On the second day, we went this little old town outside of Madrid called Segovia. Even though the actual land isn’t any older than that of the “new” world, the past just seems more real here--it’s present in all of the museums and old buildings and landmarks. Even the countryside we saw driving out to Segovia seems pleasantly and unobtrusively rustic, which makes sense because the people living here have had centuries to break it in. Seriously, all of this history is giving me such a boner (figuratively speaking).
On the way to Segovia, you can kind of see the Valle de los Caídos, which is an impressive monument nestled in the hills that’s dedicated to all of the people that died in the Spanish Civil War. As good as it sounds, it’s a really controversial landmark because it was commissioned by Franco (to say that he’s not remembered fondly is to say that I kind of had some mild philosophical differences with my history professor last semester). Anyway, you can kind of see it in this picture:
So when we first got to Segovia, the first thing we saw was the two thousand year old Roman aqueduct. I mean, it’s obviously awe-inspiring because it’s still intact, but what really made my jaw drop is that this thing is still standing and they didn’t even use mortar, they just fit the stones together really well á la Linkin-Logs.
Segovia itself is a typical twisty-street, old-building European city like all of the ones in Tuscany that gave birth to the Italians’ love of mopeds. There were cars, of course--we even almost got run over a few times, exciting! 
The city is most famous I guess for being the home of Alcázar, which aside from being a precious Spanish national symbol for the nation’s valiant past also inspired the castle in Disneyland or something. I wish I could tell you more about the history of the castle itself, but I was kind of just marveling at all the old stuff during the tour and I only caught about half of what the tour guide was saying. The spirit of Isabel was basically embedded in the stone. If you don’t know much about her, she’s one of those badasses that makes the books despite being a woman--we can thank her for guiding her resistant husband with, “Yes, dear, I do think that it would be a good idea to sponsor Christopher Columbus.” (Ultimately, though, I suppose the discovery of the Americas was inherently male because Columbus only found it after trusting his stupid map and refusing to ask directions.) Basically Segovia was just a really cute little town I definitely would not mind visiting again.
Toledo, despite being the capital of Spain back in the day and equally saturated with history, wasn’t really what I thought it would be when we saw it the third day. When we first drove in, the town was swallowed up in a thick blanket of fog and unlike our previous days, it was cold. We saw the big cathedral and that was pretty cool, lots of old displays of wealth. They kept telling us about how Toledo was famous for being a tri-cultural city because at one time there were Christians, Muslims, and Jews living there together, but I kind of got a different impression considering that the only remains of the Muslims is the city wall and the only synagogue in town is actually a “synagogue-turned-church.” Also the Jewish sector of the city is filled with super narrow and twisty streets to, as our tour guide put it, “make fast escapes.” Doesn’t seem very embracing to me, but whatever. The fog finally cleared by the end of our cold stay and we drove to the traditional look-out point to see the city from afar--it was pretty cool!
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