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Published: October 12th 2010
Guardo
with 3 of the auxiliares assigned to Guardo this year: Jacob, Isobel and JohnHey everyone,
Slowly getting myself up to date with the blog... Two weeks ago I returned to Guardo to visit all my friends, former colleagues and students from last year and had an absolutely wonderful weekend. I caught an early bus from Santander on Friday morning and changed buses in Aguilar de Campoo, a town on the eastern edge of Palencia. I had about an hour and a half before catching the bus to Guardo so I spent the time walking around Aguilar. It's a small town with about the same population as Guardo but is much more attractive with a charming historic center. Up on a hill that overlooks the town there are the ruins of a castle and there is also a Romanesque church. When I arrived in Aguilar it was quite foggy out but I wanted to see the ruins of the castle up close anyway so I walked up the hill. Despite the lack of view from the hill, the ruins were interesting and I found a path that led to the church farther down the hill. The province of Palencia is known for its Romanesque architecture and many small towns have interesting Romanesque churches between
Guardo
with my friend María Calle Aguilar de Campoo and Guardo. In Spanish it's referred to as "la ruta románica."
I arrived in Guardo a little before 1 pm and headed straight to I.E.S. Claudio Prieto, the secondary school where I worked last year. I greeted some of the teachers and met Paz, the history teacher from Cantabria that I worked with last year. She was going to do me the huge favor of taking things of mine that I left in Guardo over the summer with friends (like winter clothes, etc) to Santander in her car because there was too much for me to carry on my own returning to Santander by bus. We picked up my things and then I had to say goodbye because Paz was leaving town right then once her daughter got out of school at 1:30. I wish I could have spent more time with her but it will have to happen another weekend! I returned to Claudio Prieto where I spent some more time chatting with a lot of the teachers I worked with last year and I also entered the classes of my former students. They were pleasantly surprised to see me and I enjoyed visiting with
Guardo
playing around at one of the senior workout parks in Guardo (yes, there are several) them!
At 2:30 I left the school and went to meet the assistant English teachers working in Guardo this year, Isobel, John and Jacob. (The 4th assistant assigned to Guardo still hadn't arrived due to being accepted to the program late and holdups with her visa.) We had lunch at the Piter Dan, a popular bar and restaurant in Guardo that serves good pizza, sandwiches, etc. Isobel and Jacob are both British and from London while John is from Iowa. I had a great time getting to know them and after lunch I went with them over to their apartment. They live in a 4 bedroom place on the same street where I lived last year, but on the other end of the street. In fact, I had actually visited the apartment they decided to rent when I was looking for a place to live in Guardo last year but I hadn't rented it because there were still people living in it at the time and they weren't moving out soon enough.
I called my friend María Calle and planned to meet up with her a little while later. With her and Isobel, John and Jacob we went
Out in León
the beautiful cathedral on Saturday evening to a bar for some drinks and then took a walk around the pueblo. I showed the auxiliares one of my favorite spots in Guardo: the pedestrian walkway over the railroad tracks which is up on a hill and has a great view of the mountains that loom over the town. Then we walked to a bar that I only really got to know towards the end of my time in Guardo and that I really like: La Cueva. It's fairly hidden and is a quaint old bar with lots of pots and instruments hanging from the walls. If you make a reservation you can also eat dinner there. They serve a limited range of things but everything is really good: Spanish tortilla, huge salads with fish, and plates of cheese with chorizo and other meat. We spent several hours playing cards in the bar and my friend Eduardo also came to meet us. Jacob particularly knew a lot of card games and we all had fun learning new games and sometimes trying to modify them to work with Spanish decks which have fewer cards and different suites.
After we left the bar I went with María Calle to
Out in León
John, Isobel, Jacob and Eduardo visit our mutual friend María Llamazares who was at home resting after an operation on her foot. It was great to see her and catch up a little but I would have liked to have spent more time with her. I arranged to come by her house again the next day but in the end she wasn't feeling very well on Saturday so I never got the chance to see her again that weekend. I'm wishing her a rapid recovery from the surgery and surely I'll get to spend more time with her during my next visit to Guardo...or if she can come visit me in Santander in a few months! That night after having a Kebab for dinner I went with Eduardo and the auxiliares to another popular bar in Guardo, "Rojo Pool", a very apt name as the decor is all red, black and there are 2 pool tables in the back. We played a bit of pool and then called it an early night. I was tired and Eduardo was getting over a cold so we didn't feel like staying out later than midnight. I was staying with Eduardo in his house in the "poblado", a neighborhood
located between Guardo and Velila del Río Carrión where many of the employees of the power plant north of Guardo work. This housing is provided to the employees at the plant rent free and Eduardo's house is huge with 4 bedrooms upstairs and a large kitchen, living room, study and bathroom on the bottom floor. It has a very American layout and there is even a garage and a lawn outside so when I go to his house it reminds me of American suburbia...
On Saturday I made plans to meet more of my friends in Guardo to catch up over drinks. First I met Albino at 12:30 for a coffee. He was the owner of the academy where I worked in Guardo 2 hours a week giving an informal English conversation class to a few students. We often went out for copas after I finished teaching at 9:30 on weeknights and I got to know him well over the course of the year. Then I met my friend Ana at 1:30 to go out for cortos (small glasses of beer with a tapa given free at each bar). Ana is a young math teacher at Claudio Prieto where
I worked and we became good friends. Later after lunch I met Dani, one of my friends in Guardo who I met through playing tennis who is only 2 years older than me. It was a busy day and after saying goodbye to Dani I went back to Isobel, John and Jacob's apartment to get ready for a night in León. Eduardo was going to drive us to León, about an hour and half from Guardo, for dinner and then a night out on the town. I went to León two weekends last year and LOVE the city. It has great tapas and nightlife and is very attractive.
That Saturday was some sort of holiday in León and when we first walked by the cathedral there was a stage set up in front of it for a medieval play and crowds of people around. We also passed by some processions in the streets before starting our tapas crawl. After a few bars we went to a pizza restaurant for dinner that is really popular and it was delicious. We went to a few bars later to dance and finally ended up in a place that we really liked but
unfortunately I don't remember its name (for when I go back)! Someone was handing out promotional cards in the street to get more people to enter and when we went in there weren't too many people but they were playing good club music so we stayed and within an hour a lot more people had already arrived. We finally left León around 5 am I think. Eduardo is a pro designated driver because he's gone out in León with his friends from Madrid a lot when they come to visit him in Guardo occasionally. We had a great night and it was all thanks to him!
On Sunday I woke up around 2 pm and Eduardo and I planned to meet Isobel, John and Jacob at the Piter Dan for lunch which is their favorite restaurant so far in Guardo. They've already gone so much they now know everyone that works there, hehe. My bus to head back to Santander was going to leave at 4:15 so after lunch we all headed over to the bus station. I was pretty sad to say goodbye to Eduardo and my new friends Isobel, John and Jacob. Living in such a small
Out in León
with Isobel town like Guardo last year was pretty hard sometimes but now when I go back to visit I mostly only have fond memories of all the people I met and of the place. It was such a great weekend!
¡Hasta pronto!
Dana
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Ana Sevilla
non-member comment
wow!! unas fotos muy bonitas de Aguilar
Hey, Dana!!! It's Ana Sevilla here. I've just seen the pictures of Aguilar, and I love them... How did you decide to get to the castle on such a foggy day??? You're a brave explorer!!! Thank you for including me in your blog. Best wiches, Ana Sevill