oldest restaurant in the world

In front of Botín

Last weekend I went to the oldest restaurant in the world!...well according to the Guinness Book of World Records. Its called Restautant Botín, and I was surprised to find out that it's near my house, like 5-10 minutes walking. Well actually it shouldn't be that surprising since I live in the center of everything - I'm just lucky like that.Well at about 1:30, I went with Nikki and met with Nery and Angela at Sol - our usual meeting spot. Then Ariel showed up at 2 because he's always late. We knew that Botín would be a bit expensive (oldest restaurant in the world), so we became American for a while and ate a small lunch at McDonald's. You know they have a Kit Kat flavored McFlurry here?? It made me excited.

Well after our mini lunch, we made our way to Botín. It's near Plaza Mayor (not like any of you know where that is), and from the outside you wouldn't know that it's something super spectacular. It looks really nice from the outside, but like a cool old kind of tavern nice. We were looking at the menu, and while some things were very expensive, some things were fairly reasonably priced. It looked really good! Inside, everything looked really old, and was kind of like Applebee's in that there's old stuff on the walls, along with various paintings. It was really cool! Ariel had made a reservation, so after 5-7 minutes, we sat down.

Mi comida

We were on the second floor in the corner, and when we looked around we noticed we were the youngest ones in the restaurant - probably because it's usually expensive. The menu had some really good choices, and while some of it is very expensive, some of it is pretty reasonable priced. The wine list though...the cheapest bottle was 20 euro, and the most expensive was in the hundreds. Well, I got one of the specials, potaje de garbanzos y espinacas with an egg on top, which is a soup type thing with potatoes, garbanzo beans, and spinach. It was really good. Angela and Nery got chicken and potatoes, and Ariel got this omelet thing that looked good too. We shared a pitcher of sangria, and we had a great time just talking and eating together.

At one point, the guy at the next table turned to us and asked us what part of the U.S. we were from, and we told him California. He then pointed to the guy sitting across from him and was saying he was from California too, and when we looked over, the guy was just shaking his head. The first guy had a little too much to drink and was speaking loudly and acting crazy. It was funny to watch though, his friends were mouthing apologies to us. Well after all that, we were finally done eating, and my meal cost about 10 euros.

We then headed to my house to plan. We had been talking about going to Portugal and everything, and we still needed to decide what to do in Semana Santa, our spring break. Nikki and I wanted to all get together in one place and talk and actually set dates, so Maru let us hang out in the living room and discuss stuff. We had our dates for Portugal, and we needed to reserve plane tickets NOW while they're still cheap. I didn't want a repeat of Paris, where the tickets got too expensive...then again Paris is expensive all of the time. We found tickets and bought them together so that we'd all be on the same flight. That way we could stay together and split cab fare when we go to the airport to our apartment. Yes, an apartment! I'm SO excited!! Ariel found an apartment in Lisbon that would cost about the same as staying in a hostel, maybe a bit more. Still, we have 3 beds (there are six of us, so we'd snuggle and share), a kitchen, a living room, and our own bathroom so it's a much better deal. Also, we don't have to deal with sharing a bathroom with the whole floor in a hostel or a share a room with 14 other people. Split, it'd cost about 45 euro for each of us for 3 nights in Lisbon. Thank goodness Portugal is cheaper.

Ariel, Nery, and Angela

Also, Nikki came back from Paris last night!!! I was so happy to see her, I missed Nikki, Angela, and Ariel. Listening to her tell me about her trip, I was secretly really happy I didn't go to Paris (thank you Jesus for the fake travel company!). Apparently she spent close to 200 euro, and that was only mostly lodging and food. Paris is beautiful, but it's so darn expensive! She was telling me how there high points and low points - highs: the Louvre and getting to share a bottle of wine under the Eiffel tower; lows: their hostel giving away their reservation when Ariel had confirmed that morning, and having to pay at the least 14 euro for every meal. So in the end, I'm glad I didn't go to Paris (shhhhh!) because I still had a great weekend here. We're all excited for Portugal, and there are 6 of us going so it'll be even more fun (and we can split the cost for more stuff). I can't wait! :)