Granada

Today, Ali and I took a bus up to Granada. It's a beautiful city at the base of the Sierra Nevada mountains, which still have a bit of snow up at the top. We hiked through the hilly streets, and climbed straight up to the Alhambra, the 800-year-old Moor/Spanish fortress and palace. While the tickets were sold out, it was incredible to see just how massive the place really is.

We walked along the walls, through lush trees, past fountains and water drains, and down to the Albaicín. This neighborhood is a traditionally Arab one, with more modern Jewish residents. Many of the houses here are over 400 years old. How cool would that be?

Stopping for lunch at a little cafe, we rested from the afternoon heat. Off the coast, the sun gets to you a lot quicker than you'd like. We wandered down through the streets to the city center, finding a bazaar of tourist trinkets, printed African picnic blankets, and fresh hookahs. In only a few hours, we had covered enough of the city. When I come back, it will be to get inside the Alhambra, then I'll go finish my day at the beach in Malaga.

This past week has been interesting. It's nice to get a taste for my friend's lives here on the Continent. Things in Europe are definitely a lot farther apart than they seem. I never made it down to Gibraltar and across to Morocco (next time), I'm lucky I didn't have any major flight issues with this silly Icelandic volcano erupting. I'm excited to go home tomorrow. To not have to go to the airport for a while. To have my entire closet of clothes accessible. To start working a little and figure out the next step in my life. To get on Skype with my amazing boyfriend who's in China until Christmas. To save up for the next trip.

Feria de Sevilla

 This past week has been Feria in Sevilla. This is a week-long spring festival that the city celebrates in full force. Families, clubs, and businesses set up 'cosettas' or tents with live music, food, drinks, dancing, and a party until dawn every night of the festival. Carol, her friend Lauren and I went to check it out on Friday.

We made a pit stop in the Alcazar, the palace in the city. Started by the Moors in the 1000's, the palace grew through over 300 year of various rulers. The site today is the only palace in Spain where the royal family actually stays while in town.

Filled with beautiful tile work and gigantic tapestries, the palace opens out into a perfect set of gardens. There are open patches perfect for a game of croquet or an afternoon picnic as well as carefully mapped out squares centered around bubbling fountains. Up on the Galeria de Grutesco, you can look over the Escuary of Mercury, columns covered with roses, and both sides of the gardens.

After a nice jaunt around the palace grounds, we headed to grab a drink at a nearby cafe while we waited for restaurants to open for dinner. A group of nearby Italian gentlemen bought us a few drinks, and we eventually separated again searching for food. We stopped by a tapas bar and had deep fried zucchini, spinach croquettes, and rocheforte cheese with blackberry jam. Then we headed to the Feria.

The grounds were expansive. Blocks and blocks of tents, separated into streets, filled with girls in flamenco dresses and boys in suits. Eventually we made it into several cosettas with the help of a bartender friend of Lauren's, and enjoyed a piece of the party ourselves.

Back on the 7am bus to Malaga, it was nice to finally sit down and rest up. Next time I go to Feria, I'll bring my own polka-dotted, ruffle covered spring dress and an escort with a tie.

Buenos Dias

Buenos dias. For some reason this morning (4.30 in DC, 10.30 local time) as we were landing, I thought it was strange that that was hello in Spanish. I kept stopping myself from blurting out in Italian 'bon giorno!' or stumbling through questions in French: "j'ai a Malaga, q'esserai l'hoeur?" That's definitely not right.

It has been an interesting trip over to Spain. On my overnight, I sat in the very last row which was incredibly noisy. The flight staff did not encourage sleeping either. Just as I was settling back for bed, dinner came around and all the lights came on. Then this morning, I was harshly awoken by splashing orange juice all over myself. I was completely unaware that my tray table had been lowered and breakfast left out as a hazard. My fluffy purple blanket was immediately streaked like a splatter painting, and I hung it up behind my seat to dry before my next flight.

In security, I met a lovely woman named Mrs. Fritter, mother to two Foxcroft girls, class of 2007. How fun. Both Stephanie and Ali are studying abroad this semester and the family is traveling to Athens to try to catch a cruise boat that they missed due to the unpronounceable Icelandic volcano. I am jealous they're going to San Torini, an island that isn't very January-friendly, so it'll have to be on the next Greece trip.

I even made the mistake of running through the terminal, my flight to Malaga was delayed 20 minutes so I could have saved my energy. Ali is meeting me at the airport, and who knows how far we have to go to get anywhere.

I've made a few goals for this week: visit Sevilla, Grenada, and Ronda, and take the ferry to Morocco. Then I'll have visited 4 continents in 2 months, with a 5th in November when I go to see Adam. Hopefully that isn't too much trouble. Regardless, I'm happy my next trips are to visit Elon and a BGC reunion in Delaware. No airports for me for a while!

PS - my bag didn't arrive in Malaga with me. The funny thing is, I even asked the gate agent at Dulles if my bag would automatically switch planes. Clearly I had a reason to be worried. Nonetheless, it showed up the next morning at Ali's apartment downtown. Such bad luck.