Day 4: Wednesday, November 23: Perelada:

Riding down the highway

frolicking with the local sheep

Lunch! Tapas! Yum!

Our view

The group

Library at Castle Perelada

Glass Museum

Wine Mueseum

We got up early and had breakfast then packed our stuff and walked to where the horses were being kept. The sun was finally out today and it was warm and breezy. We headed out for our ride and rode through many vineyards. The ground was still pretty wet from the rain. At one point we crossed a patch where the horses sunk to their elbows in mud. We crossed a river that was supposed to be a street but was blocked off because cars could not pass. We could hear lots of gun shots from the near by military base. After walking through the town we went up a hill where we had a beautiful view of the ocean through the mountain tops. After going over the hill the landscape began to vary and get more flat.  We had to ride along the highway for about 1 km which was kind of fun but kind of scary. When there wasn’t room for us on the side of the road we would stop traffic and ride in the middle of the road. We turned into a more agricultural area with corn fields and farm land. At one point we passed a woman walking her sheep, they ran along with us for a little ways until the sheep dog  herded them back. We did lots of cantering today because the ground was very hard and flat. The river where we were supposed to cross was too deep so we had to go around. As we were going around one of the fields we were supposed to cross through was under water so we had to scramble up a steep hill and the horses slid down the other side. After a few more gallops we finally reached Perelada, put the horses away and had some lunch of salad and tapas. One of the plates was this delicious toasted bread with brie cheese, pears, almonds and and olive oil sauce. Ali, Frankie and I wend wandering around the town and took some pictures. We got lost for about a half hour but eventually found our way back. Then the group got together to go get a tour of the Castle Perelada. A woman there toured us through the castle library which had over 80,000 books, glass museum  with over 150,000 pieces of glass dating back to 200 BC.  We also went through the church and wine museum and got to taste the cava that was made in the museum at the local wine shop. We then went back to the house and had dinner around 8:30. Over dinner we talked about different laws and customs in the US, Germany, Switzerland and Spain. After dinner we were all tired from the long day and headed to bed.