Toledo & Oropesa

This weekend I went to Toledo and Oropesa with some friends of my grandparents from Talavera de la Reina, Felipe, Esperanzi and their friend (and chauffeur), Josefina.

Saturday I woke up bright and early to get to the train station and get to Toledo. The train station at Toledo, Felipe had advised me, is actually very pretty. Built after 1920 in Mudejar style, it features dark woodwork with vividly colored tiles. All in all a beautiful building, that actually felt a lot older. I only wish I had gotten the promotional train passport stamp there. . .

I met Felipe and Josefina outside the train station (Esperanzi had to stay home with her mother), and we crossed the river and parked the car by the Alcázar. Felipe and Josefina stopped for a cup of coffee then we went into the library which is housed in the back part of the Alcázar. Walking around, we found a hallway with neat photos from the early 1900’s of local and nearby sites. It was interesting to see how things had changed since: the buildings (most for the better), the clothing, cars, roads, etc.

After wandering around the library (apparently a favorite spot for Josefina, makes sense given her academic profession), we headed outside to finish walking around the Alcázar structure. Unfortunately, we could not go into the Alcázar museum itself as there is a new Military Museum that will open there and so the whole museum is shut down in anticipation for that inauguration, probably after a (hopefully new) president and government is elected in March. The worst part though, is that they put a modern flat stone façade announcing this museum, in what was probably the best view of the Alcázar structure. The designs were a total clash of time period and style, and makes for an eyesore. What a horrible way to ruin a perfectly good historic site!

Then we walked towards the town’s central plaza and passed Santo Tome, a famous chain of pastery store, with the famous Toledo mazapan (sweet almond paste dessert). They had a huge mazapan figure of the cathedral in Toledo in the window display. Quite neat and definitely mouth-watering. We skipped the mazapan for the time being, and turned out of the plaza towards the Museo de Santa Cruz. On the way, we stopped at the Miguel Cervantes statue. This museum is best known for it’s exhibit of Greco’s (although the first few were replicas as I had seen the originals the weekend before in El Escorial), the most notable of which is “The Assumption of the Virgin,” cited as Greco’s last work. They also had other artifacts and a cloister-like courtyard full of columns and jars and other interesting items. Additionally, the staircase and mudejar ceiling above it were nice to look at.

After this museum visit, we continued on our journey, making our way through the streets of Toledo towards the Cathedral. As we were wandering towards this main monument of Toledo, we were surrounded by a group of American students, also apparently heading towards the Cathedral. In an effort to avoid this massive group, Felipe guided us to the main façade entrance of the Cathedral, where he said there was also an entrance to the Cathedral. Unfortunately, this entrance was no longer being used to let people in, so we ended up having to go back around to get in, although it was a good opportunity to get some snapshots of the entrance façade and main portals.

Once inside the cathedral, Felipe immediately directed me towards the treasury where the massive, ornate, pure gold and silver monstrance, used to carry the Eucharist on Corpus Christi Day. It was absolutely immense with such detail and to think this 500lb sculpture was made of pure silver and gold. Then we began walking around the church, looking at the various side altars along the way. Felipe had brought along some guide books of Toledo, so I tried to read along (although the books were of course in Spanish), though they were quickly walking past everything, so it was difficult to catch up. We also saw the beautiful choir which had marvellous woodwork with different scenes, some we ventured to guess were of the capture of Granada. Directly in front is the Main Altar, although I did not find it as impressive as the one in Sevilla. We then wandered into the Chapter Room (Sala Capitular) which features a portrait of each of the Spanish archbishops over the years and about a dozen open spaces left for those to come (I wonder what happens when they run out of room? Felipe claims it has been perfectly coordinated to coincide with the end of the world …). Also noteworthy was the Mudejar ceiling in this room, a perfect example of the peaceful cohabitation of religions. Finally, we saw a few final main chapels in the ambulatory, the Capilla de Santiago, with the tombs of Don and Doña Álvaro de Luna. Next to it, was another large Capilla and directly in front of it was a beautiful mural and marblework. Finally, we entered the cloister of the cathedral and a beautiful side room that had recently been restored (I think they basically painted in what was missing on the roof, although I can’t be sure), with bright hues of blue on the ceiling and just some wonderful Byzantine patterns.

