Smaller Adventures, Segovia, and Salamanca

I hope you aren't tired after reading the last mega-post, because here's another large one. This one doesn't have as many pictures because I'm trying to test out if fewer pictures on the website ends up making it easier to upload media. After this post, we should be caught up on my life in Spain so far and I'll be back to regular, weekly posts!

After coming back from Sevilla, school has been pretty normal. We've continued rolling with material in classes, but from next week, we have lab sessions for classes also starting up. Since we only have a few lab session for most classes, we have to stay behind on Thursday evenings to do our labs. So I'm not looking forward to that next week.

However, this week, I got to go on a mini-excursion with ISA to Retiro Park. I've already been plenty of times and it's one of my favorite places in Madrid, but it was also nice having more of a guided tour through the park and learning some more about the historical aspects of it. I decided to walk over to the park because it was a beautiful day out but I wasn't exactly sure where to meet up with the group. I tried to follow the email instructions, but all they said was the metro stop for Retiro. When I got there, I quickly found out that it was a giant station and that there were multiple exits. Two of them were on the opposite side of the street I was on, so I walked all the way around, only to find no one I recognized. I walked back and forth for almost 10 minutes, before I noticed the 3rd exit, the one I needed to walk to. Turns out, before I had walked all the way around to cross the street, I was standing about 100 ft in front of where I needed to be. It ended up being okay though because I still ended up making it on time!

In Retiro, we got to visit the central "lake", called the Estanque Grande del Retiro, and also visited the museums that serve as special exhibitions for the Reina Sofía. One of them was the Palacio de Cristal, or Glass Palace. I had already visited this on one of my prior visits. At that time, we had seen the exhibit but right now, they were between exhibits. The other museum was the Palacio de Velázquez. They were also between exhibits so I didn't get to visit, but I really want to in the future! One thing I hadn't walked by earlier was the opposite side of the Glass Palace. The opposite side is actually home to Retiro's resident turtles! The turtles were super cute. We stopped for 10 minutes to watch them and it was really funny. All the turtles were on a ramp leading out of the water to land. They were trying to dry off. At the bottom of the ramp was a baby turtle. As a larger turtle tried to climb onto the ramp, it created more space by knocking the baby turtle off the ramp and into the water. It kept trying to climb back up onto the ramp but kept falling. The other really exciting thing about this visit to Retiro was that I got to boat in the Estanque Grande del Retiro! It was really relaxing and was the perfect activity in the weather!

The rest of the weekend ended up being very relaxing as I didn't do too much. The following week at school, I had my first lab session for Systems and Signals. It ended up being a really long day so by the time I got to lab at 7 pm, I was super tired. I had been at in class since 9 am with a total of 8 hours of class, and another 2 hours to go. However, it wasn't too bad because it was only working through five activities on Matlab. I hadn't used Matlab in a while but it wasn't hard to pick it back up.

On Friday, since I don't have classes, I also got to explore more of Madrid. I walked around the city and looked at different urban art. I primarily looked through the Lavapiés and Embajadores neighborhood, which is really close to El Rastro and a bit west of our house. There was a ton of really neat urban art. A lot of them at first glance seemed just that, but after I while I realized that there was a pattern. Most of them had some sort of message they wanted to send, typically for social change in some capacity. It was a very clever and impactful method of communicating and calling for change. Some of the works I saw included lots of murals by a community art group in Madrid, a mural of a woman airing laundry that also served as a sundial, and tile murals outside of Picasso's house!

This weekend also included our second day trip through ISA! This time we were heading to Segovia, about an hour north of Madrid. We needed to be at the Moncloa metro station ready to leave by 9:00 am so we had an early start to our Saturday. I made up that sleep on the bus ride to Segovia, so I was well rested for our day of adventuring. I woke up right as we arrived in Segovia. I was greeted by the Roman Aqueducts. It was my first time seeing one of them and I was amazed by them. Did you know there is nothing holding the stones in place? They stay in position just due to pressure and internal forces, which is super cool! At the aqueducts, we split off into 2 groups for our walking tour of the Old City. We were told of the history behind the city and saw cool structures, like an old prison, churches, the Jewish quarter, a statue of Juan Bravo, and Plaza Mayor. One of my favorite things though was seeing all the building facades. Each building had a design carved out of the plaster when being built that gave it a unique look. During our walking tour, we also got to see the Cathedral, although we didn't get to tour the inside.

During the walking tour, we were making our way over to Segovia's Alcázar, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It looks like a typical castle, and was actually an influence behind Disney's Cinderella Castle. It was initially a fortress but has also been used as a palace, a prison, and a military academy. It's located on a cliff, which was terrifying as we looked off the edge. I'm not a fan of heights and this definitely got to me, but the views were amazing.

