While I was in Paris I "had" to visit Disneyland. I brought a friend with me. We had a great time. It was sort of sureal because some things were the same as California and Florida, but many were different. There were not many people in the parks that day so it was nice because the lines were short. 
I then walked down to the Louvre, but it was closed. I did not realize that it was a bank holiday in France. I then continued through the parks the lead to the Champs-Élysées. Once I got to the street I was a bit disappointed because all of the stores were also closed. So I continued and then saw the Arc de Triomphe. Later that night I met some nice English speaking people and we made plans to go to Versailles the next day.
At Versailles waited in line for 2 hours just to buy tickets. So two people went and bought sandwiches for all of us while waited. Inside the château we were amazed at the grand splendor of all rooms. The paintings were spectacular. We saw King Louis’s room as well as Marie Antoinette’s room. It was so amazing. After the palace we went to the gardens. They were my favorite part of the entire place. The gardens went on forever, they are so huge. At one point we got lost inside. There are several fountains and even a lake with row boats.
We returned to Paris in time to eat dinner and then we headed off to the Eiffel Tower. We waited in line to buy tickets to go up in the Eiffel Tower. Lucky for us we were the last group of the night to be able to go all the way to the top. I was so excited as we got on the elevator that I was jumping up and down. The views from the top were amazing. The tower was beautiful and loved every minute of it. We took the elevator down to the second level and then walked down the stairs (there are so many). By this time the public transportation was closing so we rented some bike and took a ride home. It was magnificent because we drove by all the sites as they were illuminated. 
After Cordoba we boarded another train and went to Seville. I had been there for Semana Santa, but did not see the tourist attractions. In the afternoon we walked around the town and saw the wonderful Plaza de España. It is a large building in a half circle with a fountain in the middle. The plaza was built in 1929 when Seville hosted the Spanish-American Exhibition. After that we walked by the river and did a bit of shopping.
I also went to another cathedral, La Sagrada Familia, which is even more famous. Construction began in 1882 and still continues. The famous architect, Antoni Gaudi devoted many years of his life to this immense project and designed each part of it with a special significance. It is an absolutely magnificent piece of artwork. Every aspect of the building is covered in detail. The outside has 2 facades with a third one being constructed at the moment. The Nativity façade and the Passion façade both depict several scripture passages. I walked past each one several times and each time I came across something new that I did not see before. Inside the nave, (most of it was blocked off by scaffolding) it has the appearance of being under trees. It is quite imaginative. There are two sets of stained glass that have been put into place, both of which are beautiful and fill the inside with wonderful bright colors. 
Gaudi’s plan calls for several towers dedicated to different people such as Christ, Mary, the evangelist, etc. Some of the towers have already been built while others are in the process. I took an elevator to the top of an existing tower. I was able to view different parts of the cathedral up close. I also had a wonderful view of the city. I then walked down the stairs of the tower, there are about 400. The current team has scaled back on some of Gaudi’s original plans and hope to be completed by 2025. I would love to return and see it completed.
I also visited another one of Gaudi’s works the Casa Botlla. It is a house that Gaudi was commissioned to remodel. It was a beautiful house with so many interesting aspects. There are almost no straight walls throughout the entire house, and each room was designed for a specific purpose with special attention paid to lighting. The house was interesting and beautiful at the same time. 
Also in the procession there are giant floats that are carried by 30-40 men. These usually depict something like Jesus carrying the cross, Jesus crucified, Jesus being taken down from the cross, etc. In every procession there are two different floats that have the Blessed Mother. In front of the float there are usually about 4 men that carry incents. Each procession is different and as it passes each church they add something different. It is an extremely peaceful experience because of respect everyone is quiet as each float passes. It is amazing to see the thousands of people, from infants to the elderly in wheelchairs, whom line the streets each time. It was an incredible experience. 
