"You took me southwards on a plane And showed me Spain or somewhere"

February 7, 2010

Yesterday our group from Eau Claire had another excursion to areas around Valladolid. We saw a church-Real Convento De Santa Clara de Tordesillas- built in the 1400s, a Castle, and a Museum on Roman Ruins. My favorites were between the monastery and the Castle. The Roman Ruins were ok but I was expecting to see something better.

I really liked the monastery because of all of the artifacts there were inside including some very old pianos that were very tiny and had painted decorations on it such as flowers. There also once were paintings on the walls but because of old age they were slightly fading but I still thought there were really net because it showed how ancient the place really was. We weren’t allowed to take pictures so I only got some from the outside but bought postcards for myself of pictures taken inside. I really liked seeing the place where they held mass. It was so beautiful. It was decorated with gold and within it were shapes such as stars and characters from the bible. It was also decorated with scarlet and in a room off to the side were some beautiful statues.

This happened a while ago, but on a bus ride home, we stopped outside of a school where there was a huge crowd. I could see some students dancing over the top of the heads of the parents and could hear music. I listened really closely to the music playing and at first thought it was song with lyrics in Spanish but the more I listened I realized it was “Someday” by Rob Thomas. That’s one of my favorite songs and by one of my favorite musicians so I was really excited to hear it all the way over here in Spain. It really made my day.
Speaking of buses. This past Thursday, February 11th, Kaitlyn and I were taking the bus to school as usual when we forgot to press the button to stop the bus for our connecting bus stop. We both stood by the door expecting the bus driver to open it for us, but he didn’t. Normally someone else almost always presses the button so we don’t really have to worry about it. But that day, we had to. The bus continued to the next stop where we got off and decided to walk to the last stop. Well, the walking soon turned into running towards the bus stop as we saw another bus approaching the bus stop. Unfortunately that bus left without us. Not wanting to wait for another bus, we decided to walk the rest of the way to school. It wasn’t bad, only took about 20 minutes and we were really early as usual.

This past weekend, we left with six other students to go to Granada and Cadiz for five days. It was Carnaval on Monday and Tuesday (Mardi Gras) and Cadiz is one of the major cities to celebrate Carnaval. We left Friday February 12th at 6 am for Madrid where we took an airplane to Granada. Even though we were down South, it was still freezing cold. The whole weekend it was raining along with snow the first day in Granada it was so weird. To stay warm a group of us decided to eat at a little tavern/restaurant for food. One of the guys with us Ken and I decided to got a lasagna dish and Kara and Adam S. decided to try baked potatoes- one with four cheeses on it and another with a creamy sauce and mushrooms. It was so good and really hit the spot. Afterwards we did a little shopping and stopped at an Arabian store. The moors/arabs used to live in Spain for I believe 8 centuries so there were many stores with items from places including India. At one of the stores the owner spoke 5 languages and was really nice. I bought a bright turquoise round box with a lot of beautiful detail for 7 euro. I really like it and was happy with my purchase until we went to the store next door and found the same box for only 3 euro. When I bought my 7 euro box I saw it being worth 7 euro so I was ok with my purchase. After this we went to a cafeteria for a desert. I bought something familiar to flan with kiwi on top. It could have used more sugar but was still good. The other three got cheese cake and we all decided that US cheese cake is much better. We also bought hot chocolate that was sooo good. It had a bit of a dark chocolate taste to it which I loved with the weather we were having that day with all of the rain it really hit the spot!

The next day in Granada, our day was much better for weather but it still rained. We all went to the Alhambra, which was absolutely beautiful. It has been one of my favorite places so far. The Alhambra is “is a palace and fortress complex constructed during the mid 14th century by the Moorish rulers of the Emirate of Granada in Al-Andalus, occupying a hilly terrace on the southeastern border of the city of Granada, now in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain.”-(Thank you Wikipedia.) The detail in each wall was amazing and the garden-even in “winter” was spectacular. Author Washington Irving lived there for a while and even wrote Tales of the Alhambra and they had his items on display. Iriving also wrote “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Wrinkle.” If there’s one place people have to see, it’s The Alhambra. As Adam S. said many times during the trip about everything, “There are no words to describe it. I can’t think of anything that would give it justice to describe it.”

After our stay at The Alhambra, we went to the same Cafeteria for some more hot chocolate to get warmed up. As it grew dark, we walked around a bit more and stopped at a park near a flowing river that had a very strong current due to the weather. That nigh or I should say the next morning, we had a bus to take at 3 in the morning so we had to buy some food. We stopped at a food shop and I bought a really good strawberry banana yogurt smoothie drink, chocolate to eat at midnight since it would be February 14th/Valentine’s Day, and potato chips. I also had some turkey and bread/hamburger buns that Adam B. and I bought to make sandwiches throughout the day.

Our night at the bus station went pretty well. We were able to stay inside the whole time (In Valladolid, they close the station at a certain time at night but you can wait in the “Bus Stop” restaurant) which was really nice. We started off by staying on the lower ground by the doors but it was so cold that we decided to go upstairs where it was warmer. Throughout the night some people slept, stayed up or rested their eyes. I wanted to stay up till we got on the bus so I rested my eyes once in awhile. I was glad quite a few of us stayed up because we had a couple of visitors. We came a cross a young couple from California, a guy that wanted money for a bus to Madrid but we didn’t trust him so we said ‘no.’ and then a guy taking the buses that gave some of us chocolate. They said the candy bar was fine but I wouldn’t have taken it from him…I might have taken it to be nice but then throw it a way later. But it was Valentine’s Day so maybe the guy was just being nice?

Earlier in the day we were at the bus station to make sure we knew where it was before night fall and so that Ken could buy another bus ticket-he had lost his because a group bought tickets from a receipt and they were basically receipts-very easy to make a mistake and throw it away. While there a guy with a German accent and a brand new black eye asked us if we spoke English. When we told him ‘yes’ he said something in Spanish about the police and we were guessing he wanted our help to get the police-hence the black eye but we really couldn’t understand him so we just shook our heads and he left. Honestly- with the way he was looking, I was very hesitant to help him out if the person(s) who hurt him were nearby.

Our bus was suppose to arrive at 3 am, it didn’t come till 4 am. I was glad when it finally came because then I would be able to sleep on our way to Cadiz.