After the Alcázar, we had some free time so we ate the delicious sandwiches our host mother, Zaida, packed for us. We spent the rest of the time walking around the city. On our way back to Madrid, we stopped by La Granja de San Ildefonso, a beautiful summer palace during Philip V's rule. We walked around the gardens for about an hour and just enjoyed the beauty of nature. The gardens seemed to extend indefinitely into the mountains.

I got to wrap up this super fun weekend with another trip to El Rastro, the outdoor market held every Sunday morning. I didn't buy anything but it was fun to walk around and browse again. I'm still on the hunt for good souvenirs and gifts!

The next week of classes weren't bad. For a couple of our classes, we've moved into some review because we have exams coming up. On Wednesday, we typically only have one class: Transport Phenomena. However, our professor emailed us two hours before class to cancel, so I got an extra day of rest in! My favorite part of this next weekend however, and probably of this entire trip was Perrotón! Perrotón is a marathon for dogs and their owners that seeks to promote adoption. It was a run against abandonment. As most of you know, saying I love dogs is a pretty big understatement. So early Sunday morning, we took the bus to Plaza de Colón. We ended up getting off at the wrong stop and as we walked the rest of the way, we saw another marathon as well! Perrotón was in a part of town I'd never been to but I didn't really get to explore because I was too distracted by ALL the GOOD BOIS. I took so many photos of all the doggos! It was perfect and I loved it! I got to pet a good brown doggo named Trufa, meaning truffle! Brennan also got me a t-shirt, bag, and bandana to remember the event. Two nice people also let me take photos with their dogs when they found out I didn't have one!

After Perrotón, Brennan and I went to Chocolatería San Ginés, a 125-year-old chocolate shop famous for their churros con chocolate. It was cheap and definitely did not disappoint. It was hands down the best churros y chocolate I've ever had. Usually there are lines of people waiting for a table, but we were lucky to barely beat the rush and get seats right away. I got six delicious, hot, fluffy, and crunchy churros straight out of the oven with a cup of hot, perfectly melted, not too sweet chocolate. As soon as I finished, I was looking forward to coming back. It was definitely the perfect Sunday.

Now, I needed to start studying for exams. I have two next week and two more in the week after. However, this weekend we have a trip to Salamanca! This is the first of our two weekend trips through ISA. We leave early Friday morning and come back Sunday evening, just in time for me to watch the Colts play! My first two exams are in Systems and Signals and Biomechanics. They test a lot more on theory here so it'll be interesting to see how the exams go.

Early Friday morning, we left to meet the rest of our ISA group at the Moncloa metro station to go to Salamanca. It was supposed to be rainy and colder the whole weekend so that was a bit disappointing but I was still really looking forward to it! On our way to Salamanca, we stopped at San Lorenzo de El Escorial. This was about an hour bus ride northwest of Madrid. El Escorial is a monastery. It was really cool to get a walking tour through the building but unfortunately, photography was prohibited so I only have pictures from the outside. Half of the building is still used as a monastery while the other half is used as a school! We even got to see the library, which was fascinating because it had all the original, old books! My favorite part of the library was the organizational system. They separated different subjects, which were identified through murals on the ceiling. Another fun fact was that all the spines of the books were pointed toward the back of the shelves, instead of pointing out to be able to read the titles.

Once we got to Salamanca (and yes I did sleep the whole ride there), we got to check into our hotel. Turns out, we had a 5-star hotel booked for the entire weekend! The hotel was very nice, the best one I've ever stayed at. The bathroom was even awesome; it had a giant glass door bathtub/shower with jets! The only downside, and this is going to sound like such a first-world problem, was the slow WiFi. I wanted to study for the two exams I had on the Monday and Tuesday immediately after the trip, but I couldn't even get into my class portals to download practice material. After we got settled in, a group of us decided to walk around the city and explore. We walked to Plaza Mayor, explored a couple cafes, and ended up getting dinner at Goiko Grill, a burger restaurant. Plaza Mayor had a book fair going on so lots of vendors were selling books. Apparently, you have to make reservations at Goiko but we didn't know that. They still let us dine without reservations after a pretty comic exchange. They asked us for our name to check the reservation list, but Brennan accidentally said he didn't have a name instead of he didn't have a reservation.

