Madrid-Granada-Seville-Santiago de Compostela

The train ride from Madrid to Granada took about 3 hours.  I have never seen so many olive trees in my whole life.  All the way to Granada we saw hundreds of thousands of olive trees. Next time you open a bottle of olives or olive oil, check to see where it comes from.

We stayed in a beautiful hotel called the Alhambra Palace which is 2 blocks from the real Alhambra. The Alhambra is streached along the top of the hill called th La Sabica. It is not only a Palace built for Emir Yosuf I, it also a fortress and city with at one time 5,000 inbabitants. The Moors ( Muslims) ruled from the 8th - 12 century.
An interesting story was told about one of the Sultan's number one wife who had taken a lover.  The Sultan's only way to make sure who he was, was to invite all 36 males from the community to a party and have them all beheaded........nice guy Huh!
King Ferdinand and Queen Isabela conquerd Granada in 1492 and united all the kingdoms of Spain.

We were in Granada for two days and then traveled to Seville. The Cathedral in Seville is the 4th largest in the world in size.  It is so beautiful and so overwelming to see. It has the largest  continuous altar piece in the world. It took them 80 years to carve it.

 Dick looked all over Seville for a Barber but could not find one ( boy does he need a haircut......thank God for Karen when we get back!  We went to another Flamenco Show which was wonderful......our third on this trip!

We had decided to go to the north of Spain instead of going on a day trip to Tangier, Morroco. We talked to several people about some alternatives and they all directed us to Santiago de Compostela.  It is in the northern part of Spain. It is suppose to be the most spiritual place third to Jeruselem and Rome in Christianity. St James is the patron saint of Spain. The legend is that a hermit found the burial place of St James by followng a star.  The name Santiago ( St James) of Compostela ( the stars).  San Diego also means St James. This was a major pilgrimage since the 9th century.  I bought something very special today for David, Kelly, Stephan, Jack, Haley, Kiara and Megan and Julia from Santiago de Compostela to remind then that we are all prigrims on the road to life.

We went to the Pilgrim's Mass at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela...one the most beautiful churches in the world.  It dates back to the 9th Century. Ernest Hemingway described Santiago's Cathedral as "the building that meant the most to him in all the world".

Tomorrow, we leave for  Vigo Spain by train.   Why Vigo you ask..........well it is the only way we can get the train to Porto Portugal.  We will spend one night in Vigo and one night in Porto and one night in Lisbon and then we will be returning home on the 18th of November out of Lisbon.