Tilting at windmills (they might be giants)

What a day! I can honestly say that a long term goal has been achieved. But I'm getting to that... So I got up this morning with one task that I knew I must complete. I had to get to see the windmills. You know, the Don Quijote windmills. Or should I say the giants? (yes I will make that reference more than once, no it's probably not that funny, but how often will I get to do that?) I had some information from the guy running the hostel (hostels are good like that) on which bus to take to get there, so I wandered off at about the time I thought the bus was leaving. I say I thought, because as it turned out, I had switched the departure and return times, so the time I thought the bus was leaving Toledo, it was actually leaving the small windmill town, from now on known as Consuegra. Whoops. What was previously a panicked sort of run to the bus station (I left in plenty of time but got a bit turned around) became a slow amble. I arrived at the station to buy a ticket for later, but to my dismay the bus that arrived there didn't seem to have any Saturday buses. It had Lunes a Viernes, and Dias Loborales. Okay, weekdays and workdays, right? So I sat and stared and tried to work out a way the Saturday bus times could get me there and back without getting stranded in Consuegra. There was no possible way. Defeated, I went and sat down and pulled out the schedule he gave me, thinking, well, this must be an old schedule. Bummer. But as I'm about to leave I think, I should ask him anyway, what could it hurt? And why would you say Mon-Fri and then work days if they meant the same thing? That makes no sense. Perhaps Saturday is included in work days? Low and behold, that was exactly it. So I managed to get a bus to Consuegra for the late morning (also known as early afternoon in the States). I wandered over to the castle on the hill, which you may have seen in my pictures from yesterday. When I say wandered, I mean hiked. It was quite a jaunt. When I got up there I found, to my dismay, that the castle is now a youth hostel, and they don't allow tourists. First, coolest youth hostel ever. Second, stupid youth hostel, ruining my castle adventure. I did get some pretty neat pictures of the outside, so that was alright. I had a couple hours to kill, and on my way to the Mosque found a free sacred art museum (boy do I love free). They even had some incredibly old pillars and grave markers from the Roman era, Arabic columns, and of course a fantastic collection of religious art dating back to the 13th century. Old baptismal founts and statuary, right up my alley. I never did make it to the mosque (maybe it's open tomorrow?) but it was still a nice morning. Okay, on to the meat of my journey. I hopped onto the bus bound for a town past Consuegra. The thing about Spanish buses is that they assume you know the town you're going to, or at least how long it will take to get there. They won't announce the name, and you won't pass a sign saying 'welcome to' anything. Luckily, the first thing you see when you hit Consuegra is windmills. Gorgeous, circular, windmills. The actual Don Quijote windmills. And a ton of them, 12 at my count. I got off the bus with three other people, all around my age. Two were Japanese men, and one was a Peruvian woman. We all spoke enough Spanish to communicate. Turns out we were headed to the same place (not that there's a lot of other stuff in Consuegra). If you're interested in going, the tourist info is in bus station, so it was pretty easy to get a map. It turns out you pretty much head straight up. It's not an easy trip. Yes, they added stairs, but the stairs are quite slanted. It takes about fifteen minutes, and I would recommend going on a weekday. We were a bit pressed for time, as the only bus back to Toledo was coming in fifty five minutes. But the four of us did get some great pictures (some together as well, though I never learned the Japanese guys' names). Not only that, but I made some friends! As I mentioned, there are about twelve windmills. All of them have names, and they're all pretty spread apart. What you should do is climb up this short path to a wall with a hole in it. If you climb through the hole (it's quite large) you have access not only to the windmills, but to a castle. Like I said, we didn't have time to check it out (thwarted again) but the view was beautiful. Though slightly marred by the presence of a crane, it was completely worth it just to see them. Adela (the Peruvian woman) recommended that I take a tour train around Toledo, which I did. I highly recommend it. It's cheap, and you get to see the town from the summit of the castle hill without hiking up there. The accompanying audio tour is available in 18 languages, and is really very interesting. Also, they take American dollars. Weird. I head back to Aranda tomorrow, which I'm ready for. Vacation is great, but it'll be nice to get back to my routine. Also, it'll be nice not to spend so much money on souvenirs. Also, I forgot both soap and shampoo so... yeah. It'll be good to get back home. But before I do that, I'll be going to a Mozarabique rite mass tomorrow, only celebrated in Toledo and Leon, and established before the Roman rite mass. More information on that tomorrow (or Monday, when I can use the library's internet connection). Time to see if I can get some sleep. The hostel is quite cold tonight, and I've got Man of la Mancha running through my head non stop.