The first trip that I took was a day trip with Erasmus (the same kind of deal Armelle and I used to go to Sevilla) to Ubeda and Baeza, two small towns in Jaen (pronounced hi-enn), the province directly north of Granada. The trip was really cool because it included a tour of a museum that detailed the process in which olive oil was made in the 19th century, as well as a tour of the centers of both towns. I went on my own and challenged myself to make new friends and ended up hanging out with some really awesome and friendly Romanians and Italians.
As you can see, Jaen is COVERED in olive trees
The whole group that I ended up spending the day with
Us looking dramatic and perfect for an album cover
Examples of the cool old buildings that brought us to Ubeda and Baeza in the first place
Of all the places in the world where one could be during Easter Spain, one of the most Catholic countries in Europe, is certainly one of the best. The week before Easter is called Semana Santa or Holy Week and is characterized by processions in every city in Spain where the entire population comes together either to watch or take part in the carrying of huge portrayals of Mary and Jesus through the streets. We also didn’t have any class for the whole week, which means that I got to see these processionals in multiple Spanish cities!
Here’s some of what I saw in Granada
This sign says “wax on the roads” and warns that the roads were all slippery from all the processions with candle-bearing penitents (the people in the big hoods that have nothing to do with the historically later kkk)
One of the nights the procession went all the way up into Sacromonte, the Gypsy quarter of Granada. The procession lasted all the way til 6am but I only went from midnight to 1am but still look how many people were out and about!
The next city that I saw during Semana Santa was Cordoba. My friend Adrienne and I took the bus up to Cordoba for the day and it was a truly beautiful city. I really liked the ambience.
some random ruins we stumbled upon in the city
the procession in Cordoba
something that I found truly amazing was that all night I had noticed the kids running around with balls made from wax drippings and I just assumed that they were being sold somewhere but later as I was watching the procession I realized that the kids were making the wax balls for themselves! The procession would stop every ten minutes or so in order for the carriers of the giant statues can trade shifts and the kids would all break free of their parents on the sides of the parade and run up to the people in hoods carrying giant candles and ask very politely for some wax, then the hooded people would tilt their candles down so that the hot wax dripped onto whatever the kids held out in front of them
Adrienne had a big project due for one of her classes so she was only able to come with me for the day trip to Cordoba, but I wanted to travel a little longer and see more of Spain so I decided to embark on my first solo travel experience. That night after the processions and a really tasty mocha gelato I hopped on an overnight bus to Madrid with tentative plans to go to Toledo.
Overall I had an amazing time traveling alone and I think my favorite part was that any decision I made was mine alone, I didn’t have to consider anyone else before I chose what I was going to do. So when I got to Madrid I decided that I did want to try to see Toledo and after a metro ride to a different bus station I hopped on a bus. The ride there was about an hour and I got to ride through the countryside and see some cool little rural towns. When I got to Toledo it was just approaching 9am so I stopped and got some breakfast (typical Spanish breakfast, café con leche largo de café y media tostada de tomate, otherwise knows as espresso with a dash of milk and toast with mashed up tomato on top) before trying to figure out what the heck I was going to do in the city. The bus station was a little bit out of the way and about 15 minutes from the center of town but luckily the center was up on a hill so I had no trouble figuring out what way to walk. On my way a German tourist got my attention and asked (in English…how she knew I could speak English I will never know…) how to get to the cathedral. I told her the truth that I knew nothing about the city and was excited to find out that the cathedral was such a destination and walked on. The coolest part about the city was that the first thing I noticed is that the center is surrounded by the original wall from ages ago! And the center was all really hilly so it was fun to walk around.
There was really only one way into the center that looked like it might lead to the top of the hill (where I expected to find the cathedral) so I just started walking that way. A little ways further however I came to a fork and wasn’t sure which way to go. Looking around I noticed two little old ladies walking up the hill so I waited for them and asked where the cathedral was. They said they were on their way there so I could follow them but that the cathedral wasn’t supposed to open until 10am so they were going to get coffee first. I asked if I could join them (‘cause you can never have enough coffee when traveling, and ‘cause I now also had an hour to kill) and they said yes so we drank coffee together and I learned that they were sisters and were from Alicante and every Semana Santa for the last couple of years they had traveled to a new city in Spain and were hoping to see them all. After that we started back up the hill toward the cathedral but upon arriving there found out it didn’t open until 11am due to special Semana Santa hours (and due to the fact that you can never ever ever trust a time table in Spain) but this random guy was handing out pamphlets for a nearby artisan shop so we decided to go see that. It was really cool we got to see the artists actually making the filigree that Toledo is known for!
After that we still had about half an hour until the cathedral opened so we got to see the second oldest synagogue in Spain, and the coolest part was that it was actually built for the Jewish community by the Muslim rulers during the Moorish occupation of Spain! There was a really cool display about the friendly relations that existed between the two religions in that time period and suggested hope for a future where similar peace and mutual respect can be attained.
When we finally got to the cathedral we found out that Spanish citizens could get in free Sundays (and it was Saturday) so the two sisters decided they would go back the next day and try to get in free to save money and we parted ways and I went in by myself. In the cathedral there was a section portioned off where they were dismantling one of the giant float-thingies that they had carried around for the Semana Santa processions and one of the workers was handing out parts of the flowers and plants used to decorate it and I helped a woman from Texas talk to him and figure out that it was olive and thyme branches since she didn’t speak Spanish and he didn’t speak English.
After going in the cathedral I walked around town for a couple hours and saw the rest of the sights.
Then it started to get cold and overcast so I got on a bus back to Madrid. Once in Madrid the overcast weather turned into a full on storm so in order to find shelter from the rain I went on a shopping spree and got myself a new outfit and a new book to read on the bus home!
