I should really read Don Quixote

Today, our tour group had a large breakfast buffet at the hotel, then we packed into a very fancy tour bus for a lap around the city.  We saw countless statues and fancy buildings from different parts of Spanish history, all populating the same streets as one another.  There were palaces and parks, museums and statues and so many fountains.  We had an extremely charismatic local guide named Federico today, and he took us from place to place, narrating everything along the way.  He recommended we tell all our friends we had taken a side trip to Egypt as we strolled past the Temple of Debod, which was a gift to Spain from Egypt after the Spanish kicked in a few bucks to help build the Aswan Dam.  Quite the thank you gift.  There were fountains and statues in the center of every traffic circle, it seemed.  Behold, Christopher Columbus, or as he is called here, Cristobal Colon.  

When we had made a few laps around the sites in the city, our bus drove up to the Prado Museum.  I am not a big museum fanatic, but it was beautiful.  And I’m afraid you’ll have to take my word for it.  No photos allowed inside the Prado.  

I did write down that April 23, 1616 is the date Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra died.  The people in Madrid celebrate something that day they call Book Day.  It’s a day when you give someone a book you like.  Maybe I will also set that as my deadline for actually reading Don Quixote, since this is the second vacation during which I have felt guilt over not reading that book.  Federico assured us that Shrek and his friend Donkey were just modernizations of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.  That kind of modern appropriation of classic characters happens all the time, though.  Heck, the seniors I teach are absolutely stunned every year when I tell them that Hamlet is just like the Lion King, except everyone dies.  Still, I may put book day down on my calendar.  Seems an appropriate holiday to adopt.  

Anyhow, after the two hour bus tour and the two hour guided museum tour, Cas and I struck out on our own to have some lunch.  I managed to order a plate of Iberian Ham, though they sliced it so nicely, it would have been a shame to grab a fistful.  He got some fish.  We enjoyed our lunch, then waited about 20 minutes to get and pay the check.  We could have walked slowly away and gotten several blocks away before they noticed we were gone, but our prickly need to pay for what we ate kept us sitting at a table in a sidewalk cafe.  No matter, though.  When we left, we took a walk back to the hotel and settled in for a quick siesta.  Before that, though, I had to wash my feet.  Cas and I were both wearing our very sturdy walking sandals today, and when I took them off, I felt the immediate need to wash both the shoes and my feet.  The sandals have been out on the balcony for a while, now, and I should be able to get back into them in time for our fancy dinner this evening.  We’re told it will be a typical Madrileno dinner in the Plaza Mayor.  Not sure what that means, but we’re game to find out.  

Photos: https://photos.app.goo.gl/pfA2563myHYwVp6U7