Overnight in Salamanca

One day at school, a little bored at break, my other auxiliar (teaching assistant) coworkers and I began to toss around the idea of taking a short weekend trip to somewhere in Spain. We needed a little breather from work and a coworker bonding trip sounded pretty good. The trip to Salamanca, Spain was born. Casey, Ashley and I booked our bus and hostel for just one night, and were ready for a fun night out in this new town!

While only in Salamanca for a night and couple of days, I learned quite a few things in this small, yet lively town...

5 Things I Learned in Salamanca:

1. There really are such things as college towns in Spain. Before leaving for Salamanca, we'd heard that it was a really fun place to go for a night out, since a large university is there (which is actually the first university of Spain.) Small, college town? Never heard that one before. But really, in Spain I hadn't. Salamanca is no doubt a college town though. There were young people everywhere, and the nightlife wasn't too shabby. Ironically, the design and architecture of the town even reminded me of TCU back in Texas. Like my alma matter, the buildings in Salamanca had a uniform style: clean, stone and all pale yellow. Even weirder of a coincidence? The frog is the symbol of Salamanca. Yes, a frog. It is meant to be good luck, so you can literally find frog paraphernalia EVERYWHERE. Go Horned Frogs!!! Maybe I found the TCU of Spain...

2. It's stork season. Before Salamanca, the only stork I'd ever seen was cartoons in my childhood books. So this is what I expected to see when Casey yelled, "Look, a stork!"

To my slight disappointment, it wasn't wearing a cute mailman hat and carrying a baby; but this bird was very, very big and majestic. This specific stork also had prime real estate over the other storks because it sat at the top of this amazing tower right in the middle of the city. Anywhere you went in Salamanca you could look up and find the stork hanging out in its nest, looking over the town. When I heard it was stork season, I was pretty thrown off. There's a stork season? But there really is...we saw about 6 storks in the very short time that we were there.

Obviously not a great picture of the stork, but you can see it's beautiful home looking out over the city. All the other storks are jealous.

3. Empanadas and stuffed tortillas are the bomb. Of course we had to do a little research on the food before visiting Salamanca. We quickly found out that Salamancans likes their food stuffed. Empanadas (a stuffed bread) and tortillas rellenas (stuffed tortillas) are all the rage in this town. And for good reason. Pushing up to the front of the bar was worth it when it came to these delicacies. Just one order of a cerveza or glass of wine would get you a free empanada or tortilla and they never disappointed.

A veggie empanada. You can get ALL kinds though. The typical Salamancan empanada (el hornazo) is stuffed with ham or sausage.

Obviously these aren't just any normal Spanish tortillas. One is stuffed with tuna, the other turkey and cheese (almost tasted like a club sandwich) and the other...well, another type of meat? I was never really sure. But all GOOD!

4. Salamanca is practically built around two major cathedrals, one of them being the last gothic cathedral built in Spain. Pretty cool...

The amazing view from one of the cathedrals.

5. Traveling with coworkers is fun. One of the best things about living and traveling abroad is the people you encounter and the new friendships you make. I spend everyday with my auxiliar friends working at school, but it's really nice to get out and do something different. Traveling with different people is not only refreshing, but gives you knew a new perspective.

Casey, Ashley and I on our night out in Salamanca.

#travel #fooddrink