Thursday, July 5th History

     We all woke up at 7:30 to our alarm that all of us hated.  We woke up at that time because we all needed to take showers before breakfast because we had a tour at 8:45 that morning.  We all showered relatively quickly and headed down to have breakfast.
     Evan Langebeck ate a banana, some fresh fruit, and a muffin, which probably 1/8th of the muffin ended up on the floor.  David ate a pear and some sausage that he doused in syrup, resulting in him spending 10 minutes once we went back to our rooms attempting to clean his face, albeit unsuccessfully.  Evan Cope ate some scrambled eggs with sausage, which he surprisingly stayed clean while eating, while Matt went ahead and ate cheese and meat slices, a surprising breakfast to be served at a hotel.

     We left the hotel around 8:30, barely making it to our tour by 8:45.  We met with our tour group and the guide at the Puerta del Sol and began a short walk to the palace after a few minutes.  Once we got to the palace, we were able to get in almost immediately.  Once inside, the tour guide started to tell us about the rich history of the palace.

Royal Palace of Madrid // History

The Royal Palace of Madrid

    According to our tour guide, the palace was originally a Muslim castle in the 9th century, later being converted into a Christian palace.  In 1734, the palace burned down, resulting in King Philip V building a new palace, the one we visited.  Several architects were a part of the designing of the palace, such as Giovanni Battista Sacchetti, Francesco Sabatini, and Filippo Juvarra.  Since then, it has been converted to a tourist attraction, one of the most popular tourist attractions in Madrid.

     Although the palace housed over three thousand rooms, we were only brought through 20 during our tour, but we were allowed to stay afterward to explore the rest of the rooms.  Matt, an
avid fan of medieval times, rushed us to the medieval armory room.  The armory had both full-sized knight armor and horse armor.  Along with that, it also had full-sized real weapons, which was hard to keep Matt from touching.  We were finally able to drag Matt out of the armory and went straight into the painting gallery.  Of course, Matt went running off to the paintings from medieval times and those depicting battles from then.  After we spent a few hours wandering the painting gallery, we decided we should probably go ahead and eat some lunch.

Matt's Pizza at La General

     Once we got to La General, we waited for just over a half an hour to be able to get a seat, getting a seat surprisingly quickly for not having a reservation at such a busy restaurant.  Matt and Evan Langebeck shared a bacon and onion pizza.  Evan Cope had a chicken burrito with spinach and mango chutney.  David had lasagna bolognese, which he savored every taste of it.

Temple of Debod // History

The Temple of Debod from outside

     After we were done eating, we headed to the Temple of Debod, getting there around two o'clock.  According to the stands and displays around the temple, the temple is an Egyptian temple from the 2nd century BC.  It was originally built in Egypt as a dedication to the goddess Isis.  In the 6th century AD, the temple was abandoned following Nubia's conversion to Christianity.  Hundreds of years later, in the 20th century, it was given to Spain as a thank-you for helping to protect the temples of Abu Simbel from the impacts of the Great Dam of Aswan.  In 1972, it was finally opened to the public, quickly becoming a popular tourist attraction.

     We were sadly not allowed to go inside the temple all at once due to regulations set to keep it in optimum shape for as long as possible, so we ended up going in separate groups so we could all enjoy the inside of the temple.  After we had all explored both the inside of the temple and the outside, we realized we were going to miss our reservation at Astor, so we hurriedly headed to Astor.

Astor as we got there

     We got to Astor at 8:25 PM, just 5 minutes before our 8:30 PM reservation.  When our names were called, we headed in and sat down at our table.  Evan Langebeck ate some oil infused barbeque with roasted red peppers, garlic, and basil.  Evan Cope ate some Iberian ham croquettes and mashed peas.  David ate salmon tartare with roe, capers, avocado, and spicy huancaína sauce.  Matt ate a salad with red cabbage, fruit, honey, ginger, and arugula.  Once we were all done eating, we decided to head back to the hotel.  Once we got back to the hotel, we decided to all do our own things and go to bed at our own time.  David watched some YouTube before falling asleep on his bed with the YouTube still running around 10:00 PM.  Evan Cope decided to watch some more Spanish cooking shows, much to the annoyance of David, and then fell asleep around 11:00 PM.  Evan Langebeck and Matt played video games together before both falling asleep around 1:00 AM.