We returned to Madrid for dinner at Terraza del Casino. The building is a beautiful nineteenth century private club, and the acclaimed restaurant is the Madrid outpost of Spain's most famous chef, Ferran Adria. So we were expecting big things as we ascended to the top floor. The elevator opened, and we deflated a bit, as the soaring ceilings and elaborate detailing of the building were obscured by drab carpeting, beat up furniture and a dirty brown color scheme. The food, however, was excellent, really interesting ideas, some of which were too wacky but overall very enjoyable. We did a very long and elaborate tasting menu, which was too much for me to write down, so I only have the rating I gave it to attest to how much I liked it (Food-20, Decor-11, Service-16). Interestingly, as I was scouring the internet for photos of the place, I came across what looks to be a new design for the place. I've included photos of the old and new, but clearly the new looks much more interesting and more in keeping with the idea of the place. I also checked out the current menu, which includes such classics as Nitro-corn with foie gras air, cod intestines with curry, and a paella of Kellogg's corn flakes.

The best spot to see Avila's walls is from Las Cuatro Postes. From this vantage point it's easy to see that Avila's walls deserve their exalted ranking above other walled cities. As an added plus, you can also pay homage to the little shrine here, built on the spot where young Teresa was kidnapped by her uncles and forced to abandon her suicide mission to Moorish Africa.

While the walls are the most main tourist attraction for most visitors, it's also a major pilgrimage spot due to Avila's being the home of Saint Teresa. She had the misfortune of desperately wanting to be a martyr after Spain had already evicted the Moors and ended the religious war. So, at the tender age of seven, she ran away from home to go to Africa, where the Moors still reigned, and try to get martyred there. She was intercepted by her uncles outside of town and forced to return home, where she became a nun. She spent the rest of her life founding convents and reforming them. She spent a fair amount of time in prison, as many of the lazy nuns weren't keen on being reformed but in the end she got the last laugh and now ranks highly among the saints. The convent here was built on her birthplace, and there's another convent in town where she served as a nun. And all the shops in between the two convents sell pictures of her, and little sweets made by the nuns called Santa Teresa's egg yolks.

Like most cathedrals in Spain, this one took a few centuries to build, and it shows. The bottom half was built in traditional Romanesque style, looking more like a fortress than a cathedral. By the time they got around to the ceiling, styles had changed, so they built an airy Gothic top on the Romanesque bottom. The same slapdash approach is apparent on the facade, where they only got around to building the left belltower before getting bored, leaving a lopsided church for future generations to enjoy. The thrifty citizens also economized in another way, by using the back of the church a part of the city wall.

Here are some bits and pieces of the city, mostly butting up against the walls. As you can see, the city is unusually clean and empty, and generally lacked the atmosphere of a real medieval town.

Since the walls are the city's chief claim to fame, we did the obvious thing and walked around them. the city seems to have shifted a bit since the walls were built, with the part inside the city shrinking and feeling pretty empty, but newer parts developing outside the perimeter, now that the threat of Moorish invasions has receded.

115. Avila

We then continued driving, through some very nice mountain scenery, to the only sizeable town in the area, Avila. Avila began life as a Roman town, and generally followed the historical path of Toledo, being conquered by the Moors, then reconquered by the Christians, at around the same dates. The city has always been walled, but the current set of walls dates from the Christian reconquest in the 11th century. Spain has lots of walled cities, but apparently Avila has the best preserved set, and possibly the only ones that still completely encircle the city.

The famous fascist monument, the Valle de los Caidos, is five minutes away from El Escorial. It was constructed by Franco as a memorial to all the fascists who died during the Spanish civil war, and is topped with the world's largest cross. All the day trip packages to El Escorial stop here as well, which is why I included it, but actually on the day we visited the monument was closed and we could only drive around the surrounding park a bit.

Felipe also designed El Escorial to serve as the burial chamber for the royal family, who previously were buried all around Spain in whatever cathedral caught their fancy. Almost all the kings and queens are buried in the green marble pantheon with the chandelier pictured here. He established an elaborate pecking order for the graves. Queens who married into the family (rather than being born into it) and who weren't mothers of future kings got separated from their husbands and were buried in the pictured room with the row of white marble coffins. There's also a huge birthday cake in the middle of one room (pictured) to house all the princes and princesses who died as babies, which is now a bit more than half full. And there are many more rooms for assorted royal relatives depending on their degrees of closeness to the throne.

