I’m going to ignore for the time being that I have left Madrid and that I won’t be returning. That doesn’t feel real yet. In fact, it’s interesting, since the last month I spent in Madrid was unlike any other, really it was so different it’s unbelievable.
Well first off, I’ll just give you all a brief summary of how I spent my time between when my mom and sister left to return back to Canada in early June and when I finally left Madrid on July 2nd. Essentially I spend most of my days on my own, since most of my friends had already taken off, though I did see friends and spend a fair bit of time with them as well. During this alone-time, however, I took advantage to go and visit museums, lots and lots of museums in Madrid. I also took the time to go on some trips, lasting no more than two days, but trips nevertheless in order to see some more of Spain before my eventual departure. And even after departing Madrid on July 2nd, I spent a week in Spain, in Valencia and Tarragona, before finally embarking on a bus journey from Barcelona to Toulouse and settling here, from where I am writing now, before continuing my summer.
So essentially, I visited Segovia, Salamanca, Santiago de Compostela, A Coruña, Valencia and Tarragona during my last month in Spain, and of course I did more exploring of Madrid and its surroundings, which I’ll talk about here too, but I will not yet discuss Madrid and how much this city means to me here, well not yet anyways.
So let’s start with my final explorations of MY city. I visited countless museums, among them an abandoned metro station, the train museum (museo del ferrocarril), a natural science museum, the Prado (again), the Thyssen-Bormeszina museum, just to name a few, and frankly I probably visited more just I don’t remember.
Here are a few photos, just to give you an idea:
Oh, and I visited the Circulo de Bellas Artes, probably the best lookout in the entire city!
Again, I’ll talk more about the profound effect this great city has had on my life at a later date, first I want to talk a little bit about my final trips through Spain before I came to France.
So, first off, I went to Segovia. They say this is the best day trip you can do from Madrid, and so naturally I left it to the last second, but hey I got it done in the end so it’s all that matters.
Segovia boasts several attractions. As any medieval city, it features a castle and a cathedral, some nice gardens and quaint small streets, however its main attraction and something that cannot be found just anywhere is its Roman aqueduct.
One day was enough for Segovia, nay, a few hours were enough for this city. In fact, even a few hours would have been enough for Salamanca, except I went there for two days, also partly to visit a friend, Daniela, who is the outgoing president of the organization I was selected president for next year, the Concordia Student Exchange Association. We became friends through this connection and she graciously gave me a nice tour of the city she was studying abroad in for the summer.
One thing to note, Salamanca is one religious city, perhaps the most religious one I’ve seen thus far, with convents literally at every street corner…
BTW, that dessert was probably one of the most amazing desserts I have eaten IN MY LIFE!! And that last image of food, that a hornazo, which is typical of Salamanca, essentially it’s a melange of cold cuts in a typical bread, delicious!
After Salamanca it was time to hit up Santiago de Compostela in the Galicia region. My Italian friend Amar and I headed up there, and it was supposed to be a two-day trip in the Galicia region. For those of you who don’t know, Galicia is the northernmost region in Spain, directly above Portugal. So we went to Santiago and quickly discovered that the city was tiny; it took about three hours to visit, so the following day we made plans to visit nearby A Coruña. Anyways, so I’ll talk about Santiago first. This city is the final stop of the famous Camino de Santiago, or in English it’s better known as the ‘Way of St. James.’ Essentially it’s one of the longest pilgrimage walks in the world, and could start on the East of the Pyrenees in France, though people doing this walk can start at any point and don’t necessarily need to start in France. Anyways Santiago is the final stop and thus also quite religious and glamorous.
To note that the architecture and accent in Galicia are really different. In fact, similar to in Catalunya, here they speak their own language, Galician, which is basically a mixture between Spanish and Portuguese, and the architecture actually strongly resembles Northern Portuguese architecture, reminding me a little bit of Porto, with all the houses being stuck together and kind of white-washed, nothing at all like the rest of Spain.
Meanwhile, the next day we went to A Coruña and the first impression of the city was quite poor. A Coruña looked boring and plain, as if nothing was really going on. It did, however, boast a cool tower, called Torre de Hercules, and we did later discover some cool architecture and some quaint streets to walk down, so it actually wasn’t all that bad at all.
Finally, about ten days after that, I left Madrid, for good. My last night in Madrid was amazing, I spent it at Cofi with some friends, including Myrthe who introduced me to the bar and was also leaving shortly, and Antonio was so sad to see us leave he kept preparing us free sangrias, truly the sweetest man ever.
Anyways, finally on Saturday July 2nd at 3 PM I left Madrid, accompanied by my Portuguese friend Filipa, and we caught at Blablacar and headed to Valencia for a beach vacation there. It was my second time in Valencia, however I did not get the opportunity to visit the downtown much during my first visit, so it was a good opportunity for me to get to know the city a little bit better. Oh, and once again, the Valencian beach was BEAUTIFUL (not like I have any pictures of it this time…)!
I had some paella while there as well, and that last picture is of fideua, also typical Valencian and it was delicious.
Finally, my last stop in Spain was to Tarragona. Not a spectacular city in terms of architecture, but it did feature a Roman forum, and its beaches were also incredible. Let’s just say my last week in Spain was a nice beach vacation, and the water was actually really warm!
I guess no better way to leave Spain, right, than to spend a week on the beach? I mean, in the year I spent living in Madrid I saw way more of Spain than I’ve ever seen of Canada (probably since the country is much smaller and it’s a lot cheaper to move around) and I must say that I have fallen in love with its culture, its customs, its food, its ambiance and pretty much everything there is to see there. I will soon write about how Madrid changed my life, but in the meantime it’s time to share how much I enjoyed the rest of the country.
I’m in France now living another amazing experiences, and I booked my flight home, August 22nd from Brussels, so Montreal, I guess we’ll see each other soon…
Dan.
Studying Abroad in Madrid!! 