We leave Barcelona on a fast AVE train to Madrid. Nice to see some of the countryside from the train window after being in two large cities. I am a country girl at heart.

Train travel tip: Use the lavatory on the train or you will pay one euro to get into the station bathroom in Madrid, which is not a big deal unless, like me, you have no euros smaller than a 20, which then means you have to go buy something at a café (for me a bottle of water) in order to break the 20 and get a euro coin. So really it cost me 3 to 4 euros and extra wasted time. Just use the facilities on the train well before you arrive as they lock the doors as soon as you get there. Lesson learned.

We we walked and walked to the rental car pick up, which all worked smoothly even if time consuming. I was very excited to get behind the wheel of a black Citroen and we arrived in Toledo without a hitch. I was pretty proud of our virgin voyage. Susanna is the master navigator, along with the rental car that can access gps through my Apple car play. We are set, the road trip section of our trip begins!

We booked a few government established historic accommodations along the way called Paradores. They are in historical and cultural places of interest like remodeled castles or monasteries. We check into our first one late this afternoon, Parador de Toledo. 

The view from my room is to die for, not in the old town of Toledo but looking at it over a canyon. Gorgeous! The desk staff was friendly, but the wait staff in the dining room not so pleasant but I suppose I wouldnt be either having to deal with clueless tourists all day long.

We venture into the UNESCO world heritage site of Toledo, an ancient city that dates back to 59 BC and looks like it jumped from the pages of a medieval fairytale. There’s nothing like it that I’ve seen in our young United States.

But being so historical the streets are not friendly to vehicles, so we park in a garage at the edge of town and hike around the quaint streets until our reservation for the 9pm light event at the Toledo Cathedral.

We walk through the Jewish quarter but most things were closed. We have not gotten into the swing of eating the Spanish way, dinner at 9 PM, but we can’t resist the El Cafe de la Monjas (Nun Cafe) and we have dessert for dinner, the best cheesecake I have ever eaten, and Susanna had the local delicacy of churros which are dipped in warm chocolate. 

Everything here feels very Catholic, though it is dubbed a city of Christians, Muslims and Jews.

The light show at the cathedral was cool. We entered the dark cathedral with only a small group of people after hours. It was all in Spanish, neither of us speak the language, but we could guess what was going on by the projections onto the statues and walls. Very creative, very religious and beautiful to see.

We find the car and make our way back to the Parador with only one wrong turn. It’s been a long day of travel and we are exhausted. We are only here one night and will sleep in tomorrow to catch up on some rest.