Museum Hopper

My mom and I also headed over to the El Greco Museum.  It was purportedly his house, but that has been de-bunked in recent years.  That being said, it is still in a house that would be similar to what he would have lived in and how it would have been furnished. The house is just around the corner from the Church.  It was actually free to go into on Sundays, so my mom and I took advantage of that. The house is a good sized.  To start with, take advantage of looking at the cellars.  It has some old views of the ruins below the city.   My favorite part of the museum was actually a part about El Greco's apprentices.  They discussed his workshop and a number of his apprentice's art.  The descriptions of the apprentice work was astounding (and quite painful to read).  To paraphrase one: I cannot believe we ever though this was El Greco's work -- the lines are so unsure and tentative and seeped in mediocrity.   The gardens are also ...

For another day trip, my mom and I headed to Toledo, which was a short 30 minute train from downtown Madrid.   We hopped on the express train first thing in the morning and arrived in Toledo.  We hightailed it over to Toledo.  Secret: there are escalators up to the town on the right hand side as you approach it.  They are within a parking garage!   I knew that the Church of Santo Tome had to be on the list.  One of El Greco's paintings, The Burial of the Count of Orgaz , (the link has a picture of the painting) is directly on the wall of the Church.  It is one of the two paintings that he has on the " 1001 paintings to see before you die " list.  And it is the main (read: only) attraction in this Church.   We quickly got into the Church as I could see a few tour groups getting the summary outside.  Boy, I was grateful we did -- the side Chapel is quite small.  We could not even go into the other part of the Church. ...