Te amo Espana!

Yet again, it has been a while since I've written and I apologize! I feel busy all the time which is odd since I only have 9 hours of class a week. What to catch you up on? How about my trip to SPAIN!!! I had a blast, it was so much fun. The weather was perfect. It was cool in the mornings and evenings, but in the afternoon it got hot sometimes. Even if it was just warm the sun was always out which was a nice change from dear old cloudy Coleraine. The hostel we stayed at was the nicest one I've seen. Each room had it's own mini kitchen and living room, all newly furnished with ikea furtiture and artsy photographs on the wall.

The first day, after eventually figuring out how to ride the metro, we went on a bike tour and saw all the major sites. It was brilliant as the Irish would say! Our tour guide was a girl from Arizona that decided she wanted to up and move to Europe and do something exciting with her life before she turned 30. She was funny and very knowledgeable. We biked to the castle which used to be the home of Isabel and Fernando in the late 1400's. Isabel was the woman who funded Cristopher Columbus' trip to sail arcoss the world in order to discover America. Archaeologists recently discovered an underground city underneath the castle which visitors are allowed to walk through. These workshops, factories, and rooms that were found were for washing, dying, and drying clothes, making wine, salting fish, going to church, and shops. You could see the 'very modern' drainage system that ran through the little city. I snuck some pictures you can see at the top. We also saw Sangrada Familia which is a cathedral that looks like a drippy sandcastle. It is very impressive and extremely intricate. We went to the beach at the end and we got to learn about the man made beaches that were created for when the Olympics were held in Barcelona. We went out on the town that night with some people from our hostel and drank calimocho, which is red wine mixed with coke. Sounds disgusting but it is actually quite tastey.

The next day we were all tired and decided to spend the whole afternoon on the sunny sandy beach. We packed some sandwiches and laid by the ocean for a couple or 3 hours. These beaches are clothing optional...that was interesting. After the beach we went shopping for some touristy things and headed back to the hostel. We planned on seeing the Magic Fountains (fountains that shoot up water that has music and lighting) but they were closed. We ended up sitting on our deck playing cards in our sweatpants :)

The next morning we took the bus to Girona which is where we flew out of. It was a wonderufl town! I enjoyed it more than Barcelona because it was quiet and cute with parks all around and everything felt very simple and relaxed. That could have also been because it was a Sunday, and Spainards apparently just hide out for the whole day. I'm not exactly sure why. So we had a delicious inexpensive lunch out on the street under the sun listening to the birds chirp and the Spanish people walking past. It was lovely.

On our flight home I learned a very valuable lesson thanks to Ryanair. Leave PLENTY of time between connecting flights, because if you miss your flight (like we did) you have to either pay a 100 pound fee for changing your ticket or just buy a whole new ticket which turned out to be 75 pounds. That was disappointing and stressful, but we made it home eventually and it was so good to be back. I missed Ireland, I really do love it here.

Tuesday night I met my International Friend's family! This is just a family who is active in the church that runs this program. Each student who signs up is assigned to a family and that family can invite you over for dinners or take you out and show you around. My family, Mervyn and Pearl, are so sweet and friendly. Pearl reminds me of you, Mom :) I brought Siri along with me and the four of us had a cozy sit down home-made dinner in front of their crackling wood burning stove. Pearl made chicken, potatoes, salad, and bread for dinner, home made crepes for dessert, and tea and cookies to top it all off. By the way, I am loving the tea here. I put cream in it and it is calming. We chatted about politics, Irish history, the differences in cultures, school, and their 3 kids who are all graduated from college. It was a delightful evening!

Pictures:
The first one is of the wine vats that were in the underground city. It was a huge complicated process of fermentation and production. Pretty cool!
The second is me on the beach :)
The last one is Sangrada Familia, which had scaffolding on it but it was still incredible.

Now that I have just written an essay telling you about my life, I'd love to hear what everyone else is up to! If you don't know how to leave a comment, I will tell you now:
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4. Once you find my blog page, scroll down to the bottom of a post and click 'comment'.
5. Write away! Let me know if you have any questions by emailing me. I use holcombe@cwu.edu the most.

Ok, I am loving life here but I can't wait to come home for Christmas and see the family, friends, and Chloe and Cleo!!