Day 10

At this hotel, the Pintor El Greco, since I booked with the hotel website rather than through Expedia or booking.com sites as I usually do, we have breakfast included for the same price. This is the first hotel breakfast for us since we arrived. Wow, what a spread. Only in Germany have I seen more meats, cheese and breads. Also: cereals, sweet rolls, fruit, juices (fresh squeezed OJ) and coffee – real coffee! We rolled out of the hotel after breakfast to take on the hill town of Toledo but more ready to go back to bed. No time for that. We need to get to the work of vacationing.

Today, nothing of a unique or humorous nature occurred. We went to the Cathedral, the Alcazar and the church of Santo Tome. At this church, Santo Tome, was another El Greco, the burial of Count Orgaz, one of his most important works, on the wall inside a room of the church. To see his work, we paid $7 total to walk into the one darkly lit room, look at the huge El Greco and walk out. We were not even allowed to see the church which is open only for mass. Stupid tourist. Stupid tourist.

The Cathedral of Toledo was one of the most amazing I have seen in England, France, Austria, Italy or Spain. The amount of labor, the precious materials: gold, silver, rubies, emeralds, etc, etc, was over the top. The scale was beyond cathedral. Only Spain could create such a “busy” volume within that immense space. The church was liberally adorned with the gold and silver plundered from the Americas in the 1500’s Age of Exploration. Here I usually begin my rant about the reverse money pit that a catholic cathedral is. Why so much wealth “stored” within the walls? Could the value of the ornaments not be used better than to sit in cases to be looked at? Why do I pay $11 to enter a church filled with many multiples of millions of dollars of just “stuff” sitting around or decorating the walls? How much is too much? Ok so it was a rant.

Toledo is a delightful city on a high rise above a 270 degree curve of the rio Tajo. The city, within the medieval walls, is characterized by narrow, winding streets. The one full day is enough but well worth the time here. The hotel we stayed at was next to the El Greco Museum. I was so happy to book this place. You guessed it. The museum is closed and all of the El Greco work is on temporary exhibit in Mexico. Wonderful.

After the huge breakfast and quite substantial lunch we passed on dinner and even passed on wine.