Leisure and Holidays — Describing How Things Used to Be

Not every experience is a single completed event. Sometimes we want to paint the background: what vacations were like when we were children, what we used to do every summer, how a place felt. For this kind of description Spanish uses the imperfecto (imperfect tense). This lesson combines leisure and holiday vocabulary with the imperfect and introduces the present perfect for experiences that connect to the present.

Begin with leisure vocabulary. El tiempo libre is "free time" and el ocio is "leisure." Common activities include tomar el sol (to sunbathe), dar un paseo (to take a walk), montar en bici (to ride a bike), hacer senderismo (to go hiking), ir de compras (to go shopping), and quedar con amigos (to meet up with friends). Note that quedar meaning "to arrange to meet" is different fr