hoy fue un dia EXCELENTE

today was an EXCELLENT day.

we went to the parque del buen retiro again, after eating lunch at our respective houses. the park is one of my favorite places in all of madrid. there were 16 of us that met up and went and rented boats on the "great lake" of the park (it's probably about the size of the pond by the heritage library in irvine.. but square) and rowed around for a while. it was beautiful weather (one of the first nice days we've had in a while) and it was totally tranquilo and wonderful... we lay there with all 4 of our boats connected by people's feet and hands and just enjoyed the beauty of madrid.

then we went to the gigantic "feria de libros" or BOOK FAIR that was seriously so ginormous i almost died in the park. it was like heaven (although if it actually were heaven, all the books would have been in english). the line of stalls went on forever.. the last one was numbered #336. so technically it didn't go on forever, it went for 336 stalls. but it was incredible. why aren't there things like this in the united states? i find myself saying that about a lot of things here... seems to me somebody should be taking notes for good spanish/european ideas to adopt in the united states. like gigantic parks with huge huge huge book fairs.

the day ended with a trip to get some equally delicious gelato. muchas gracias, espana, por este dia perfecto...