Holiday In Spain

Yes.  I am home, safe and sound.  My plane rides went very well, and it was an uneventful return.  It feels good to be back.  Tomorrow real life begins again.  We’ll see how I feel then.

Un besito, Natalie

I just wanted to add a huge thank you for everyone who shared this adventure with me.  I despise journaling, and keeping this blog was a great way to motivate me to write about my travels.  I’m so glad you got to partake in them somewhat with me, and I loved all of the comments I received.  It made the ocean seem smaller, and the distance between us much closer. 

besos y abrazos,

Natalie

I can’t believe I’m down to less then 24 hours.  It doesn’t feel like I’m leaving.  I have everything packed, more or less.  I acquired a lot of things this semester… my suitcases are quite heavy…  The sun has finally decided to show its face after almost two weeks of straight rain.  The weather is actually decent today and the forecast looks like it’s only going to get better.  Go figure.  I’ve been trying my hardest the past few days to mentally prepare to leave.  Yesterday morning I went with Kim to the airport to say goodbye.  I couldn’t imagine thinking this is it.  But that will be me tomorrow.  Everytime I ride the metro now, or the bus, or walk somewhere I try to take everything in because chances are I won’t see it again for a while if ever.  Last night Carlos and I went out one last time.  We reminisced how I spent my first night in Madrid with him, and now I’ve spent my last.  It seems like forever since I’ve said goodbye to my friends here from school.  Most of them left sometime at the end of last week.  We’ll keep in contact though.  Going through all of the papers I’ve collected from traveling, museums, receipts, newspapers, and what not, I can’t believe how much I’ve done this semester.  I wish it was all still fresh in my mind.  I wouldn’t change anything.  I loved every moment of it.  The good and the bad.  Even the difficult times.  It was all new, eye opening, and I learned so much.  I am ready though.  Ready to see my family and friends.  But I will be back.  I know that for sure.

Cold and rainy.  That was the weather that greeted me when I left the train station.  So Grenada and I were not quite on the same page.  It was just a light sprinkle when I started walking.  And then it rained buckets.  I found a cafe.  For the next hour and a half I slowly sipped a cup of coffee while I waited for Kim to arrive on the bus.  At least I stayed dry.  Between countless calls and text messages back and forth we finally found each other.  It was still raining.  We decided to get lunch and then attempt to find our hostel.

Grenada has this wonderful tapas deal.  You order a drink, you pick a tapa to go with it from a menu.  They are so smart.  So that was our lunch.  Drinks and tapas.  I had some delicious meatballs with potatoes, little sausages on toast, bread with cheese, and a small dish of potatoes alioli (in garlic and oil).  

The sun eventually came out.  We found our hostel.  Dropped our bags, and went out to explore the town some more.  A bakery sold mini pizza bread things, and that became dinner.  We went to bed early.  Mainly because we knew we would have to wake up early to get our tickets tomorrow for La Alhambra.

5:45 am - wake up, dress, and hobble out in the cold and rain.  After a 30 minute trek up the side of the mountain we encountered about 100 other people waiting in line.  

9:00 am - We got our tickets!  It was well worth the wait.  I can no longer feel my toes though and my hands are cold.  It was like Paris all over again…

9:15 am - We found wonderful bathrooms on the premises with heat and hand dryers that are perfect for drying out shoes and warming hands.

The Alhambra is huge.  It stretches out on the side of a large hill/ mountain.  The palace and fortress to be built in the 13th century by the Arabs.  It has been a royal residence since, and now is an extremely famous tourist location.  While it did rain off and on throughout the day, when the sun came out it was glorious.  We climbed among the old fort towers, viewed the ancient arab baths, and wandered through the never ending gardens complete with palm trees, ponds, fountains, archways, and buildings.  By favorite is the garden that aims to create a tranquil setting by drowning out background noise with the sound of the rushing water.  The star of the Alhambra is the Nazarid Palace.  The colored tiles decorating it aren’t nearly as amazing as the plaster work that hangs from the walls and ceilings like icicles.  Carlos I of Spain also had to leave his mark on the Alhambra by constructing a palace in the center of the grounds… it is interesting though because it is square on the outside and has a round patio on the inside.

