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.