Day 66: Segovia, Spain

Today's "business" (as Frank would say) was a day trip to Segovia, a city 54 miles northwest of Madrid famous for it's Roman aqueduct. We figured out how to get there by bus and arrived around 11am. This was one of the views from the bus:




We went straight to the aqueduct, which is extremely impressive. It was built some time around the end of the first century AD and was constructed without the use of any mortar or cement. According to our guide book, it is over 800m long, has 166 arches and 120 pillars, and at its highest point is 30m (98 ft) tall. For some reason there were a ton of birds (swallows, maybe?) constantly flying back and forth all around the area - those are the black specks you see in the sky in this picture.




We walked the entire length of the aqueduct and found this structure at one end. No idea what it is but Frank climbed up anyway. The aqueduct isn't in use anymore but from up there you could see the top hollowed out area where the water used to flow.




Here is another view of our favorite sight in Segovia:




Here are the birds:





This is the Plaza del Azoguejo which is directly beneath the main portion of the aqueduct.




Here is a random door that I liked:




Maybe tied for first place as our favorite Segovia sight is the amazing Gothic cathedral in the Plaza Mayor (main plaza) of the city. At the end of long day of walking and sightseeing, we found a bench in the Plaza with a view of the cathedral and just sat and read/wrote postcards.




For lunch, we found a place with outdoor seating in the Plaza Mayor and enjoyed the fabulous weather and some very cold Mahou beers. [See if you can spot Frank in this picture.]




This is the Iglesia de San Esteban (Church of St. Steven) which has a beautiful 12th century tower.




This is the view of the surrounding countryside outside the city walls.




Our last major sightseeing activity was to visit the Alcazar, which is a castle that was supposedly used as the model for the original Disneyland castle in California. The guidebook describes the castle as "a bit of a sham" because, although it originally was built in the 14th and 15th centuries, the whole thing burned down in 1862 and was rebuilt "as a deliberately hyperbolic version of the original". It's still fun to see and we had a great view from the towers.

Here's a view of the castle with some guy in the way.




This is a view out of one of the Alcazar windows.




This was taken from one of the towers looking down onto the gardens:




After visiting the Alcazar, we wandered more around Segovia which has fabulous small windy streets, very typical of old European cities.




We found a random plaza area with a fountain to rest for a little while. Far in the distance there is Frank working on some postcard writing.




This is a random window that we saw in our wanderings:




Here is another view of the cathedral in the Plaza Mayor where we ended our visit.




Here we are getting back on the bus to Madrid. After lengthy fiddling around with the computer, the nice guy at the ticket office was able to get us on an earlier return bus. We absolutely loved Segovia but 5 hours of walking around in the 97 degree weather was enough for us...



The most amazing thing in all of this is that somehow Frank managed to convince me to use buses as a mode of transportation...

Tomorrow we get another Madrid relaxation day before we attempt another excursion on Monday.

ILM