Salamanca and a Vacation from my Vacation

Some time has passed since my last post, and I’m finally writing again because at the moment I’m on a vacation from my vacation. I’m sitting at an outdoor cafe in the smallish Spanish city of Salamanca, a couple-hours train ride north and west of Madrid, enjoying a cafe con leche and a - rather tiny for Spain standards - order of toast with butter and jam while watching people mill around in front of me inside Plaza Mayor, one of Spain’s largest and grandest plazas. I just witnessed my waiter scold a group of “chicos” for putting two tables together. He chased them away - good customer service - so they moved to the cafe just one spot over and are now sitting contentedly over there. Good for them.

When I arrived back to Madrid 10 days ago after spending time in loud, trafficky, crowded, somewhat dirty Athens, Madrid felt like a breath of fresh air. The streets were wide, parks and squares were plentiful and clean, back streets were calm and quiet. There was a general peace in the air. It felt great to be back. But…slowly over the past week…Madrid has beaten me down. A city that seemed tranquil in comparison to Athens 10 days ago, became a city that grew in my mind as busy, difficult, congested, and mostly…HOT!!! I love Madrid. Don’t get me wrong. It’s one of my favorite European cities, but let’s just say, of late, it’s gotten the better of me. In all honesty, however, I don’t think it’s totally Madrid’s fault. I think I’ve gotten to a point on my trip in which I’m quite exhausted from traveling, my brain hurts from speaking and trying to understand so much Spanish, and did I mention also, that it’s HOT!!!

I’ve learned from previous travel experiences, that I can sort of embrace the culture of a new place, exist on adrenaline, beer and coffee, go a mile a minute and soak up the experience, for only so long. At some point all I want to do is order a pizza in, read the Star Tribune online, talk to people back home and curl up on the couch and watch Netflix. That moment came several days ago as I was sitting in our dark, mostly windowless AirBNB, not wanting to go out into the hot, sun-drenched streets of Madrid and just wanting to escape into normalcy, familiarity and comfort. A few other things about Spain that had begun to lose their charm - and again, don’t misread this, I freaking love Spain. I love it. But… eating at 10:00 pm, going to bed at 12:00 or 1:00, coffee at 10:00 am, lunch at 2:00, staying inside from 3:00 until 8:00 because of the HEAT…I was growing weary of this routine. I was hitting my wall.

The other thing I noticed that had begun to happen was that I had begun to completely lose sight of the routines that matter so much to me. Long walks, morning runs, yoga, reading, writing, blogging. Previously I had been able to maintain these routines - on the beach in La Barrosa, in Amorgos, even while we were traveling between Cadiz, Sevilla and Granada. But something had slowly begun to happen in Madrid that started getting me into a funk. Definitely some down times - call it dips into feelings of depression - began to kick in, too. I think most of that came as a result of - dare I belabor this point one more time - the HEAT. Our dark, cave-like AirBNB didn’t help either. For me, the best cures for dips into feelings of depression have always been sunlight, exercise and getting outside. If I’m feeling blue, the first thing I do is get the hell out of the house. Go on a walk. Get the blood pumping. The problem was, that in Madrid, with temps consistently climbing near or above 100 degrees and with an unrelenting mid-day sun, getting outside during the afternoon was not necessarily a pleasant endeavor. So I’d find myself staying inside more, and that didn’t help much either.

Now, let me step back for a moment. In all this - admittedly long - prelude to me writing about my need for a vacation from my vacation, I would be completely misrepresenting my time in Madrid by making it seem like I didn’t have many moments of enjoyment and fun. I did. Many.

There were lots of fun meals out with Maria and David. I hung out with Kenia a ton, including a really fun afternoon in which she showed me around the neighborhood where she works and in which we spent several hours picnicking in El Retiro park.

There was a fun night of croquetas, sangrias and really good conversation with my friend Mariela from back home.

There were multiple walks, and just a couple of runs, along Rio Manzanares and to the sprawling Casa de Campo park beyond the river. There was an afternoon of tacos and a night of rollerblading - and lots of laughter and a few panicked screams from Kenia - along the same river with Kenia and her sister Yesi.

There was a really fun, test-the-limits-of-my-Spanish day visiting David’s parents, sister and niece and eating a delicious lunch of ham, octopus and lentils, in Mosteles, just outside of Madrid. There was a night in a cuevas restaurant with Santi and a bunch of his friends from Minnesota who’d arrived in Madrid a day earlier.

And…there was a totally awesome day with Kenia that began with a fabulous menu del dia for lunch, finally seeing - and loving! - Top Gun Maverick in a Madrid theater, a stroll with ice cream near Palacio Real and finally dipping into a bar to enjoy a cerveza and catch the end of the Spain-England Women’s Euros match. Madrid, along with some lows I’d been feeling, definitely provided a lot of highs as well.

However, my frustration with Madrid came to a boiling point Sunday afternoon. Kenia and I had planned to meet for churros and chocolate at Chocolateria San Gines - founded in 1894 and Madrid’s most famous chocolateria - in the late morning then head to Retiro for a picnic and an afternoon of relaxing. Kenia brought her rollerblades - a fact that doesn’t matter much at the moment, but later will a helluva lot. The churros and chocolate were great, but I was dragging a bit and couldn’t wait to finally get to the park and chill out. I had plans to write in my journal, blog, perhaps read a little, have a beer and a good lunch, and definitely sleep. We planned to be there into the early evening.