It ended up being a really great trip and I got to see two more of the most truly Spanish cities in Spain.
My next trip was a week and a half later and I went to Bordeaux, France and stayed with my friend from UCSD, Becky, and her roommate from UCLA, Stacy.
Me, Becky, Stacy
Bordeaux is an amazing beautiful wonderful city and one of my favorites that I have visited all year. Here are some examples of the things there:
Quinconces: an awesome fountain/pillar/monument
The Jardin Publique: (public garden) a beautiful park where I spent at least an hour every day I was in Bordeaux just walking, sitting and relaxing, reading, writing, listening to the French around me, or napping.
The Miroir D’o: (water mirror) a realllly cool fountain that’s basically just really shallow water that when still reflects the buildings behind it where everyone congregates and wades about. I also went here almost every day. So cool.
When I wasn’t at the Jardin Publique or the Miroir D’o I was either hanging out in the apartment or walking around Bordeaux. On my walks I saw some cool things including this statue in front of the Musée des Beaux-art de Bordeaux
And some cool sights
Despite the fact that the traveling aspect of that trip was kinda screwy…since I missed my flight there and then my flight back was cancelled because of the ash cloud so I ended up taking really long bus rides both there and back, it was a wonderful trip and I’m so glad I got to see Bordeaux. It’s one of the cities I’ve visited this year that I know I am going to have to go back to again.
And my most recent trip, last but not least, was to London again! But this time it was all about seeing as many musicals as we could.
I went with my friend Rachel who is studying abroad in Italy for the year so while we didn’t actually do the traveling part together we met up in the airport and spent 4 days in the city together.
Well…at least that was the plan. The Iceland Volcano decided to wreak havoc on my life yet again on this trip and the first installment of its evil plans was to delay Rachel by a day. So the first day I ended up spending alone in London but it actually turned out to be really cool because I got to do something so nerdy I would have never ever dragged anyone else along with me! In one of my favorite books, Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, the main character takes a walk through London and I was able to find her route online and trace her footsteps! I walked through London all the way from Westminster Abbey to Regents Park and it took about two and a half hours but it was really pretty and I had a good time living the book.
Rachel’s plane arrived at 5pm that night so I went an “collected her,” as they would say in England, from the airport and after that we walked around the city a bit and bought musical tickets for the next day! We were so excited we bought tickets for a matinee and for a night show, Dirty Dancing in the afternoon and Les Miserables at night! SO EXCITED!
Dirty Dancing had some amazing dancing, as expected, and was a really fun entertaining show but didn’t have quite as much singing as I was hoping.
Les Mis was all that I could ever hope for in a musical even if it was a bit long and serious (3 hours about the French Revolution) but the leads had the most AMAZING singing voices ever and the whole show I was just stunned by the talent.
The morning before the shows we walked around Camden Market, a really cool bohemian part of the city with a bunch of artisan shops and amazing food stands and liked it so much we decided we had to go back the next day also.
We also decided that we had not had our fill of musicals. So the next day we went to Camden Market and walked around for a while and then caught the matinee showing of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, which was an awesome giant drag show with musical presentations of a bunch of diva pop songs that we all (the whole giant packed audience) knew and hummed along to. I have never before seen so many men who are so much more graceful at being women than I am!
That night we walked around the West End of London and enjoyed the bustling night life before getting on a bus to the airport where we were spending the night due to a flight scheduled the next morning early enough that the buses wouldn’t be running.
But, of course, the Volcano strikes again. This time cancelling our flight to Bolonia. So instead of being able to visit Rachel’s home in Italy before going back to Granada, I had to book a new flight directly to Spain…well, not directly. The ash cloud had ruined so many flights it was almost impossible to get a direct flight anywhere so I was scheduled to fly from London to Glasgow to Malaga. Rachel was able to get on a flight to Bolonia for the next day also so we were flying out at almost the same time the next morning…but once again, super super early. So, once again, that meant sleeping in the airport. But since we had the whole day at Stansted we found out that there was a cheap bus from the airport to a tiny town called Bishop-Storkford so we went there and walked around, sat and drank coffee and read in a nice café, and to kill time saw Iron Man II (in English! Yay!) and it turned out to be a really lovely day.
Me being silly on part of our walk around town
The next morning after a delicious English Breakfast we both got on our respective flights and flew out of London. And then the Volcano took its final conquest and an hour before I was supposed to fly out of Glasgow and into Malaga, my flight was cancelled. I had two choices, I could stay in Glasgow for 2 nights and get into Malaga on Wednesday, or I could fly to Alicante later that night. Although in general I love traveling and it would have been amazing to see Scotland, at that point I was exhausted from (not)sleeping in the airport for two nights, I was grumpy, and I just wanted to see my own bed. So I caught the flight to Alicante so that I would be in Spain and not have to rely on ash besought planes and hoping that I could catch an overnight bus back to Granada and be home by morning. Luckily my plane to Alicante was not cancelled. Unluckily I didn’t land until midnight and it was too late to catch a bus. So I got to spend another night on the cold hard floor of an airport. But finally a happy end to these ridiculous travel maladies, I made it on a bus at 8 the next morning and got back into Granada by 2pm…and promptly fell asleep for the rest of the day.
Despite the plane difficulties I had a really great trip and I love London and it was so cool to be able to meet Rachel there and see so many musicals!
So that’s all for now, but last weekend I went to Almería, a city on the coast of Spain where my roommate Lidia lives, so I got to spend the weekend on the beach! And I will write to you about how it was very soon.
Much love! And can’t wait to see all of you when I get home (in less than two months!!!)!!!!