After our long visit to the Cathedral, we decided it was time to stop for a bite to eat (good thing too, because I was starving), but in the interest of time, we had some quick tapas rather than a sit down meal. We had a couple of caña’s and wine with some olives and some very good morcilla. The bar was smoky as usual, but I tried not to think too much about it. Then we set off in search of the most famous El Greco painting in town, “The Burial of Count Orgaz,” in Santo Tomé. As we entered Santo Tomé, we found there was a large tour group also looking at this famous painting, and a guide at the front explaining various details of the work. Although I had seen Rick Steve’s video on Toledo and knew a few things to look for, it was still interesting to hear the commentary live, even if some aspects were difficult to see with all the people in front of me. It’s always fascinating to me to see these works of art I’ve studied up close and in person. And you never really know what you’re going to get: sometimes they are much better or vibrant in person, sometimes much duller or smaller, sometimes you just say, yup, there it is. I guess in the end it’s cool to just be able to say you’ve seen it in person.

Now that I had fulfilled almost all the items on my list for Toledo, we headed towards the Monasterio de San Juan de los Reyes. Perhaps in part because it was “siesta hour” or perhaps in part because it’s a less important site, there was hardly anyone there. It consisted of a decorated by simple two-level cloister and a small chapel we wandered around. Unfortunately part of the façade was blocked off by some restoration or construction tarp, although you could see on the outside chains hanging, which Felipe said were the chains of the slaves, whatever that means. Overall, a nice stop on our tour of Toledo.

Finally, I wanted to visit one of the synagogues in Toledo, so we stopped at the one of the two Josefina recommended called Sinagoga de Santa Maria la Blanca. Inside, it was very small and simple space, with a five-aisled nave and horseshoe arched columns separating the aisles. This building was certainly another example of crossing and intermixing of cultures and religions, as the architecture had lots of Arabic (Muslim) influences, but there was an altar in the front from when the synagogue was used as a church.

This concluded the sites we would visit in Toledo. I had thought of going to the El Greco house museum, but as Josefina said, it was basically just a house with two chairs they claimed he used and replicas of paintings, so not really worth the visit. As for souvenir shopping, I only got to do some modest browsing, but the prices all seemed a lot higher than in the art shop I love in Madrid, so I figured I would just buy my Toledo souvenirs there. And I got some insight into why I can rarely do souvenir shopping with locals – as Josefina explained, they are so used to seeing all these things and have always had them around, it’s not really anything interesting to look at or even consider buying to them. Interesting insight. With that, we started wandering back towards the Alcázar, passing a church with a tower you could climb to get a view of Toledo. Since I knew we would stop at the parador, and I was getting pretty tired (so I could only imagine Felipe and Josefina were too), I decided to skipped that climb (which would have been by stairs).

We ended up at the main plaza of Toledo and Felipe went in search of information about the trolley around town, while Josefina and I looked at the sweets and mazapan of Santo Tome again. Felipe returned having found out that the next tour wasn’t for a couple of hours, so not worth us waiting around for. Having a strong sweet tooth myself, I decided I wanted some mazapan, and we bought a small box (Felipe observed how it was much more expensive in Toledo than Oropesa, for example; the power of branding and tourism!). Although it was more expensive than the mazapan I tried from Oropesa it wasn’t nearly as good! This variety was also filled with a little bit of yema or egg yolk

With that, we headed back towards the Alcázar to get to our car. We stopped to take in some of the scenery and some last views of the Alcázar, noting the military school and parador visible on the other side of the river. Once we got back into the car, we headed towards a Puerta in Toledo Felipe wanted to show me, then towards the parador (although we ended up circling the whole city). We got to the parador to take in the view of Toledo and enjoy one last bit of scenery, then headed on our way to Talavera.

