. We want to move there and live there forever!
We loaded back on the bus and headed back into Madrid.
We were a pretty tight schedule so when we arrived back in Madrid we headed straight for the Carrol de la Moreria to watch a live Flamenco Performance. We arrived with some time to spare so Brian and I went to look for a coffee, a bar/cafe had the most AMAZING cinnamon cappuccino in the world and I savored every second if it.
Finally the time for flamenco had arrived. We had been warned about the sweaty dancers and small stage, but none of that mattered. The performance was awesome. The dancers were phenomenal and the atmosphere was perfect. We later found out that this place has hosted it's fair share of celebrities including Natalie Portman, Mariah Carey, Samuel L Jackson, and Jude law. Fancy fancy.
The last stop was dinner. We drove back into the more centralized part of Madrid and walked around town until it was time for dinner. We ate at a very "popular in Spain" place called the Museo del Jamon. This place is a freaking meat museum, not vegetarian friendly might I add. The smell alone caused my body to tighten up, but luckily we were downstairs and the air was not as pungent. After trying to feed me ham twice they finally brought me an interesting egg dish. Weird, but tasty. I have chosen to forget/block out most of the Museo del Jamon experience.

After dinner it was obvious we all needed to get back to the hotel and get some sleep. So we all went to bed preparing our bodies for the 18 hours of travel ahead...