But first, a finished knitting project. Don’t faint, there is still knitting going on around here. This pair of socks probably has taken longer to knit than anything. They’ve been sitting in the “I’m bored with this” pile for a month, and I finally pulled them out this week and just sat on the couch until I finished them.
And they fit perfectly!
Project specs:
Yarn: Lorna’s Laces sock yarn, Watercolor
Needles: Size 0 for the cuff, 1 for the sock. I used Ivore double points, my favorite sock needles.
Pattern: Plain sock, generated by Sole Solution software. The sock cuff is 72 stitches, 2 by 2 rib, eye of partridge heel stitch, plain flap heel. Simple as pie.
What I learned from this project: Not much. I’ve done this sock so many times that it’s mindless knitting at its best. Perfect for a train trip, or a few rows after work when you are dead tired.
At first the color pooling of big yellowish stripes bugged me, but when they occurred fairly evenly in a spiral pattern down the sock, I started to like them.
Now, on to Toledo. We took the bus from Madrid to Toledo just for the day, and had a tour guide show us around town. Probably one of the funniest language moments from our trip occurred in the Toledo bus station. We were sitting and waiting for our guide to show up, and I pulled out those socks to knit. After a few minutes I noticed a woman standing behind me watching me, and we began a conversation. She spoke no English, and my Spanish consists of about thirty food-related words. I can ask where the bathroom is, and I have a collection of medical-related phrases that can come in handy, but not in a bus station in Toledo. We seemed to be able to communicate, though. After a lot of sign language and smiling, it appeared that she is also a knitter, she knits socks, and she uses circular needles to do so. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough Spanish to ask where the yarn shop in Toledo was.
Here are the city gates of Toledo:
The cathedral is probably the biggest tourist attraction in town. You can’t take pictures inside, and mine wouldn’t have done it justice, anyway. I’m discovering that pictures inside of large dark buildings just don’t look like much most of the time. Here’s the outside of the cathedral:
Here’s one of the city streets. Yes, they drive on these.
We ran into these guys again. Though we saw Don Quixote all over Spain, this was the only statue of Sancho.
After a nice meal, we took the bus back to Madrid for another day of touring. We learned to take the metro, and walked some more. We did make it to the Palace in Madrid, though we didn’t go in due to the hot date we had with a paella waitress a little later in the day. Here’s the palace:
The next day we took the train from Madrid to the coast. This was not the fast train, and I had four enjoyable hours to listen to my Ipod and knit. Here’s proof:
While we were at the resort in Marbella, we played around on the beach, drove up and down the coast, and toured up into a couple of the white hill towns. Puerto Banus was just up the road from where we stayed, and we went there one day for lunch. John pretended that he owned one of these:
Here we are with a couple of friends that we found:
Here is one of the “white hill towns” that Andalucia is so famous for. We took day trips to Mijas and Ronda for some tourist action and more good meals.
Though it was a bit too cool to swim in the Mediterranean, we did stroll along it in the evening. Note the gin and tonic in hand.
Yes, we dipped our toes in:
And the obligatory sunset shots:
Next time: Gibraltor, Granada, maybe even Sevilla! And the Case of the Missing Sweater Sleeve, in case any of you are interested in knitting around here.
What a fun trip!! We went to Andalucia last spring – it is so beautiful. I adored Ronda. I’m loving your photos!
The socks look great and I really like the way the colors worked out. Isn’t it great to finish up those languishing projects?
This is so fun… I get to travel vicariously through you and don’t have airport lines, scrunched airplane seats and lost luggage. Woo hoo!
Very cool trip!
We took the bus from Madrid to Toledo as well – but all we did was go see the El Greco stuff. Funny, but I don’t know how we got anywhere beside the bus ride. Huh.
You’re trip continues to amaze! Glad you had such a wonderful time.
I love the statue of Sancho! Beautiful pictures. Looks like you both had a wonderful trip.
Beautiful socks..beautiful Spain. Your good life goes on and on;-)
Ah – Andalucia looks beautiful after wading home in the cold slush today! Love the socks – the first thing that attracted me to them was the yellow stripes – very cheery looking!
Great travel pics…nice socks…
I hope your holidays are going well.
mk
The obligatory sunset pictures are stunning. And I agree with you about the sock striping. It makes it very stylish.
Very lovely socks.
🙂
Wonderful pictures! The socks are just lovely!
My socks always take forever and a day to knit. I start out great on them and then always get bored and move on only to work on them a row here and there until they are done. I don’t know why that is. Yours came out great! Enjoy! 🙂
Such beautiful vaycay pics Lorette! Thanks for sharing!
You know I have those Ivore needles, NEVER tried em! Gonna get em out on your recommendation, I’ll let you know what I think 🙂
Lovely socks, sometimes our “no brainers” turn out to be our everyday favorites!
Thanks for sharing your vacation photos! I have been to Spain but only Madrid and Barcelona so it was nice to see some other places (albeit vicariously). BTW, if you had been in the sunset shots with your hubby, they would have been perfect photos for a Trojan ad.. (hee hee!)
Looks like a good trip. Many thanks for your advice/comment. I booked the Casa Grande in Arcos. Don’t think our December weather will be as good as yours was though! Gracias!
Great photos of Spain. That cathedral is stunning and I’m sure the inside was even more so.
I love those socks. What a beautiful
colorway. Sometimes simple is best.
Love the photos – I remember ending up in Toledo on whatever day everything was closed, so we had the city to ourselves and really got to see a lot of the architecture, etc. The synegogue was fascinating.
The problem with 4th year of med school is that I have plenty of time to travel, but absolutely no money. Sad that I haven’t been off the North American continent since college, isn’t it? Maybe this spring . . .
beautiful socks, beautiful sunset! need someone to carry the knitting next time?
all the best,
caroline
Great photos–the socks and the scenery.