Trip to Toledo

Okay, a side trip to Toledo is a must if you are in Madrid. So we planned an early morning train sight see the day spend the night and then hang out until about 1:00pm then the train back to Madrid and on to Valencia.  Why Valencia?  Read the next installment?

Okay, out of the apartment and a walk to the train station. Good news is no rain, the sun is out. All is great when the gods of travel start to intervene.   Get to the major street in front of the train station and it is cordoned off. Seems there is some type of marathon or something. The street monitor suggested we haul the bags down to the metro station and come up the other side. I told her no. They were too heavy. We just waited for a break between runners. They were pretty spaced apart so it was easy.

Finally determine how to buy a ticket and the machine has no way to insert a credit card. It has some sort of optical reader.  Now to the ticket office.  I buy the round trip ticket and the early train ended up getting to Toledo at 1PM.  So much for an early start.  Also on the way to Toledo I figured out we had 3 more horse to see some of the town.  Back to the ticket office in Toledo and surprise of surprises the changed the time and didn’t even charge us.

Toledo is built on a hill with the train station outside the city walls.  Needless to say it was the best 6 euro we spent.  Dropped off at the hotel door. We had several things to see that were closed on Monday.  Toledo is like a rabbit warren of curved streets that are all cobbled and seemed to be all uphill.  

Every single shopped was selling knives or swords including decorative and kitchen knives. We found the museum of tortures and of medieval machines of war. As we worked our way back to the center of the city we stopped to see the cathedral.  This is the oldest one in Spain but 10 euros each to enter is a little steep especially after waiting in line for 25 minutes to buy a ticket.  It was beautiful and even had a move describing how gothic style cathedrals were built.  Unfortunately. I think we are both church and museumed out and we still have one more city to go.  We bypass the alcazar and will see it in the morning since it is closed on Wednesday. We also have to have something to do since are train doesn’t leave until 1:25pm

So today up packed and off to the museum.  Of course closed on Monday.  I found another museum that was converted from a hospital that had a great mix of displays, we checked out the shops, back to the hotel to get our bags since Dan was not into another city tour and did not want to navigate up and down hills. We get the cab back to the station. Funny how it cost 1.5 euro more to get back.  Because Dan always needs to be early we get to the station 1 hour and 10 minutes before I train is to leave.  I guess it is better than missing it. We have one more day in Spain and Dan is getting antsy, not to mention cathedraled out!