After dinner, we returned to the hotel and I attempted to do practice problems from files I already had. The next day, we got up early and went to the restaurant, located on top floor of the building, for breakfast. They had everything, from a continental breakfast to more of a Spanish breakfast. I grabbed continental breakfast and a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. I even got to eat cereal for the first time since I've been here! Then we got ready to leave for our walking tour. It was still raining, but the rain cleared up after a little bit. We had a historical tour of the city and saw sites such as Casa de las Muertes, Monterrey Palace, Casa de las Conchas, Pontifical University of Salamanca, the University of Salamanca, and the Cathedral (old and new). Seeing the University of Salamanca, the oldest university in Spain and the third oldest in the world, was probably my favorite part. The architects sculpted into the plaster on the facades of the building, just like Segovia. However, they would hide different symbols into it. One is the famous frog on a skull. The legend goes that if students can spot the symbol when they first arrive at the university, they'll have great academic success. The University of Salamanca also houses Cielo de Salamanca, or Salamanca's Sky. It's a cieling mural painted in the 15th century that was discovered when they were attempting to renovate in the 1900s. It was painted by Fernando Gallego and shows the sky with stars and various Zodiac signs. Photography was prohibited so I can't do it justice.

The Cathedral of Salamanca is really two cathedrals joined together - the old and the new. It was absolutely beautiful. We also got to climb up and check out the view from various terraces. We didn't tour the inside of the cathedral but we got a look at the inside as we climbed up. We happened upon a wedding at the perfect time too - just as the bride was walking down the aisle! It was very exciting to see.

After our tour, we had free time, but we got tickets to see an Art Deco and Nouveau museum. It was pretty neat to see some of the exhibits but I didn't really enjoy it as much as I had expected. After the museums, we got some lunch and had free time. We relaxed a little bit in the hotel before heading out again to check out some of the shops in the city. We didn't buy anything but it killed some time. Once we had enough, we tried finding a good place to eat dinner, but everything seemed to require a reservation or didn't have an vegetarian options for me. Ultimately, a couple people at a little diner we found, while I ordered Domino's and brought it back to the hotel. I tried getting more studying done that night but wasn't too successful.

The next morning, we once again were treated to a wonderful breakfast, but our time in Salamanca was coming to an end. We left to make our way back to Madrid, stopping in Ávila to walk on the medieval city walls. However, because of the weather, we decided to leave earlier and only stay for an hour or so. We walked along the wall, which was very bumpy and definitely a worse tripping hazard than Richmond's sidewalks. I wasn't hungry but others were so they grabbed lunch, and we explored Plaza Mayor and stopped to buy souvenirs before heading back to the bus.

Once we got back to Madrid, instead of doing the smart thing and studying for my exams, I decided to watch the Colts game instead! After that, it was exam time. Monday's exam, Systems and Signals, wasn't really that bad. It was a lot of theory but it ended up going really well. Tuesday's, however, was not at all fun. In Biomechanics, we only got 40 minutes for our exam. It was two questions, the first worth 70% and the second worth 30%. The first problem had five parts and the last two parts themselves were wroth 40%. I got through the first three parts of problem 1 and problem 2 just fine, but I'm pretty sure I messed up my math on parts four and five of problem 1. I still don't know whether or not I failed the test, but my gut tells me I did. I was pretty upset at this for a while, and honestly still am. But it was time to focus so that the same thing didn't happen again for my next two exams. This week I also had two labs, one for Instrumentation and one for Biomechanics, so my Thursday ended up being long. I had classes from 9 am to 9 pm with only an hour break. Instrumentation lab was fine, but we started learning about Finite Element Modeling in Biomechanics, which isn't fun going into the 10th and 11th hour of class for the day. Although I was exhausted, I still had an interesting time with FEM. I got to sleep in on Friday and relax so it ended up being okay.

Friday, I also got to go on another mini-excursion with ISA to the Palacio Real. It was so cool! I couldn't take photos inside but I got a decent one from the outside. The palace was beautiful, but I definitely preferred it at sunset. Here's a photo comparing it in sunlight to a photo I took earlier this trip at sunset (the photos are on opposite sides of the building since I couldn't get inside the courtyard without tickets before)!

The inside of the palace was super neat. It has over 3000 rooms, each with at least one clock, some with two or even three. During the tour, we went through close to 50 rooms, seeing over 200 clocks. They also house five Stradivarius violins used in concerts on special occasion. This is the largest collection in a singular location in the world. My favorite part of the palace was that no two rooms were the same. Each room was unique in it's material and color. There was a room made entirely of porcelain, another entirely of silk, and so many more. It was amazing! After the main palace, we also saw the armory. I had a really good time.

The rest of the weekend was spent relaxing and studying for my Instrumentation and Transport Phenomena exams. I'm happy to say that those exams went much, much better than Biomechanics did. Now that I'm done with midterms, I can relax a bit more, until the end of November, when we have round two of exams. This second round will be a lot tougher because we have an ISA trip to Granada the weekend before, and this time, I have three exams in two days.

Anyways, I apologize for the two consecutive long blog posts. There's been a lot that has happened in the past month and I haven't been able to post because of media upload issues. If you've had the patience to stick and read through the two blogs, thank you! I'll be going back to the weekly blog updates from now so make sure to subscribe if you haven't already! If you want to see more pictures, definitely let me know!

Hasta la próxima semana!