Segovia

For our second excursion everybody went to Segovia! It's not too far north of Valladolid and had several fascinating landmarks. The first thing I saw when I got off the bus was this giant bridge thing made completely of stone arches. I quickly learned that it was not a bridge at all, but an ancient Roman aqueduct built completely of giant, hand-carved stones without morter! My friends and I stared at it for awhile just trying to fathom how perfectly preserved it is, and how intricate a task it would be building something like that. Incredible.

We also got to visit the humungous Alcazar of Segovia. It is literally built like a fortress with a deadly moat, draw bridge and towering walls. The Alcazar eventually become the home of the Catholic Kings (Isabel and Ferdinand) and contains cannons, beautiful tapestries, knights in shining armor, spiral staircase towers, and luxurious decor, and gorgeous stain glass windows. It was quite the experience climbing to the top of the Alcazar. The view was breathtakingly beautiful and like the one in Seville had a lot of moorish influence. The ceiling inside was beyond words impressive. Hand-carved ornamentation and geometrically perfect tesselations. I know K^2 would have been fascinated by them too :)I wish I could have got a good photo of them, but my camera wouldn't snap a good picture. Nonetheless! I managed to kind a decent picture of them online (here's the link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/monster/219275112/ )

I'll be writing again soon about my soccer experience! :) I don't have the photos as of the moment. Pero soon.