Thanks to development money from the European Union and also a local farmer, the old building has been put to new use.
A couple of hundred kilometers north of Segovia lies the tiny town of Amusco.
Until approximately 1492, when the entire Jewish population of Spain was expelled, a little community of some 300 Jews lived there and built a synagogue.
Now, that synagogue is one of the attractions of the little farming town, not as a place of worship, but as a hotel and restaurant/bar, Cafe de la Synagoga.
Thanks to development money from the European Union and also a local farmer, the old building has been put to new use.
We stopped to check it out, eating our lunch in the van in front.
The former synagogue sits directly across a little square from the local church where storks roost.
After we ate our lunch and siesta ended, one of the staff of the hotel showed us around. We did not go upstairs to see the 24 rooms, but downstairs… to see how the synagogue had been converted into the restaurant--a big, open, cool space. The basement location reminds visitors of the limitations on heights and placement of synagogues.
They really emphasize the fact that the place used to be a synagogue.
