Semana Santa: Madrid: Part 1

Monday I took the night train so that I arrived in Madrid at 8:00 in the morning. I actually got more sleep than I expected. I headed to the hostel and was able to put my stuff in my room even though it wasn’t time to check in. Then I had about 5 hours before my friend Christi was supposed to show up so I went on a tour of the city through SANDEMANs NEW Europe. It was a ‘free’ tour, meaning you could tip the guide however much you thought was appropriate/what fit in your budget at the end. I really liked my tour. My tour guide was from Ireland and she told us a lot of cool stories about the history of Madrid.

We began in the Plaza Mayor. This was the main square where all the important activities used to be held like bull-fighting and Inquisition executions. There used to be 4-tier seating and people would rent out their balconies.

Then we walked just about a block away and saw the world’s oldest restaurant. They have a certificate to prove it. :)

The bear and tree is the symbol of Madrid. Apparently it used to just be a bear with all four paws on the ground, but at some point in history the city and the church were arguing over who got to cut down the trees and who got to use the land for pasture. So, they asked the king who decided that the city got to cut down the trees and the church could use the land. So, the 2 paws on the tree represent the city and the 2 paws on the ground represent the church. Later in history, a king (I can’t remember which) was deathly ill, but then someone made him a potion out of a particular type of berry and he was cured. So after that, they added berries to the tree in the symbol to represent that.

The Bear and Tree statue found in Plaza del Sol.

This is the cathedral. It is actually pretty new, finished in 1993. But, it took 100 years to build. Thus 3 different architects with 3 different styles. It is very obvious where the changes in style happened.

This is the back.

And this is the front. 

We ended our tour at the Royal Palace where Christi and I saw the changing of the guard the next day.

SANDEMANs NEW Europe operates tours in many different cities in Europe. If you get the chance, I would definitely go on one of their tours!

Semana Santa: Santiago de Compostela

Semana Santa technically means Holy Week, but refers to the week and a half vacation I had starting the Thursday before Easter and lasting through the next week.

For the first Friday through Monday I was in Santiago de Compostela in Galicia. The cathedral in Santiago is where the remains of St. James are kept. So, there is a pilgrimage leading to Santiago called El Camino. There are several different routes, the most popular one beginning in France. You can read more about El Camino here. It was really cool to be in the plaza in front of the cathedral and see people arriving after having walked for weeks to get there.

This is the symbol of El Camino.
It's also found in Oviedo because Oviedo is on the route.

Something unique that occurs in Spain during Holy Week are the processions. These oftentimes include what look like KKK uniforms, but these processions have been going on for hundreds of years long before the KKK. I tried to attend a few processions in Santiago, but many were canceled due to rain. I did catch one luckily, but their outfits didn't include the hoods.

I think this one was kind of cheating because it was on wheels, they didn't carry it.

Both men and women participated and you can kind of
see in the picture that some of them were barefoot.

Some of them carried the metal staffs that were used to
prop the float up when they stopped.

Daylight savings time began on Easter in Spain, I believe 3 weeks after in the United States. Which resulted in me missing the main Easter Mass in the cathedral because my little track phone doesn't change time automatically and I forgot the time switched.

Some of the cool things I saw in Santiago included the cathedral, an exhibit of more than 200 varieties of Camelia, the flower of Galicia, and the cathedral museum.

The cathedral

Double organ!

The altar

Camelias

Stay tuned for Part II when I head to Madrid!