Our next adventure began in northwestern Spain with a stop in Salamanca, which is known as a university town.

Salamanca University is the oldest university in Spain and the third oldest western university but apparently the first to have its degrees validated by Pope Alexander IV. For this reason, as well as the fact that it contains the most incredible cathedrals and palaces (UNESCO world heritage site since 1988), it attracts thousands of international students. The atmosphere therefore is young, vibrant and diverse.

We visited Salamanca almost a decade ago and not much has changed – it is still a wonderful place to visit. We, of course, have changed and have an additional travelling companion (!) so, as has been the case in many towns, we visited different parts of the town and descended mainly upon restaurants rather simply jumping on the tapas wagon like last time.

We had the obligatory churros con chocolate for breakfast near the Plaza Mayor, which are doughnuts made of choux pastry, dipped in hot chocolate – yum! Plaza Mayor is also amazing – originally built in the Spanish baroque style as a bullfighting arena, it is now used as a public space, with cafes, bars and shops tables located around the perimeter.

On the Rykersaurus front, said dinosaur was intrigued by the Knights that were installed in many shop windows and decided to use the money that had been given to him by relatives to buy one (he would have preferred a full-size sword but for obvious reasons his parents weren’t too keen on that idea).  Later in the day, he expressed an interest in having another one so that the two of them could play together. Understanding this and due to the fact that he had some money left, we allowed the second transaction to take place. We should have known that when he said ‘playing’, he meant ‘fighting’! Much sparring took place – on restaurant and cafe tables, hotel beds – until the Knights and the Rykersaurus ran out of steam. Thank goodness. These pint-sized dinosaurs have colossal energy reserves.

On our last night, we woke to hear Ryker calling out ‘Hola!’ in his sleep! Assume it is due to exposure to the Spanish language during the trip and not watching Dora the Explorer at home! Either way, we were very proud of our bilingual boy.