Once in Talavera, we agreed to meet Josefina later that night for dinner. I greeted Esperanzi and her mother and told her all about our day. Then we got ready to go to church that night. Felipe and Esperanzi go to church every week, usually on Sunday, but if they foresee an event on Sunday, they will go on Saturday. So to keep our schedule as flexible as possible for Sunday, we went to the Saturday night service. I’ve now been to church with them 3 times, and although I don’t quite know what responses are in Spanish, I try to pick up what I can. I remember when I used to only know prayers in Spanish and not in English! Now it’s the opposite. After mass, we hung out some more, then went out with Josefina.

Felipe was particularly excited to have me going out with Josefina and see where she goes out since it is a “younger” environment. It was pretty fun, with the first bar we went to having walls painted with different signs and young couples and families. There was still some smoking, but not as much. We then went to another pub around the corner (with very American looking fries and some kind of chicken mcnugget looking meat as the accompanying tapas), and finally in search of a spot for dinner. The place Josefina wanted to go to originally was actually closed that night, though, so we went to a seafood type place instead. There were no tables available soon and what looked like a long wait for the high tables, so we ordered a beer and munched on the olives and croquetas. Finally, a table opened up (although there were not enough seats) and we ordered our meal. Felipe had inquired about my wine preferences earlier and noting that I liked white wine more, we ordered glasses of white wine, which was quite soft and fruity, very good.

The next day we woke up (although not as early) to go to Oropesa, Felipe and Esperanzi’s home town and where Josefina works at the Instituto (the equivalent of High School). After the drive, we started by walking towards the castle and walking around it’s courtyard, and climbing up to the tower. Felipe told me the legend of how Oropesa got it's name, saying that there once was a princess that got kidnapped and the ransom demanded was her weight in gold, hence "oro" (gold) "pesa" (weight)! Then we walked around the parador next door where my grandparents once stayed in the octagonal suite there. Finally, we headed towards the town cathedral, just as service was getting out, which for such a small town had a very nice altar. The whole time we were there, we kept running into people Felipe and Esperanzi knew and would start chatting with them. It was such a warm, close-knit town feeling. Finally, we got to the town central square and talked with more acquaintances (although a couple upset about their son’s performance in one of Josefina’s classes the previous year made for a bit of an awkward situation). Our last destination was a visit to Felipe’s mother.

Felipe’s mother is taken care of by his sister, Isabel, who lives a couple of doors down the street. We all gathered in the kitchen, and I don’t know exactly what happened, but the whole situation overwhelmed me with emotion and I began to cry. She was so old and frail and I think it was all the emotional stress from the previous few weeks of finding out about my grandmother having hip-replacement surgery and my grandfather having an artery replacement surgery and complications just boiling over. Getting old and becoming less self-sufficient was just an overwhelming thought, especially when I thought about my grandparents and even parents getting into that situation.

We then met up with Felipe and Esperanzi’s nephew, Isaac, and his girlfriend, Angela for drinks and tapas (some breaded crab claws were the only good ones), then headed back to Talavera to prepare lunch for Esperanzi’s mother. We then headed to Felipe’s favorite and usual restaurant, where we had morcilla and I had cochinillo (since I had tried the lamb the previous time). We then shared this wonderful dessert they have and Amparo joined us for some apple flavored digestive drinks in cute chocolate cups. After hanging out at the house again, I left with Isaac and Angela, who kindly drove me back to Madrid (although there was a bit of traffic on the road).

All in all, a very good weekend with some great people. Even though I slept on a fold-away bed in their office and woke up overly hot throughout the night, I still had a great time with them, as they are very warm, caring people, wanting to get to know you and share good food, good wine, and in whatever you want to do. I don’t know if I’ll get to see them again before I leave Spain, but I have a feeling they may one day come to visit, maybe even in NYC!