Wandergliding: Holy Toledo!

January 25^th, 2026

I awoke to some kind of precipitation hitting Octi’s roof. Was it heavy rain or ice pellets? Thankfully it was rain. Octi does have all season tires, but I’d still prefer to drive on wet roads than snowy roads in the campervan. Unfortunately, that did mean that there wasn’t much point in staying in Cazorla Nature Park, plus the low cloud robbed me of any nice views of the lake and surrounding hills. I decided to press on to Toledo.

Well I did get a bit of a view of a waterfall.

The level of the lake was a bit low.

Dam!

Yeah, I'm sure it looks better on a sunny day.

I liked the contrast of the colours.

Some old hill fort. I didn't bother stopping to check it out.

Definitely out of the Cazorla Nature Park now...into the plains.

Canadian Beef!

Those are stumps of trees. Perhaps olive trees that have been seriously pruned?!?

Another hill fort, but also some old school windmills on the right. I've only seen a few of them in Spain.

Arriving in Toledo after 1 pm, I found the camping spot, which was a huge parking lot, but decided to try and find parking closer to the historic centre of town as I knew that I’d already have a fair amount of walking to do. Even though it was a Sunday, parking was a bit hard to come by, but I lucked out finding a spot on a side street.

The San Martin Bridge. Built in the 14th century, that big span on the right (40 meters wide) was one of the biggest in the world at the time.

Going through the gate to get on the bridge.

Looking up the Tagus River, which is the longest river in the Iberian Peninsula and it empties into the Atlantic in Lisbon!

The gatehouse at the other side of the bridge, the entrance to the historic part of town.

That's the San Juan de los Reyes Monastery in the background...I'll visit that tomorrow.

One of many narrow lanes in the heart of the city.

My plan was to start with checking out the Toledo Cathedral and then wander around after that and see what I could see.

That's a cool, skinny building with narrow lanes on either side.

My first glimpse of the cathedral's tower...now where's the entrance.

Okay, that's part of it...but not the entrance either.

Walking around one side.

At this point I've pretty much circumvented it.

Nope, that's not the entrance either. Notice the sqaure netting obscuring the photo is to prevent birds, primarily pigeons, from messing up the cathedral.

Okay...I'm in!

Pretty sweet organ.

It is an impressive building for sure.

The main area of the nave was fenced off from public access.

So I stuck my camera through the bars to get this shot of the altarpiece.

A look around in the cathedral.

The intricate wood sculpting in the choir area.

Each seat portrayed something different.

Checking out the choir section.

I overheard a tour guide talking about this. This is a seat folded up, for when the choir members have to stand. Notice the three semi-circles in darker wood above the carving...those are so you can rest your bum against it and not get so tired from standing up. Brilliant.

Going down some stairs I entered the "Chapel of the Sepulchre" which is in the form of a crypt. There was some saint's body in a glass casket.

Can you make out the skull and ribs? Kinda weird...

What do you think this is?

Most intricate Nativity Scene ever!

This was located behind the main altarpiece, and above the crypt. It was quite detailed...

...so detailed, that I couldn't help but notice this one cherub naughtily sticking his finger in his buddy's mouth!

Way up there is a dome that must have some windows letting the natural light in.

The cool thing was the statues surrounding the opening to the dome...quite unique.

The Chapterhouse, at the back end of the cathedral.

Zooming in on the previous photo, this looks to be some characters escaping from hell. The poor lady just to the left of the middle has flames on her private parts...she better get that checked out by the doctor!

The ceiling in the Chapterhouse.

Each archbishop has his image painted on the wall. As I explain in the video, they didn't know what the earlier archbishops looked like so they just recycled four to five different faces.

I think someone forgot to read the manual!

The cathedral just didn't seem to end with it various antechambers.

This Hebrew word was in the center of the ceiling fresco. I had to send this to Naomi for translation. She replied that it's God's name, which is not supposed to be spoken out loud.

This guy seemed to be eyeing God's Hebrew name.

They had fancy bathrooms too.

Some cloisters out back.

Which lead to this room with a couple of tombs.

The cathedral was quite impressive, and that’s coming from an atheist! It was getting late in the afternoon, and I was feeling a bit tired at this point and realized that I’d need another day in Toledo to really do it justice. I figured it was a good time to return to Octi and drive up to a few viewpoints that look back at the centre of town…it should be good lighting with the sun getting lower in the sky.

Just one of many fancy buildings in Toledo.