A couple of photos of the basilica, which is decorated in typical over the top style. If you go back to the first post on El Escorial, which nobody will do, you'll see a huge dome jutting out of the middle of the complex. That is the basilica, which gives you a good idea of the size of the church, which dominates the secular parts of the complex. The basilica was designed by the architect of St Peter's in Rome, and shares many similar design elements, including a clear desire of both buildings to intimidate and awe visitors.

The interior is much more colorful, and chock full of famous artwork. The king established a world famous library at the complex, for use by the monks that lived there. It was supposed to be something like a research center against Protestantism, collecting all sorts of ancient religious volumes for the monks to use in their research. It fell into disuse shortly after construction however, as subsequent generations of monks were illiterate, but is now the most popular part of the complex. By the way, a big chunk of the palace is still used as a monastery, convent and school so much of it is off limits. Which is a good thing because what's left is pretty tiring.



I thought the most interesting part of the palace was the king's quarters, a couple of plain white rooms tacked onto the basilica. He didn't age well, and for much of his life was afflicted with a disease that rotted his body and caused him too smell so bad that nobody could approach him. So he stayed by himself in his room,with a window overlooking the basilica where he could hear the church services being conducted around the clock, every day of the year.

The complex was built as an enormous grid, with a huge amount of numerology and related fake science governing the building's construction. The grid pattern was supposed to be patterned after the long-lost Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, as well as the griddle on which his favorite saint, Saint Lawrence, was roasted by the Romans. But there are all sorts of rules governing the number of windows, staircases, rooms, courtyards etc that you will learn in numbing detail on a guided tour.



We decided to skip the tour and explore for ourselves, which is a good idea, but the downside is that the place is absolutely massive and mazelike, and I'm sure we missed about half of it.



Construction started in 1564 and finished about twenty years later, in time for the king to receive the news that his famous navy, the Armada, was completely wiped out in his ill advised attempted invasion of England. Unlike the other palaces littered around Europe, this was always designed by the monklike king to be primarily a religious complex that happens to house the king and the advisors governing, or attempting to govern, most of Europe. This accounts for the austere architecture of the exterior, which complements the bleak surroundings.

114. El Escorial

On Friday the three musketeers (Brian, Somchai and Jose) headed west to Avila province, stopping first at El Escorial. Escorial is Spanish for slag heap, as the incredibly huge building was built on a slag heap (leftover crap from iron mining) in a desolate stretch of terrain. The location, and every other detail of the immense project, was chosen by King Felipe II, at the time the richest and most powerful man in the world. And why did he choose such a horrible location? Because he was crazy in a religious nut sort of way. He was king of Spain and Portugal, the Holy Roman Emperor controlling most of Germany, and the Emperor of Austria and occupied Holland, Belgium and Latin America. He ruled this vast empire from this spookily austere complex in the middle of nowhere. It took a couple decades to build, and was conceived as a palace, monastery, convent and religious school all wrapped up in one. Any money left over from building this place went to his perpetual wars conducted in his singlehanded attempt to wipe out Protestantism throughout Europe, which ended up being a gigantic waste of life and money.

We had dinner at a restaurant near the hotel, the Balzac. It's supposedly a celebrity magnet, but as far as we could tell we were there on an off night. (Then again, our knowledge of Spanish celebrities doesn't extend much beyond Antonio Banderas and Penelope Cruz). It was a very handsome room, the best of our Madrid restaurants, and food was consistently high quality, though not particularly adventurous. My main course of pigeon and foie gras was particularly good, surprising because I usually find pigeon too gamey. Service was competent and friendly. (Food-16, Decor-17, Service-18).

We then walked around the town's quaint streets, which were appropriately cobbled and lined with uniformly well maintained stone buildings. Many of these had been converted into decidedly upscale inns and antique shops, making the town a real pleasure to walk around. Unfortunately we arrived at closing time so all we could really do is walk around, then we headed back to our car (pictured here through the arch) and drive back to Madrid.

Supposedly the town's center doubled as a bullring, as in Penafiel, but this one looked far too ornate and twee for this to be true. Most of the houses surrounding the plaza have been converted into shops and restaurants, and it was clear that the town knew how to capitalize on its charms.

113. Pedraza

Pedraza was the prettiest town we visited, so we accidentally saved the best for last. The town has maintained its medieval town center through a tough set of defences, including an attractive set of walls and a not very attractive wreck of a castle. The castle is still owned by the local nobility, and at the time we visited it looked to be under renovation, so by now it may look more impressive. But when we were there it looked like it would collapse if we touched it.

We lost the driver (unintentionally this time) so spent some time admiring the view, then heading into the workaday pub, where we had a beer and watched some Spanish soap operas while we waited for Jose to find us, then we headed out for our last stop of the day, Pedraza.