As previously mentioned, I'd gone to bed early the night before because I had to be up early the next morning. This was why. I got up at 6:30am to make it to the Fundación by 8:00am. I wanted to leave time to check Facebook, eat leisurely and whatnot. I caught the bus at 7:30am and was at the Fundación by 7:50am. I found Elle and we headed down to meet the rest of the group.
We left the Fundación at 8:15am to meet the bus that would take us to Madrid. It was an hour ride there and I'm pretty sure that I was sleep for most of it (as was Elle). We finally got off the bus around 10:00am and waited in line to go see the inside of the Palacio Royal. The line was long (and in the sun), but we were soon inside the courtyard taking pictures. Not long after that, we started our tour of the rooms. They were amazing! My favorite was the king's "dressing room". The king and queen literally had rooms for everything... Dressing, eating, sleeping, greeting. You name it and I bet there was a room specifically dedicated to it. But the dressing room was amazing. The wall and carpets and everything had designs that were meant to create the illusion of movement. Kind of like the book "Sarah's Room" I was so in love with as a kid (Mommy, I bet you remember what I'm talking about!). It was amazing.
After the tour, we got back on our buses and got a brief driving tour of the city. Those of us with Arcadia had seen it all before, so we kind of just dozed off and vaguely listened. I'm not sure anyone was really listening because we all knew that lunch was coming next! The place we ate lunch was called "Museo de Jamón" (Museum of Ham). Strange name for a restaurant, yes? I thought so. Anyhow, ironically, they served us the Spanish equivalent of chicken nuggets and French fries. We all thought it was pretty funny. They were good though!
Once we were done, we were allowed to leave to either go somewhere for the weekend or to go have free time until 6pm (when we were meeting to come back to Toledo). Elle and I already knew how we were going to use that time. Our first stop was to the Puerta de Acala. I can't remember exactly what the story was behind it, but Elle really wanted a picture, so we stopped and got her picture. Our next stop was the Parque del Retiro. It was really really pretty. It was very similar to Central Park in New York: a little piece of paradise in the middle of a city. Elle took more pictures, we rested for a little bit (our feet were killing us) and then we headed back to the Puerta del Sol to take a picture of the hotel we stayed at the first two nights in Spain. We took the picture, wandered into a few stores, and then caught the metro back to the Plaza de España were we were supposed to meet. We were there 45 minutes early, so we browsed the little shops that were set up all along the plaza. Elle ended up buying 2 scarves and I bought a soda. Shows our priorities, huh? :P
At 6:00pm we left Madrid and headed back to Toledo. But before we left, I realized I really needed to pee. I asked Yuki (one of our professors) if there was a bathroom nearby. She said not really, but to go run to Starbucks and use theirs. I was hesitant because, at least in the U.S., you need to have bought something in order to use their restrooms. She assured me that I would be fine. So I ran across the street to check. It turns out that in order to get into the restrooms, you need a number that they provide on the bottom of the receipt. Those tricky Starbucks people... What I ended up doing was asking someone for their receipt so I could use the bathroom. Fortunately the person I asked was really nice and let me steal her receipt. I went to the bathroom and ran back to the bus. We left only a few minutes after 6:00pm.
We made it back to Toledo exactly at 7:00pm. I stayed at the Fundación for half an hour to double check some stuff for my trip this weekend and headed to the bus stop about 7:30pm to head home. I got here around 8:00pm and my "mom" had left dinner for me on the table. It was really good. AND (you aren't going to believe this...): IT HAD MUSHROOMS! I don't know what she did to them, but they were delicious! After dinner, I read a little bit for my Literature class and part way through the reading, my "parents" came home and my "mom" and I watched TV for a bit and then I went to bed, because I had to get up early to go to Granada the next morning. Yipeeeeeeeee....
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