The one with the flashback to Caceres

Marissa and I had been contemplating a trip back to Caceres for a while.  It was where we had our orientation all the way back in the beginning five and a half months ago.  I hadn't seen much of Spain yet, but I fell in love with its quaint, lamp-lit streets, white buildings, red roofs, and feeling of history.  Because we only saw it for a few hours at night, most of which was spent outside a bar getting to know the other auxiliars, we decided then that we should go back.  After considering it for the last few weeks, we decided to go for it this weekend.

Yesterday morning we got up early and headed to the catch the 8:50 bus.  It is a two hour trip, and as is usual for me, I slept most of the way, though I also took advantage of the free wifi that they have here on some of the buses.  We arrived in Caceres and decided to walk from the bus station to city center, about a mile away, hoping to see the city as we walked through.

Old town was classic Spain, as we expected.  The sun was shining, for once, and it was actually quite nice out.  We had planned to hit up this palace, but we arrived to find that it was really just an old house with a military/Semana Santa museum inside, guarded by soldiers.  I don't know what happened.  There are supposedly a lot of palaces in Caceres, but they are not what you really think of when you think of a palace. Oh well. It was still really pretty.  We walked through the main plazas, which were very nice.  There were a couple of flamenco singers hanging out in each, which was fun to listen to.

 

We also went into Iglesia de Santa Maria.  We were able to go up into the tower, which was cool.  It had some pretty views of the city.  The only downside was that there were a lot of stairs, which weren't fun for my painful joints.  Finally we headed to Plaza Mayor.  We sat on the stairs and enjoyed some people watching, particularly of several small children (gosh I love kids!).  It was then that we realized that we had been there for an hour and a half, had done everything that we wanted to, and were ready to go home.  We turned on the Internet, and when we found that there was a 1:30 PM bus, decided to head back to Zafra.  Maybe that makes us lame, but we had a good trip. And we got some pastries on the way to the bus :)