..and its Montes

Bianca is studying the 18th-century history of the rural region in Castilla-La Mancha known as the Montes de Toledo. They are, quite literally, Toledo's Hills since the city of Toledo owned the land and the people who worked it.  The peasants tended livestock and turned its milk into the best cheese on the planet (hence queso manchego), they grew olives from crooked bushes, turned skinny, tall tree trunks into coal, and cut and dried tangled herbs like rosemary, which dots the landscape with its fragrant light purple blooms. Where else would you see

a sign in the street that says "Bull Crossing"? (And how much more Spanish can you get?). It's a rough road to roam, a road both ridiculed and revered by Cervantes. We were in love at first sight.