POD(s) June 15th - June 22nd(?)

So, the picture part of picture of the day has quickly morphed into plural with the same fluidity that day has morphed into whenever.  That disclaimer out of the way, here is our "picture" of the "day" for the week of June 15th - 22nd. 

See that little yellow speck in the bottom? That is our tent.

Our fist stop from Madrid was Parque Someido, the most beautiful place we have ever been to.  Sadly, our first forray out of Madrid also corresponded with our first introduction to rain in Spain.  The rain clarified a lot of things for us: we miss the northwest, we are willing to trade warmth for solitude (seems like most people in Spain read the weather forecast and do not hike when rainy), the water proofing on our tent no longer works, etc.  Despite the wet and cold (it was down in the 30s, y'all), we had an amazing time.

Lagos de Valle

Lagos de Saliencia

View from the drive we got to take every day!

From Somiedo we traveled to somewhere on the coast.  It was not the most beautiful place we have ever been to, but it was fine.

Playa de Silencio

We camped for a night before traveling to Arriondas, which is, we discovered, also the most beautiful place we have ever been to.  Here is our hotel.  

The first room you can see (with a terrace!) was ours.

We celebrated our second anniversary hiking in the Picos Europa (the most beautiful place we have ever been to).  Matt, cows and stone house included for scale.  

Ocean side on the way up

Picos side on the top

There was an optional addition to our hike that we attempted and then quickly aborted.  

Do you see the trail?  We did not either.    

The following day we drove to the Ponga Mountains (most beautiful, etc.) for another incredible hike.   Primed by our hike the day before, we wandered around on the top of this mountain with very little trail using mostly cairns.  Highlights included the views and not dying.

It should be noted that Leah took this exact picture twice. Once on the way up and once on the way down, completely forgetting she had done it once before  

We ended the day with the most beutiful sunset we have ever seen.  It lasted for over an hour and involved horses.  What is our life?

We write this now from San Sebastián, a place we have yet to explore because we were late getting in.  We got side tracked by, among other things, a NUDIST BEACH!

Again, what is our life?

Someday we will write an entire post devoted to places we have eaten lunch.  The beach will number among our most memorable. 

P.O.D. June 14th

Tomorrow we leave Madrid and embark on the first nature portion of our trip.  In anticipation of our impending walks in the woods we give you a few scenes from today's walks in Madrid: Parque Retiro, a random apartment building, and the train tracks we spent way too long trying to figure out how to cross.  

 

P.O.D June 13th

Our picture of the day is noteworthy for many reasons, one of them being that Matt and I both have swatch watches.  This is because one of our goals as a married couple is to slowly create an entirely matching wardrobe.  So far, we also have matching gray T-shirts.    The main thing to note though is, obviously, the time...which is past our typical bedtime of 10 pm.  To reiterate, we stayed up past ten.  Not only did we stay up past ten, we had dinner after ten.  This is a big deal.  Just to put it in context, other pictures of the day we could* have chosen included a photo of an Aztec calendar, a photo of one of four remaining Mayan codices (ironic as we can place the blame firmly on the Spanish and their fear of devil books for the fact that only four examples of Mayan books remain), and a photo of a man sleeping in a modern art gallery (was he actually part of the art?).    Other noteworthy news - Matt and I both have a new favorite word, it is portabebe...we think it translates as pappus (sp?).  The museum we were at was not so great at the curation.     *we didn't actually take pictures of any of these things as they are not flowers, other plants, or nicely lit - but decontextualized -  buildings.   

Summer Vacation Picture of the day

On June 8th, our seniors celebrated graduation and we marked the end of our first year teaching in Vietnam.  Instead of taking time to reflect on the growth and new understandings that a year of teaching, learning and living within a new culture has instilled in us, we fled, literally.  June 10th, found us on a plane to Spain where we plan to spend the month camping, drinking all of the wine, and eating all of the cured meats.  

 

In an effort to try new things and make up for the fact that we basically ignored the blog for a half a year, we're attempting a photo of the day (as internet permits).  Predictably (maybe we should reflect more?), we've been in Madrid for three days and all we have are zoomed in pictures of flowers.  So, here's your picture of the day:  Roses from Parque de Oeste.