Despite the wet and cold I was very impressed.  It was well worth it.  The rest of the day we spent inside drinking coffee and watching our Rugby friends from Seville beat Portugal!

It is weird to think that one week from today I will be getting ready to leave.  (well I’ll probably really still be in bed one week from today at this exact time, if we want to get technical…)  I can’t believe it’s come so fast.  I can remember back in February when I thought I would never have to leave Madrid.  Someone mentioned the other day how just when you start to find your feet in a place you are yanked out of it.  It’s true.  I finally feeling truly comfortable.  I’m working on enjoying everything so much more.  Last night at dance I actually remembered everything we learned.  I can now do my grocery shopping in half an hour (instead of two) because I know where to find everything and know exactly what I need.  I cooked real food for lunch yesterday.  I can manage traveling every weekend and still excel in my classes.  I feel comfortable speaking Spanish daily.  I have built some great relationships with people here.  And I’ve stopped counting down the days until I go home.  It’s coming too fast.

When I left the U.S. I felt unprepared to leave.  I didn’t know what I was getting myself into, and I had no idea what to expect.  Fall semester was a rush of putting documents together and filling out applications.  I had no time to actually prepare my mind for what I was going to experience.  I think it will be easier in that sense to go home.  The thought of leaving frequently crosses my mind, especially these past two weeks.  I know what home is like, no I know what Minnesota and Iowa are like!  Madrid is my home now too.  No surprises heading back to the states, and a wonderful family to greet me!  

It will be interesting to be back.  I know things are different back home.  And I’m definitely different.  I think it would be a waste if I went home exactly the same as I had left.  No.  My mind has been opened.  I have so much more confidence.  I am a true WOW (thanks Carol!).  I never thought I would be able to live in another country, pay rent, cook, grocery shop, go to school, work a little, travel, organize travel, book hotels, do homework, figure out a public transportation system, tour, learn, and speak a different language.  But guess what?  I can.  And I did.  Maybe I have a big head now… but sometimes I just get so utterly impressed with myself.  I can appreciate the way other people live.  I understand that every country lives differently.  The people value different things.  Most importantly I can say that no one way is the “right” way to live.  Different circumstances require different lifestyles.  I’m afraid of going back and falling into the same old patterns again.  So I plan to continue to learn and explore.  And travel.  It is safe to say that I will be back in Spain again.  (Hopefully living there… at least for a while.)

My last final is today.  Art and Civilization.  I have learned an incredible amount of information in that class.  I can tell you all about the different styles of architecture and Spanish history from B.C. until the beginning of the XIX century.  All in Spanish.  (I have absolutely no idea what any of the art terms are in english.)  So if you would like to know about the portadas of gothic cathedrals or the remate or cresteria of the fachada of a plateresco building feel free to ask!

A todos de mis amigos en los estados unidos… Hasta Pronto! (and I will write about the alhambra, I promise!)

The past weekend was full of tasteful temptations.

We (Kim, Leah, and I) arrived in Farnkfurt, Germany Friday afternoon and miraculously survived driving with Leah’s sister on the Autobahn to her home 2 hours away. It had been my first time in a car since… well since before I left the states. I forgot how comfortable they can be. I kept my eyes closed most of the time for fear of going off the road, but when they were open the scenary was amazing: Lucious green fields and quaint towns with real houses.

We stopped for weiner schnitzel along the way. Interesting processed taste. Spanish food seems so light compared to German food. We spent our first night at Leah’s sister’s apartment on the U.S. Army base in Wiesbaden. That evening we went into the town and listened to a live band at an Irish Pub. Clearly German, they performed only popular English songs reaffirming my belief that only America can produce music…