With our bellies full of probably one or two too many churros, we took to the streets and onto the metro. I carried Kenia’s backpack filled with her rollerblades and various accouterments. Heat. Back sweat. “I can’t wait to get to the park. Shade. Trees. Soft grass. You can do this.” One metro change and we were on the #2 red line. More back sweat. Kenia’s clunky backpack. But, we’re almost there. Nap time soon. Finally, our stop. Retiro. We followed the signs that led directly to the park, we rounded several corners, we took a tunnel under the street, and we finally arrived at the - WTF - locked gate!!! “You’ve gotta be kidding me!” We didn’t know what was up, and optimistically went up to the street to find another entrance. In the meantime, I checked Google Maps. Google said Retiro was “closed.” What the hell? Why? This has to be some kind of a mistake. On a blistering hot summer day on a Sunday, you’re going to close the freakin park??? Main gate - closed and locked as well. We looked to an electronic sign next to the gate running a video message - “the park is closed due to extreme weather.” What in the actual F? Extreme weather? Was it the heat? And if so, wouldn’t you want the park to be open as a respite from the heat??? Now what? I was pissed, and determined - to REST dammit! We sat - like dejected puppies - in the shade to try to figure out our next move. Go to Parque de Roma, a park Kenia and I had walked through a day earlier, but that was a good 15-minute hike from El Retiro? Nope, I had a brighter idea. Let’s walk to the adjacent - so I thought - botanical gardens and have our picnic there. So we walked, and walked, and walked some more. It wasn’t so adjacent. I felt bad when Kenia offered to carry her backpack, but damn I was happy to rid myself of that beast. Finally, after more walking and more sweating, we arrived at El Jardín Botánico. There was an entrance fee. OK, I can live with that. But then… the sign. The big sign posted next to the ticket booth. One of the many things forbidden inside the gardens - picnics. Oh for crying out loud! That did it. We sat again and finally both admitted to one another that we each just wanted to go home. We were finished. What a freakin fiasco. By the time I made it back to the apartment, I was bound and determined to escape the inferno and find some solace. Salamanca it was. Hotel - booked. Train ticket - booked. Siesta time.

So. Salamanca. And my vacation from my vacation. Craving sunlight, and being able to see the outside world from my room - unlike our Madrid AirBNB, I splurged on a “cathedral view” room with two balconies at a 4-star hotel in the center of the old town. No more interior courtyard, dark views for me. Considering this “splurge” was still less than $100 per night, I didn’t feel all that terribly guilty for giving myself the treat I felt like I deserved, and definitely needed. I took the train here Monday afternoon, and quickly felt like I had made the perfect choice for me. Salamanca was 10 degrees cooler than Madrid, the pedestrian old-town had a strolling, quiet, peaceful vibe, and my hotel room lived up to the hype. The first thing I did after checking in was throw all my balcony windows wide open and dive into the minibar for an over-priced, yet ice-cold and delicious, Heineken. I was a happy man. I could feel my mood improve by the second and my stress physically disappearing within me.

The next three days were fantastic. (I had originally booked just two nights, but by the end of my first day, I knew I needed to stay one more.) Really, really long, peaceful, not-that-hot walks along the wide and beautiful Tormes River. Lots of cervezas. A nice chat with a Peruvian-Canadian family over breakfast one morning. A super fun night of tapas-hopping that included a fun and interesting conversation at Mesón Cervantes with bartender Fusi, a Spaniard from Morocco who had a penchant for playing 90s pop music - think Michael Jackson’s “Black and White” - over the bar speakers and who had a lot to say about the racism that’s still prevalent within many people in Spain. Fusi got my tapas crawl off on the right foot with two free tapas and even a beer on the house. Good start to my crawl. Three beers. Two tapas. 5 Euros.

Exercise. Yoga by Adrienne and runs by the river. Strolling the amazingly gorgeous old town - complete with stone streets and cathedrals and university buildings that date back to the 1100 and 1200s - stopping often to listen to live music performed on the street, mostly in the form of a solo guitar or accordion player. Tuna music - young musicians dressed in capes and leggings and following a 600-year-old tradition of belting out tunes for money - in the late evening hours in Plaza Mayor. A much-needed haircut from Uruguayan-born, friendly, chatty (in Spanish!) Javier. (Dios mio, my Spanish is being put to the test! And I love it!) And finally, on my last night, an evening of outdoor traditional Cantabrian and Castilla Y Leon folk music performed by a 5-man string band called Vallarna in the beautiful gardens of Sala de exposiciones Santo Domingo de la Cruz.

Vacation from my vacation - complete. Time - and money - very well spent. I’ll remember Salamanca as the place that - for lack of a better expression - helped me get my mojo back. Thanks Salamanca. I appreciate it.

Outdoor music on my final night in Salamanca

My fun, friendly, chatty barber Javier

Beautiful Salamanca

El Rio Tormes and Puente Romano, ancient, Roman bridge

Salamanca's Plaza Mayor as seen from a balcony of Fusi's bar above Mesón Cervantes

Tuna singers