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| Sevilla's Cathedral was in the old section of town, and even had gorgeous lamp posts and horse-drawn carriages to enhance the old world feel |
| Erin's Sevilla Journals 6-4-02 We got to Madrid around 7am after a long night of little sleep. The seats in our cabin stretched out, but there were 5 of us in a 6 person cabin and Glenn & I had to share the equivalent of less than a single bed mattress. It was a long ride, but at least I did get a little sleep! We had a 2 hour wait for our 9am connection to Sevilla, plus a metro ride to another train station in the opposite end of town, so we had to be awake when we got to Madrid. Once at our proper train station, we had a little breakfast before boarding the next train. The extra security at the Madrid station was a bit surprising, as they had metal detectors and armed guards checking people onto the platforms for all the longer distance trains. This train took 3 hours, and I watched Duets in Spanish while Glenn did journals. After an uneventful ride, we got to Sevilla around 11am, found info and used a free hotel booking service. It was in the area we wanted, so we caught a bus to our area (Santa Cruz), which was crowded and full of short people. They wouldn't move at all to let someone as burdened as we were turn around, and though I was near the front when we reached our stop, the driver and other passengers insisted that I MUST get off in the back. They barely let me off the bus, as I had to push and shove people to get to the back door! Ridiculous!!! Check out our photo on the home page to see us with our colossal packs on, and imagine pushing through a crowded bus with those! Anyway, we walked the last bit to the hostel, and ended up taking a room with no windows. We figured it would be quieter, and it was very clean and close to the bathrooms we would share. We showered to freshen up, then napped until almost 6pm to make up for the lost sleep of the night before. Then we went to find the cathedral, look for internet (the place we found & tried was way too slow), and then had dinner near the hostel. We had an excellent and overabundant paella that we split, and while sitting at table, we met 4 girls who'd met each other over the internet and only met in person for this trip. They were friendly and funny, and we enjoyed chatting over our meals. The fun was added to by Jose, our waiter and a very animated guy all on his own. After dinner, we showed the girls our hostel (theirs stank), discussed going to a flamenco bar we'd read about in our books that only opened up after 11pm (most were even later!), but found that I was still tired. So we called it a night and hoped to see the bar the next night. |