After London I went back to Madrid and took a high speed train to Malaga. The train reached speeds up to 302 km/hr (187.7 mph). We stayed in a town outside of Malaga on the coast with beautiful beach (it reminded me of California). I only spent 2 days there and it was extremely relaxing. One of the days we took an excursion to near by town that was recommended to us. It is a typical Andalucian town up in the hills overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. The town was small and quiet but enjoyable. There were some incredible views of the surrounding area. At one point I was able to see Africa in the distance. I end my stay in this area with by spending a few hours in the city of Malaga. I did not like it that much. I felt that it was dirty and boring. Other than Malaga I enjoyed the few days in the most southern part of Spain.
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It was a holiday weekend in Spain so I headed up north with my host family. We stayed in their house there. The house and the area was beautiful. It was very green and things were a lot more spread out than in Madrid. It was extremely relaxing. The weather was a bit cooler but not too bad. The first day we went to a Dinosaur Museum in their small town of Salas de los Infantes. It was extremely interesting because I had no Idea that dinosaurs roamed Spain and that they have remains barried in the area. We took a few small excursions to small towns so that I could get the feel of how life is in the Spanish country side. We also visited a cloister of Santo Domingo de las silas which is famous for Gregorian Chants, and because it was a feast day they opened up vespers to the community so we attened. 
The following day we went to the largest city around which is Burgos. We walked around the realtively small city and visited the cathedral. I found the cathedral to be extremely interesting because the architecture style has been changed three times, Roman, Gothic, and Baroque, which each coresponding time period.The cathedral was beautiful and much larger than I had expected.
The following day we made a 2 hour drive to the BASQUE Country, everyone thinks it is dangerous because it is home to the terrorist group ETA. This is my favorite part of Spain.... it was so gorgeous. We visited the city of Bilbao. The city was wondeful and I loved it. While we where there we visited the world famous Guggenheim Museum. We also walked around and a family friend that lives in the city gave us a tour. The next day we made our back to Madrid. It was a wonderful weekend and I am so thankful that my host family invited me to spend it with them. 
Saturday began at around 8:30am (we had a lot to get done). We ate a quick breakfast hat was provided by our hostel. During breakfast one a girl gave us a crash course on Portuguese pronunciation, it is similar to French. Next we headed to the train station to go about 30 minutes north of Lisbon to the small town of Sintra.
The views were absolutely spectacular. Words and even pictures do not begin to do justice to this experience. It was like being on top of the world, and I could have stayed up there forever. The only downfall was that it was warm so all of us were wearing sandals which made it a bit difficult to climb up and down stone stairs. Also, we were in a garden taking a picture and some wild plant attacked my foot and gave it stinging sensation. I had a first aid kit so I put some ointment on it and it was fine. When we were finished with the Castle we caught the bus going downhill and this was an experience all in its own. The driver was going down steep paths, but he did not really believe in using breaks so we were flying down the hill, probably much faster than we should have been. It was a tad scary for us because on side of the road it was like cliff dropping almost straight down. Thank God we made it back to the bottom.
Then we walked to a 19th century palace that housed some sort of a colt. It was sort of interesting, but at the same time creepy. There were all kinds of secret doors and passageways. In the library there were mirrors on the floor to give the appearance that the shelves went down to the floor below it and that you would fall through. It sort of reminded me of the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland. 
However there was a beautiful chapel and gardens. The gardens covered several acres with greenery, including palm trees. We could not spend much time here because we wanted to make sure that we were able to make to the next stop.
So we got on the bus and headed for Cascais, a beach town. I loved this place, it reminded me of California. There many people on the beach playing, laying out in the sun, swimming, and of course surfing. We just walked along the shore and then at one point just sat and watched the ocean and the people. It was extremely relaxing, just what I needed. I was able to touch the Atlantic Ocean from Europe. We watched the sunset over the Atlantic and then we took the train back to Lisbon.
Once we were in Lisbon we took the Elevador de Santa Justa. It was built in the early 1900’s. It was designed by an apprentice of Gustave Eiffel, the architect of the Eiffel Tower. The elevator took us to the top were we had great views of Lisbon at night. Then we went back and had another wonderful dinner with friends at our hostel. 
