The New Year in Madrid

My travels did not slow down after Katherine’s mom and brother left Spain, as on the same day they left several more friends arrived. We had a visit from Kate (our friend from Oregon) and her friends, coming to Madrid for New Year’s Eve.

For reasons that seem unclear, but perhaps because Spanish people really like to party and really like to practice, we went to “Practice” New Year’s Eve in downtown Madrid. Let me say though, this was no small event, but instead completely full of people as early as 10pm. It occurred the day before and we were to celebrate with a ball drop at midnight. Unfortunately, the ball dropped 2 minutes before midnight; I guess it is a good thing Spain has a practice run.

Kate, Becky, Keely, myself, and Bryson in Sol in Madrid.

For the real New Year’s Eve we celebrated with Kate and her friends as well as Katherine’s roommates, Natia and Alvaro. We had a Spanish style dinner party, starting at 10pm, and watched the New Year celebration on the television. Another strange Spanish tradition is eating grapes at midnight. Not just one grape, and not casually. Instead, you eat one grape every five seconds during the chimes of the midnight hour, a total of 12 grapes in 60 seconds. Oh, and these are seeded grapes. Needless to say, we were lucky to make it out without the need of the Heimlich maneuver. After recovering from the grape incident we all set out to the streets of Madrid and enjoyed a night out on New Year’s Eve in one of the most fun cities in the world, almost as good as London and the UK!

The New Year's Eve Party in Katherine's apartment.

Kate and her friends left a couple days after New Year’s Eve and Katherine and I finally had a chance to relax, Katherine especially, after several days of entertaining visitors. On the 2^nd of January there was a very, very important American College Football game I had to watch, the Oregon Ducks in the Rose Bowl facing Wisconsin. The game started at 11:30pm in Spain, and Katherine and I made it just in time to an Irish pub in the center of the city that was showing the game. There we watched with other fans from Oregon, many former students, as the Ducks won in exciting fashion. I had such a great time watching the Ducks win the Rose Bowl that I could have been mugged on the walk home and still had one of the best nights since I have been in Europe. There was certainly something strange about watching the Duck game so far from home, but a once in a lifetime experience to watch it in Spain, surrounded by great Duck fans and very confused Spanish people.

 

Go Ducks! Katherine and I with our new Duck friends in Madrid.

After the excitement of the Rose Bowl Katherine and I took a day trip to El Escorial, the royal monastery of Spain. This is historically the residence of the King of Spain, and many of the Spanish royals are buried at El Escorial. However, the strangest part of El Escorial was not the royal burial grounds at the Monastery, but instead the center of town a short walk away.

El Escorial from a distance

Sunset from El Escorial.

El Escorial

In the center of town Katherine and I walked into what was a life-sized nativity scene… unlike any I have ever seen before.

Fake sheep figures at El Escorial.

More "nativity" scenes.

Life size does not do justice to the number of statues around the city, at every corner we were confronted with a strange human-like statue – much like the beginning of a horror movie.

 

Yes, that is a statue cow giving birth with the help of a statue old woman.

Another statue, pretty impressive.

This is when it began to look like a scary movie.

Luckily we were able to make it out safe and back to Madrid. We had to get to sleep early, because we were leaving the next morning for three days in Porto, Portugal.

A trip to Segovia, Spain

I left Cambridge after Christmas and traveling to Madrid, arriving a few days before Katherine’s mom and brother, whom were visiting for Christmas, left to go back to Oregon. In these few days we set off to travel to the small city of Segovia, which is about an hour outside of Madrid by train.

Segovia is a beautiful city that was decorated beautifully for Christmas! Katherine, her mom, her brother, and myself stayed in a hotel that was right in the center of Segovia next to the massive Cathedral.

Large Cathedral next to our hotel in the center of Segovia.

Our awesome hotel, thanks to Katherine's booking ability.

On our first day in Segovia we enjoyed Spanish meals and a trip to the Aqueduct of Segovia. The aqueduct dates back to the first century, when built by the Romans. An unbelievable sight to see, it was used up until the 1900’s when it finally was set aside as a historic world heritage piece.

Aqueduct of Segovia!

After the aqueduct we visited the Castle of Segovia, or the Alcazar of Segovia, which is an amazing castle that was famously used as the inspiration for the castle in Disney’s Cinderella. As soon as we got to the castle we ran up to the top of the watch tower and looked over Segovia. 

Katherine and her brother Michael atop the tower on the Castle of Segovia.

View from the tower in the Castle of Segovia, notice the cathedral in the center.

Katherine and I on top the tower with Segovia in the background.

After the tower we went through the castle, and by the time we got outside it was dark, but beautiful.

The shield of arms for Segovia.

Castle of Segovia.

Back at our hotel, we had a fairly nice view from the entrance, but even better was the view from our hotel room. Off our balcony you can see the church where Queen Isabella of Spain was crowned in the 1400’s. Queen Isabella was the wife of Fernando II, both of which are famous for sending Christopher Columbus on that voyage in 1492. 

Cathedral at night.

Katherine with the church in the background (on the right) that Isabella was crowned in.

Aqueduct at night.

The next day we enjoyed a tour of the Cathedral, which was an amazingly large church, similar to the Alumudena Cathedral in Madrid.  Afterwards we jumped on our train back to Madrid and enjoyed a relaxing evening in the city, as Katherine’s mom and brother prepared for their long flights back to Oregon early the next morning.

Inside the inner courtyard of the Cathedral.

Christmas time in Cambridge

Several weeks have passed since my last blog post. I have been very busy with lab work, Christmas break, traveling, lab work, and the start of a new term here at Cambridge. After my trip to Edinburgh in the beginning of December I stayed in Cambridge through Christmas. We had our first snow in Cambridge since my arrival (and so far the only snow), just a light dusting early in the morning.

Light dusting of snow one morning outside of my room in our garden.

The first two weeks in December were full of great Christmas parties for my lab and college. We had our graduate formal, where only graduates are allowed and there are only four a year. The theme was a "Tim Burton Christmas" and everyone dressed as characters from Tim Burton movies. A great way to end my first term at King's. For our lab we had Christmas dinner out at a nice restaurant and exchanged secret Santa gifts, which was great fun. I received a home-made "Welcome pack" to the UK, complete with comical instructions and warnings. Such as "Americans coming to Britain be ready for: Irony, thin people, warm beer, bendy roads, free health care, and the Queen."

A couple weeks into December a Marshall friend from London, Allie, came for a visit with those of us still at Cambridge. I am getting pretty good at being a Cambridge tour guide! Over the weekend we went through King’s College, the chapel, around several other colleges, and to Grantchester. It was a really great trip and nice chance to catch up with Allie and the other Marshalls at Cambridge that were still around, Temple and Jessie.

Temple, Jessie, and I in King's College Chapel showing Allie (who is taking the photo) around.

Emmanuel College inner greens and pond.

All of the undergraduates finished classes by 1 December, so Cambridge was relatively empty over December. Many taught-master students also left Cambridge early in December, but a lot remained around to enjoy the graduate formal. Around the final days before Christmas almost everyone else left, and I celebrated Christmas with the handful of graduates that remained in Cambridge. It was a great celebration with home cooked food thanks to our graduate society and movies and conversations into the night. I also made sure to come back so I could skype for a couple hours with mom and dad!

King's College entrance just before Christmas

So there is a long-delayed update on my first Christmas outside of the United States what what went on at Cambridge in the winter time. The day after Christmas I left fairly early in the afternoon to head to the airport to catch a flight to Spain. I had worked in the lab on my research project up until Christmas, and was excited to take a holiday break and spend a couple weeks in Spain with Katherine. More on that trip soon!