Today was our first “day trip” during our vacation.
Segovia is located about 50 miles northwest of Madrid and makes it an ideal one day visit as it only takes about an hour to get there by bus.
I was particularly interested in Segovia because I wanted to see the Roman aqueduct that still stands there.
To get to the bus station we had to take the Metro, the underground subway system in Madrid. No big deal, right? WRONG!
I don’t think I fully appreciated Cynthia’s fear of the underground until today. I knew she was not fond of the subway from our trip to Paris but I learned the hard way that Cynthia’s literally terrified of being underground. She’s got no problem being up on a rickety ladder hanging a quilt or whatever, but get her in a subway station and she can get rather freaked out.
To get to the bus station we would have to catch the subway train to the Principe Pio stop which entailed one transfer. It was quite a journey with poor Cynthia nearly hyperventilating the whole way.
Once we reached Principe Pio she was fine. The fresh air reinvigorated her and we headed over to the bus station, bought our tickets and boarded the bus to Segovia.
We were laughing and having a good time when all of a sudden the bus entered a tunnel. It was quite a long tunnel and again Cynthia was a bit freaked out.
We cleared the tunnel and before long we were pulling into the bus station in Segovia.
The weather was threatening to rain all day. Menacing clouds gathered above the mountain tops and the day bounced back and forth from cloudy to sunny. I think this made for an interesting day of photography.
Right as you walk into the city center you see this wonderful old church
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If you look in the upper right-hand corner you can see the cathedral in the background
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All very nice, but the main attraction IS the aqueduct
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So exciting that even William the Sheep needed to have his picture taken in front of it
We checked it out and then walked on to have a closer look at the cathedral. It’s more Gothic than you can imagine!
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From there it was on to the Alcazar
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We opted not to pay the entry fee to take the tours and just enjoyed the spectacular weather and scenic views
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After that, we headed back to our hotel in Madrid. Cynthia did much better in the tunnel and on the subway. I think that now that she understands it a bit better we’ll have less trouble. This is good since we have to utilize it for two more day trips from Madrid alone…