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This weekend I made a journey to Portugal not knowing what to expect. It was not exactly at the top of my list of places to visit in Europe. Words cannot express how wonderful it was. There is so much to write that I have decided to split it up into 3 entries, one for each day. 
When we landed it was beautiful weather, sunny, clear skies and about 78 degrees. We took a bus from the airport to our hostel, Living Lounge. When I think of "hostel" the picture that comes to mind does not resemble this place one bit. It was gorgeous, so clean, just wonderful, better than some hotels I have stayed in. We put our stuff down and headed out to explore the city.
Portugal's discoveries throughout the world. Now looking out onto the river there is a bridge that looks identical to the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, it is the sister bridge. It was commissioned to be built during the reign of a dictator in 1965, and is now named "Ponte 25 de Abril" (Bridge of April 25) which marked the day that ended dictatorship in Portugal in 1974. After admiring the bridge we headed down the river to the Belem tower. Torre de Belém was built in the 16th century to provide protection for the city and has been used for other things over the years. It is now a monument and we were planning on going up in the tower. When we got to the door there was a sign that said "Closed - workers on strike". So we were not able to go on top of it. After a few hours we decided to head back. This journey turned out to take much longer than expected. 
Estrela, the first church in the world to be dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. When we arrived we could not just look inside because they had just started mass. So we decided to go to mass and this way we would also be able to see the church. Well it was in Portuguese so knew what was going on, but did not know the words that were being said. It was interesting. During the sign of peace we picked up on how to say peace in Portuguese and so we said it to the others around us. Following mass we headed back to the hostel for dinner. The cooked us a wonderful meal and we met new friends, some from the U.S., others from Ireland, and some from France. This would soon become the closing of our eventful yet ejoyable first day in Lisbon.
That is correct; I ate in the oldest restaurant in the world. The Guinness Book of World Records has given this title to this restaurant. It was founded in 1725 in the heart of Madrid and given the name Casa Botin. It is said that the famous Spanish artist, Goya, washed dishes before he made it big as a painter. Hemingway ate at here and 
claimed to be the best. I went with my friends Jessica and Kondi and we had a wonderful dinner. I ate one of their specialties, cordero, roasted baby lamb. It was spectacular, so rich with flavor. I am not sure it was the best meal I have ever had, but it certainly was historic. Also the service in this restaurant was the best that I have encountered in all of Spain, top notch. After we were finished eating and just prior to us departing the waiter asked if we would like to see the original wood burning oven, which is still used today. So he showed us to the kitchen and we were able to go inside and see it. This restaurant was small, but quite charming.
Madrid is well known for its Prado Museum, which features one of the world's finest collections of European art. It contains over 1,300 paintings as well as other pieces that range from the 12th-19th centuries. Most of the artist are Spanish, some of the most famous include: Goya, El Greco, and Diego Velázquez.
I went on a day adventure on Friday to Segovia. It is about 1.5 hours outside of Madrid. The trip began with us going to the train station and finding out that the ticket price had doubled since the night before. So we decicded to take a bus instead which left from the other side of town. We got on the Renfe Cercanias (it is a mix between metro and commuter rail). The line we went on goes in a loop, but we did not know that the direction we were headed was a lot longer than the other direction so we passed through deserted areas that probably were not even in Madrid.
So we arrived in Segovia and our first stop was the aqueducts. They were absolutely marvelous. These aqueducts were built by the Romans at the end of the first century and do not have mortar or braces holding them together. They reach up 11o feet off the ground... just amazing. There was a road that used to go through it, but it is closed because the air polution was harming the aqueduct. I think this is one of the oldest thing I have seen.
Next we headed to Alcazar. It was built on a Roman temple and expanded several times. It was later used as prison for 2 centuries and then a royal artillery school, in which there was a fire that gutted the place in 1862. It was immediately reconstructed. The silhouette is believed to have been a
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