Saturday morning we drove to Frankfurt and checked in to a very contemporary hotel. I quickly claimed the two beds that were next to each other and proceeded to sleep the following two nights diagonally across both of them! Saturday was spent exploring the town. We walked along the Rhine, checked out the “old” downtown area, and visited the Cathedral. I saw “old” because it was all destroyed during WWII and then rebuilt in the old style following the war. It only looks slightly fake. Food: best bratwurst and a doughy pretzel. That evening we napped for a couple of hours. Well actually Leah slept the whole night, but Kim and I woke up at 9:00 starving so we went to a cute restaurant next to our hotel. Have I mentioned yet that it was extremely difficult to communicate here? German is not in anyway similar to Spanish or English. I felt very lost. We initally sat outside until we realized no one was going to come out and serve us. So we went inside to order and were met by smiles from the only person working. (He had watched us sit out there waiting…) We ordered and sat back outside. When our food was ready he simply opened the window behind us and passed it out to our table. Danke! Pasta with meat sauce and pizza. Yum. When we finished we went inside to pay and he asked us something we couldn’t understand but took to mean seperate or together. Kim made an amazing arm motion (cutting up and down in the air) and he understood! We then walked through the red light district and returned to the hotel to sleep. It would only be a complete trip if we saw the waiter guy at least four more times that weekend and everytime we saw him no one could contain their laughing.

Sunday I had chocolate cake and coffee for breakfast. Then we toured Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s house. You may recognize him for being a famous author and poet and writing Faust. Then Leah went to an art museum and Kim and I went to a bakery for a snack. Apple Strudel. We then went for a walk along the river where we ran into a Lions Club International festival. Initially the 3 yard long slide that kids were riding down in plastic buckets caught our attention. Then it was probably the live band with accordeon player. Finally the brats, applewine, and bread with melted cheese. Our day ended with a walk through the affluent neighborhood and a hunt for some German chocolate bars.

Monday was spent traveling and napping and then finally home in Madrid, studying. I had one final yesterday, I have one today, and then two more next week. Only two weeks left from today. I’m not quite sure where the time went. As much as I’m ready to go home, I’m nowhere near ready to leave.

coming soon… update on Grenada and la Alhambra.

The weather wasn’t as great this weekend.  Actually I’m still in Grenada.  But it has rained off and on for the past three days.  It makes life a little more miserable.  Good weekend though and I will write more about it in the future.

On some side notes, my computer applications were acting up so it is currently at a tech store in Madrid getting fixed.  I debated about waiting till I came home, but I thought I’d give this a shot.  We also watched our Rugby team beat Portugal on Saturday from an Irish pub in Grenada (the game was in Madrid).  And I can now successfully say that I have “lived” because I have seen the Alhambra. 

Seville – Cordoba – Cadiz

(April 30 to May 5)

Words could not even begin to describe this past weekend, but I will try my very best.

Wednesday afternoon was spent in great anticipation, some packing, and lots of nerves. My bus left Estación Sur at 11:00 p.m., Kim’s at midnight, and Caroline’s at 1:00 a.m. I probably could have accomplished quite a bit Wednesday afternoon but I was too excited. Oh and the nerves… we had bus tickets to and from Seville, high hopes, great backpacks… but that was it.

I arrived in Seville at 5:35 Thursday morning, and then just as we had left we arrived. Kim came next around 6:00 and Caroline showed up by 7:30. We felt gross, tired, and a little hungry. So we thought we might attempt a search for a hostel. Difficult. It was a holiday weekend (we did know that we might encounter this problem before we left, but where is the fun in that?). One very “nice” place had vacancies. Okay, whom am I kidding, there was a reason it was the only place with vacancies, but at least we had a back up plan. After a half hour of searching and a detour to sneak into the Cathedral, we decided we might try calling a few places in my wonderful Let’s Go book. Success. It was almost too easy, and it was located next to the most delicious bakery. So room and breakfast were taken care of, as well as a quick call to a hostel in Cordoba to make reservations for the following night. Amazing. We were rather impressed with ourselves. We’d gone from only a bus ticket at 7:30 to hostels in Seville and Cordoba by 9:00 a.m.! I called my friend Erin who was studying in Seville, so after coffee and croissants we decided to meet at the Alcazar.

The Real Alcazar de Sevilla was built in the 1600s by the Moors. The Arab influence in all of Andalucia was striking. Anyway the palace had beautiful arches, patios, and gardens. The gardens were breathtaking. Fountains, palm trees, ponds, more arches, courtyards, roses, more flowers, ducks, beautiful.

