Burgos

Burgos was the last stop on our road trip in August with the Hawkins.  It is a beautiful city and fun to visit.  It is about 3 hours north of Madrid, and most famous for its outstanding cathedral.  It is in the top 3 cathedrals in Spain, the other two being Toledo and Seville.

This is a view of the city from the hill above.  You can see the cathedral in the center.

Of course the old city is walled, and this is one of the gates.

This is one of the many interesting sculptures throughout the city.

We took a fun little tour of the city on this cute train.

Part of the enormous cathedral.

Again, I can't get my pictures in order.  This is a very interesting convent.
I have more pictures of this later on.

This is one of the doors inside the cathedral.

Cathedral on the far right.

This cathedral is so large, there was no way I could get the whole thing into a shot.  It has twin spires on this one end.

On the far left you can see the Gothic twin towers.  The doorway in the middle is the central entrance.

Here is the first quarter of the building.

Dave and Charlotte are posing with Greg's old friend.

Another gate

Outside the wall.

Greg always manages to find locals willing to listen to his jokes.

Dave is a cowboy from way back.

One of the many pretty fountains.

Another old church, and some interesting locals.

This is the Spanish version of "American Gothic" (farmer and his wife with the pitchfork.)

Greg and Dave put a big smile on her face.

I love this old bell tower.

El Cid was from Burgos, and here he launched the reconquest of Spain from the Moors.

Pretty parks and walkways along the river all through town.

Trees line the main boulevard.

They graft the trees together to make a canopy.

This is the main gate into the old city.

I loved this bronze statue of a woman roasting chestnuts.

A great clock.

All over Spain people have iron balconies.
So many in Burgos have beautiful flowers growing on them.

Get thee to a nunnery!

This is the old convent I showed earlier.  We were excited to tour it, but it
was closed that day.  A whole van was unloading the new nuns coming in. Kind of a Catholic MTC.

The gateway into the joint.

Another gate in the wall around the old city.

You can see that the Moors were there.

More of the wall.

These cyclists were having a thrill ride.

This woman's trainer was trying to kill her, I think.  While we watched she must have done at least  half a dozen runs up these stairs, and she was at it long before we arrived and still there when we left.  They kept trying for a faster and faster time.  I'm not sure I could have walked it once.

This is the drawbridge for the old castle above the city.
The castle is in ruins now, but still fun to see.

Opposite the bridge.

Another tower of the cathedral, as seen from the same hill as the castle.

More views from the castle.

Here you can see the 3 main sections of the cathedral.

Now to the inside of the cathedral.  I wish I could have done it justice.

My favorite part is always the choir.

Amazing domes over every chapel, and there were 16 chapels.

The misery chords on each for the seats were different.

The hand painted music (illuminated).

Beautiful engravings and inlays.  The seats fold up (like the one second from the right)
with just a small ledge for them to lean on, so they could be extra miserable,
but have their diaphragms in full force.

Most of the chapels had spectacular gates to match their spectacular altar pieces.  

A beautiful walk along the river.

The tree canopy.

Our hotel just outside the main gate.

Just another steeple over the tops of the trees.

There he goes again, getting personal with a perfect stranger.

Greg and Dave camped out on the gate.

Half the cathedral in the shot.

Still can't get it all in.

Above the main entrance.

The rose window.

My favorite gargoyle.

Something about it just makes me giggle.

There is a wonderful bridge similar to the Charles Bridge in Prague.  These Otavalo
Indians were performing on the bridge, and it was fantastic.  They are from Ecuador and have an extremely interesting story.  Look it up.  We have them come to the temple now and then, and love to see them there.  A very large percentage of them are LDS.

El Cid on the bridge.

I thought this was very strange sculpture, and I'm not sure what it represents.

This reminded me of our sweet Brenda, and made me smile.

Storks in Burgos.

More cathedral shots.

Well, that's Burgos in a nut shell.  We loved it, and would recommend it highly to anyone coming to Spain.  This also finally catches me up on the sights we have seen so far. July and August were jam packed, but September had no excitement, except for Greg's heart attack.  We are hoping to see more in October and November before it gets too cold.  So much to see, so little time.