Day 501 - 7th August 2008

It was with a mix of pleasure and regret that I left Seville this morning. On the one hand, I love travelling and I'm always one to enjoy the journey more than anything else.

On the other hand, the city was so lovely that you could not get bored of seeing the same things for weeks on end there. That, however, comes mixed with the heat. The intense, furnace-like 45 degrees centigrade is a common occurrence here. Anyone will tell you, myself included from having spent a lot of time in criminally hot places, that you can get used to this. Yes, I can adapt to be constantly covered in sweat, having to drink all the time and taking a shower every third half hour of the day, and the lack of sleep. The truth is though, I don't want to have to do all that on holiday, not if I'm only staying a day or so.

On a more permanent basis, given lots of time to do everything nice and slow, take the afternoon off etc... Seville has a huge appeal. If you want to pound the streets for ten hours like I did, you'll pay the price, like I did.

Although I was looking forward to the ride back on the swanky train, it was on there that I realised why I felt so sad about leaving - my friend there was one of the few, unrelated, friends I'd actually properly spoken to in about a month. For that, you know who are, I cannot thank you enough.

Now it's back to the mountains, where I'd never thought I'd say that 30 degrees is refreshingly cool! I've travelled just under 1400 miles by train in the last three days and been to a great place to see an even greater friend, and despite the heat - I wouldn't have changed anything for the world.