Manzanares el Real

Well, well, well...It's been a little while. Actually, for me, not so much. Not only do I have a list of things that I've been meaning to write about on an electronic Post-It Note on my computer desktop, but I've had literally four posts that have been sitting in draft form for several months now. Shame.
http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=1617827759491842830#editor/target=post;postID=6643231031662027662
Well, school's been out for three weeks now, and I've finally hit the stage of ultimate boredom (which hopefully won't last too long). So today I'll try to finally finish up these four posts, just for you, mis amigos. Here goes:

Moving along, this year in Madrid I've really been trying to travel and explore as much as possible. I'm probably only doing a mediocre job in doing so, but in my opinion, I've still seen and gotten to know a lot more of Spain, Madrid in particular. I've also been, as you may know, to Portugal a few

Community of Madrid & Surrounding

times in the past year, and Germany and Austria, of course, all of which I liked a lot. But getting to really know Madrid and its close surroundings has been something of a goal of mine, and it may seem like an easy task, but it's not always. That's partly why I decided to try to complete that list of 100 things to do in Madrid (um...yeah, about that...). But I also enjoy going to places outside of the city of Madrid but still in the community (which, for the sake of this post, is essentially Spain's equivalent of a state or province) of Madrid. One of the great things that I like about Madrid is the public transportation. The bus and train system are pretty reliable, relatively cheap (although they recently raised prices a lot), and most of all, extensive. Seeing as I don't have a car and would be terrified to drive here even if I did have one, this is key for me. For a while when I was first living here, I thought that pretty much the only places worth seeing on the outskirts of Madrid were Toledo and Segovia (neither of which are even in the community of Madrid). Since then I've seen some great places like Aranjuez (my favorite by far), El Escorial, and this one, Manzanares el Real (red arrow), all within 45 minutes of my house.

Manzanares is located not even an hour north of Madrid, at the foot of La Pedriza, a part of the Sierra de Guadarrama. Just in case you were curious, courtesy of Guidebook Sarah. Anyway, so it's up in the mountains. Right on a huge reservoir (el Embalse de Santillana), towards the mouth of the river that bears the same name. A town relatively busy with tourists and yet still tucked away enough that it's only the good tourists (i.e. few non-Spaniards - during peak season there are plenty of Spanish tourists) who even know about it. It's mostly known for its very well-preserved medieval castle, but there's a lot of great hiking in the area as well. So long story short, I'd been meaning to go for a while, and back in March (I know, right, March?) I bit the bullet and finally went.

Manzanares River

 The town itself doesn't have a whole lot of things to do or see, aside from the nice scenery. There is the medieval castle, the Castillo de los Mendoza from the 15th century. There's also the castillo viejo, or old castle, which is pretty much just ruins and no one seems to really know exactly when it's from (I guess they think maybe sometime around the 14th century, so really not much older than the other castle). There's also a church (surprise, surprise), and some monastery or something like that, which we didn't go to because it was a bit of a hike up in the mountains and we didn't have time. We started out by crossing the river past the "old castle" and taking a walk alongside the river, across from the town. It was a good walk, and really the scenery alone makes it worth going out to Manzanares. It's the perfect combination of mountain, water, and cute little town nestled somewhere in between.

View of the pueblo and mountains from across the river.

Please don't feed the adorable, pretty, sweet horsies.

Old Castle - not a whole lot to see.

 Anyway, afterwards, we checked out the castle. Basically its story is that the Mendoza family decided in 1475 that the old castle just wasn't flashy enough for them, so they had the new castle built. (Hence the castle's name, the Mendoza castle.) Now, of course, the castle is open to the public (although I think it's still privately owned). Inside there are a lot of tapestries, paintings, some furniture - the usual. The two-story courtyard is pretty cool, and in the middle of it there is an apple tree (although a somewhat small and pathetic-looking apple tree). This is because "manzanares" means "apple orchards." You can also go up on what I guess I would call the roof of the castle (or a walkway along the roof), which gives you a great view of the town and surrounding landscape.

Castillo de los Mendoza

For anyone thinking, "Medieval Times" much? Yeah...the castle is a bit cheesy and fake looking. It's no Segovia Alcazar or Neuschwanstein Castle, but it's cool nonetheless.

Like I said, there's not a ton to see in the little town of Manzanares, but since it's located in the Sierra de Guadarrama, there is a lot of hiking. On this day in March, we didn't venture up into the mountains, partly because we didn't have time and partly because the woman in the tourist office advised against it since it was still, well, March. And since then I've also learned that these mountains have some of the most confusing and easy-to-get-yourself-lost-in trails around Madrid. So good thing we just stayed in the pueblo.