We met up with Erin and her roommate and went to the Cathedral next. It is the third largest in the world and the biggest gothic structure ever constructed. There are 44 chapels, a patio of orange trees, a thorn from the crown of Jesus, and supposedly the remains of Christopher Columbus. We also climbed to the top of La Giralda minaret which was built in 1198. The view from the top was breathtaking. There is a law I believe, that doesn’t allow any building to be more then four stories so that it isn’t taller then La Giralda.

Did a little wandering through the streets after our touring. We learned about Seville’s colors, which we also happened to be wearing that day: Red for the bulls blood (bullfighting is very big) which Caroline was wearing, Yellow for the dirt/sand or maybe clay (Kim), and White for España (me)! We bought our bus tickets for Cordoba, saw the Plaza de España and then stopped for a long lunch near the Cathedral. It was mid afternoon when we finished and realized there was nothing left for us to see of major importance. Walking by a tapas bar we noticed it was overly crowded so we thought we’d stop by for a drink and hopefully meet some people so we could practice our wonderful Spanish. Kim aksed for “tres cervezas” which resulted in a song and dance from a group of people in the bar and us spending the rest of the evening hanging out with a Spanish Rugby team. Truly entertaining. This trip was turning out very well. The party eventually left the bar and moved down by the river and then we eventually said our goodbyes (it was almost midnight…) and met Erin to see a Flamenco performance. Sleep.

Friday morning we had breakfast and boarded the bus to Cordoba. Another beautiful city. Oh and did I mention the weather was gorgeous? Sunshine and 80 degrees at least everyday. Our hostel was adorable. It was a family’s home and very quaint. We had a balcony that overlooked the street. All of the streets in the old neighborhood were skinny and winding. Lunch and then the Mezquita.

La Mezquita was built in AD 783 on the site of an old Visigoth basilica. It has more then 850 columns and at the time it was the third-largest mosque in the Islamic world after Mecca and Medina. However in 1371 following the reconquista the first chapel was built in the mosque beginning its transition into a place of Christian worship. In the 1500s a cathedral was constructed in the center of La Mezquita. It looks horribly wrong. All of these Arab arches in red and white and then Christian crucifixes and chapels stuck amid the numerous columns. So very wrong, almost frightening, but also very cool. The original mosque was added onto multiple times over the course of two centuries with the same style repeated. I thought it was interesting because with the last addition there was a lack of funds. Instead of using actual red and white stones to form the arches, they simply painted the stone red to make it match the rest and save time and money.

We also visited an old Jewish synagogue, one of only three left in Spain and the ancient Arab baths. That evening we had teas and juices sitting on cushions in a recreated 12^th century tea house and then we left the walls of the old city in search of food. We ended up stumbling upon a small grocery store where they made us bocadillas (sandwiches) for less then a euro! Fruit, cookies, wine and pop (to make Calimocha) completed our picnic and we crossed the street to a park to eat and watch the sunset. Delicious. We also made friends with a dog whom we named Rodrigo. He was basically just using us for our food but we thought he was cute and he would sit and lay when we gave him the commands in Spanish! That night we slept with the doors to the balcony open. The weather was still nice…

Saturday morning we took a bus from Cordoba to Cadiz. It was time for the Beach. We arrived in Cadiz by 2:00 in the afternoon. Perfect sun-time. The water was blue, the sky was blue, we didn’t have a place to stay so we went straight to the beach with our backpacks and everything. We kind of assumed that since everything had worked out perfect so far it could work out once more. After about an hour and half of lying in the sun we were realized we were hungry and really hadn’t eaten at all that day. Plus we were hot. Cheap Chinese food hit the spot. And then disappointed that we could see no visible tan we thought we might find a place to sleep that night since we were tired of carrying around our massive bags. After a half hour walk to the old city we were ready to begin our hunt. We walked into the center of a plaza and a middle aged man stopped us and asked if we needed a hostel. Well “yes!” of course, that was easy. Although it might be a little shady we were thinking… but we said we’d go look at it. So he grabbed his bike (the non-motorcycle kind, don’t freak out mom!) and we followed him to his apartment on Feduchy street number 15. The whole way there he told us about the room, bathroom, and who else was staying in his home at the moment. This was our first experience with an “illegal” hostel, so we listened intently. It turned out to be a third floor apartment, slightly cluttered, but extremely clean. It was cheap, there was a lock on the door, and there were three of us. We took it. That was the easiest hostel to find yet! (We later realized that he was an obsessive compulsive cleaner. He mopped the bathroom everytime after we used it, emptied the garbage multiple times a day, and took our sheets to wash before we even left.)

