San Ildefonso

The countryside just makes you want to breathe in deep the clean air with a smidgen of cow and horse manure. The sound of continuously running water is just so peaceful until the wildlife including ants, horses and dogs come up to you to see if you're good for a meal.

We drove to San Ildefonso, which is about an hour north of Madrid. There were a couple of other families in the vicinity except they set up their camp as if there were at the beach. One kid had his boogie board and his mother was decked out in a bikini. It's not gonna happen kiddo, not on these ripples of water.

It was also an opportunity to do some star jumps and also practice my Karate Kid crane pose on a rock. If you want to see a couple of embarrassing photos go ahead and take a look at the album:

San Ildefonso

After the picnic we drove to La Granja, the summer palace of Felipe V and Isabel at the foothills of mountains. It's the grandest palace I've visited yet and it's known as Spain's answer to Versaille. There was an entire length of corridors filled with wall to wall tapestries and by that I mean an entire tapestry that filled an entire wall. There were the usual chandeliers, paintings, clocks and frescoes. The gardens were covered with topiaried shrubs and nicely bordered with an assortment of coloured bouquets. The fountains are suppose to be spectacular but they weren't turned on when we were there.

Also, I was this close to seeing Bjork in concert. She is suppose to
be doing a gig in the backyard of La Granja tonight. The crew was setting up as we were wondering around the jardines. We don't know who was invited and where to buy a ticket. Just as well I'm not a Bjork groupie or else I would have hid in the garden until the concert started. Although I didn't get a photo of her, I did get a photo of her stuff!

Photo of the Day
Being in an avenue of trees with lush green foliage in the summer time is probably one of the coolest and environmentally friendly things you can do. Ahhh... it's just very pleasant.