Aqueducto! (no, it is not a Harry Potter spell...)

Since yesterday was Father's Day in Spain we had a day off. I love days off, you would think that a 3-day weekend is enough for me, but you'd be wrong. I'm actually quite lazy and like to have as many free days as possible. If a 3-day weekend is nice a 4-day weekend is better, right? Right. Glad we cleared that up.

Contrary to my lazy tendencies, I used my free day to go on a little trip. Emphasis on the "little." Audrey, Eimear, Blair and I all took the bus an hour and half north east to the touristy town of Segovia. I had been to Segovia last time I was in Spain, but it is truly adorable, so I didn't mind going again. Segovia is known for two things, the Roman Aqueduct and the Alcazar. We disembarked at the bus station and walked to the aqueduct. It was an enjoyable walk along some narrow streets to the plaza at the base of the aqueduct. The aqueduct was built around 50 BC by the Romans and uses no mortar at all, only gravity and geometry are holding the stones together.

After the aqueduct we made our way to the Plaza Mayor. Every Spanish town has a Plaza Mayor; this is because that is where victims of the Inquisition professed the Autos de Fé (basically Oaths of Faith) and if their performance was deemed unsatisfactory by the powers that be they would be killed. Legend has it that if you look hard enough in the Plaza Mayor in Madrid you can find antique blood splatter; I have yet to see any.

From the Plaza we toured the Cathedral, which to be honest wasn't all that impressive. I've seen my fair share for Churches and Cathedrals since coming to Europe and this one didn't wow me. It was nice, but it wasn't jaw-dropping.

The next few hours of the trip were eaten up by Audrey and my search for lunch. We wanted to eat in a restaurant, as we were on mini-vacation and she wanted to try the traditional Cochinillo, or baby pig. We spent at least an hour walking around trying to find a restaurant with a menú del día. We tried two places just off of the plaza, but one had an hour wait for a table and the other didn't have a menú. Finally we ended up at a nice, but a little expensive, place on the plaza. Unfortunately, Segovia is built up around promoting its cuteness as a tourist town and there are few restaurants outside of the plaza or main tourist paths. Nonetheless we enjoyed out lunches and conversation while Blair and Eimear had a picnic in the sun. Suckers.

After lunch Audrey and I walked passed the Antonio Machado Casa-Museo, which is basically a room the poet rented for a while in Segovia. Sadly the building was under construction and thus looked a little sad. Also, we couldn't find anyone working there, so any hope of going on the half-hour tour was shot to hell.

At the end of the day we walked to the Alcazar to see about going in, but the wait was long and I had been on the tour two years ago so we bailed on that and went in search of the traditional Segovian pastry, ponche. When we got to the bakery, Eimear and I noticed that ponche was the same thing Ana the school secretary had brought to a school party a few weeks ago. Since we had already tried the traditional pastry we opted for something else. I had a delicious, chocolaty brownie in honor of my dear friend Maja.

Then we went to walk a section of the aqueduct and returned to the bus station for our ride back. It was an enjoyable day in an adorable little town.