More beach time after we “checked in” to our hostel then a stop at the grocery store so we could pack lunches for our beach day on Sunday. After showering the three of us admired our “color” that had appeared over the past few hours. That color happened to be very reddish. Lotion time. That night we tried a hookah bar, but they were out of the tobacco. Instead we had a few drinks and chatted. Then a group of 17 and 18 year old Irish boys invaded our table. They were funny, immature and in high school. We left and went to another bar to eat potato chips!  They also offered us some carmel pretzels.  Don’t fall for it!  Kim opened the can and out popped those boingy snake things… The bartenders thought they were pretty clever…

Sunday morning we had a breakfast of coffee and churros and then toured the cathedral and bell tower of Cadiz: amazing views from the tower of the Atlantic Ocean and the city. The Cathedral was built in the 18^th century and took over 116 years to build. While the Cathedral is newer the city itself was founded in 1100 B.C. by the Phoenicians and it’s thought to be the oldest inhabited city in Europe. The old part of the city is located on a peninsula and is full of winding streets with open plazas. The people of Cadiz go to the beach. I’m not sure if they do anything else. Sunday afternoon we went to the beach again with our lunches and laid out some more. It was full of people. Very fun to people watch, the little kids were adorable. Went back to our “hostel” by 4:00 because we couldn’t take the sun anymore and showered. The nice thing was that there was no check out time…! Cleaned off all of the sand and put on fresh clothes for our marathon bus rides. We said goodbye to Miguel, our host, he gave us business cards made out of construction paper and written in pen. We told him if we were ever in Cadiz again we would definitely look him up. At 6:00 p.m. we took a bus back to Seville.

In Seville we stopped at a tapas bar along the river for a light dinner. Plus it was only 8:00, Kim had three hours until her bus left for Madrid and Caroline and I didn’t leave until 1:00 a.m. It was a swanky place called “Rubek: International Cocktail House.” We couldn’t afford the cocktails but we could afford a jar of Sangria. Yum! We also ordered some patatas bravas, croquetas, and meatballs. All of it was good. They served it with little cracker like breadsticks. We were hungry. We basically licked our plates clean. Then we reminisced and laughed about our wonderful weekend. We also joked about asking for more breadstick crackers. Most people don’t even eat them, they were kind of stale. So we asked our waiter for more. Laughed some more. Then the gentleman behind us got up and yelled at the waiter “Get these nerve-wracking girls Chupitos (shots) on the house. They speak perfectly good Spanish and here they are sitting babbling in English.” We looked at him surprised. Nerve-wracking? Really? Who uses that word to describe girls? I personally might have tried obnoxious… but NERVE-Wracking? And was the shouting necessary? Who did he think he was? The man sat down behind us with his friend again and asked us where we were from. We did the brief run down then we turned back to finish our stale crackers. He wasn’t done talking to us though. Turns out he owns the bar, as well as a few others in Germany and Amsterdam. He was originally from Ohio and now lives in Seville. He was a little crabby because his ex-wife was in town and had taken his car for the weekend so he couldn’t drive to the beach. That was a surprise to us. So we got our shots on the house. They were good. We kind of hoped our whole bill would have been on the house… no such luck. He probably heard us insulting some aspects of the establishment before we knew he was the owner and he was in earshot… His friend did offer to drive us to wherever we were going. We told him we could manage the five-minute walk to the bus station.

Kim caught her bus. Caroline and I went to McDonalds and got McFlurrys and played hangman and MASH for two hours. I slept relatively well for it being a bus. We arrived in Madrid by 7:10 a.m. Monday morning. Just the right amount of time to take the metro home, change, eat breakfast and go to school.

Five hours of interrupted sleep, classes, homework, I need to pay rent, go grocery shopping… I’d really prefer to go back to Andalucia at the moment! At least Madrid is sunny and in the high 70s today, and I have Flamenco class tonight.

Grenada and La Alhambra this weekend. Hopefully. I think we may actually make reservations for a room this time. Ha!

Last Saturday Kim and I went out to some tapas bars for drinks.  They gave us some delicious tuna like potato salad with mini forks to eat it.  And then they gave us potato chips with raw fish on top.

I’ve been a terrible updater lately.  I really hope it hasn’t been since spring break, maybe it was Segovia… that I updated, but I fear that may be the case.  So to be briefly caught up:

I’ve been traveling every weekend since my parents left and this is my first weekend at home.  It feels wonderful to not have anything to do, especially since the weather has finally decided to cooperate.  Hot.  80 degrees, I’m going to the park after I write.  School on the other hand has finally decided to be work.  It’s felt like high school the whole time I’ve been here, mainly because there isn’t a true campus feel and I must commute to school each day, but now I have a college workload.  That’s what it should be I guess, but it hinders my after school activities of shopping and laying out… J

Alright.  Rome: April 10-12.  It was short and sweet and we managed to see everything in slightly less then two days.  Flying budget airlines equals true discomfort.  We spent Wednesday night in the airport waiting to check in for our flight and then to board.  I slept wherever I could find a spot, whenever I had at least 30 minutes to sit.  So Matt, Leah, and I arrived safely but slightly tired.  Our hostel was nice, the shower lacked water pressure and hot water, but breakfast was included.  I ate gelato everyday as well as the most delicious meatballs and pasta I’ve ever had.   And tiramisu.  Yum! 

Besides the food (I seriously think all I did was eat that weekend…) we saw:

-       The Vatican

-       St. Peter’s

-       Coliseum

-       Roman Forum

-       Trevi Fountain

-       Termini Station

-       Lots of churches

-       The Pantheon

-       Bernini’s fountains/ sculptures…

-       And a good variety of other monuments that I don’t recall the name

The city is soooo old.  It is amazing to see how old some of the ruins are.  The Pantheon for instance used to sit on a hill, but the ground around it is flat now.  It has been there for so long that all of the dust and dirt that has settled has caused the hill to completely disappear.  That is a lot of time.  The Vatican has a great collection of art, almost to the point where it is overwhelming.  I enjoyed the Sistine Chapel, just sitting there and taking it all in.  And I like the Swiss Guard.  J

This past weekend was one of my favorites too.  I took the Ave train to Barcelona.  HIGH SPEED!  We averaged 300 km an hour making it to Barcelona in 2.5 hours.  I met Molly (my roommate from Drake) there.  She is studying in Ireland and had flown to Barcelona for the weekend.  We spent Saturday and Sunday wandering the streets of Barcelona; with little to no agenda it was very relaxing.  The beach was beautiful, although it was still a little too cold to go swimming.  We ate some delicious food and tried out some cute hole-in-the-wall restaurants that were amazing.  Sunday night we took the bus back to Madrid arriving at 6:00 a.m., and I somehow made it to school by 10:00. 

Molly stayed until Wednesday afternoon.  She explored the city while I had school, after which we would meet, tour, and hit all of my favorite spots.  Great weekend, great week.

My homework is starting to pile up, but once I write my American History paper I think I’ll be okay!  It’s relays this weekend at Drake, and I wish I were home to enjoy that.  Next year.  At least the weather is gorgeous here.  Next weekend I’m going to Andalucia to see Seville (and Erin I hope!), Cadiz, and Cordoba.  Grenada the weekend after, and then Germany.  Following that I will have two weeks left.  This past month has sped by and I’m sure the next one will too.  I will miss Madrid and Spain when the time comes, but right now I’m excited to be home too.