La aventura italiana: Pisa

Italia! First stop: Pisa

Fui a Italia! On Sunday, I got back from our 5 day aventura in Italia. I went with 5 of my friends from API: Marcela, Colleen, Lorelyn, Kat, and Molly. We decided that we would spend 1 night in Pisa, 2 nights in Florencia, and our last day in Bologna. When we left, I couldn’t believe that we had booked the trip a mere 3 weeks prior and now we were actually going!

                And so here the journey begins! Our first destination was Pisa, Italia. We were flying out of Madrid and we’re clearly not living in Madrid so we had to get a bus from Granada to Madrid. The bus we took was SO. NICE. The best way to describe is was the favorite love child of an airplane and a coach bus. The seats on the bus not only had the reclining back part but it had a reclining foot rest too. YEAH, I know. The seats were so comfy which was convenient because we were all beat on account of not going to sleep before boarding this bus (again, we’re young, right?). The bus left at 2 am on Wednesday morning so we left our houses around 1 to get to the bus station which is about a 10 minute cab drive away. After 5 hours on the luxury bus, we arrived at Madrid Barajas airport in Terminal 4. This terminal is in a completely different portion/building of the airport so we hopped on a bus and took the 10 minute journey to Terminal 1-3. We went through security without any problems and then found a nice row of chairs for us to make into some beds. We were SUPER temprano for our flight (it left at 1:30 pm and we got to the airport around 7:30 am). We all curled up on the seats and took some siestas. Then, before we knew it, we were boarding our RyanAir flight to Pisa! The flight went very smoothly and we got there sin problemas. 

Our RyanAir flight to Pisa, Italia!

              

 Molly y yo en nuestra avión a Pisa

 

 First glimpse of Italy from the skies <3

  Once in Pisa, we had to catch a bus to the city centre to get to our hostel. First thing to learn about Italy? You have to buy any sort of bus ticket in advance, including if it’s just public transportation AND you have to validate it once you get on the bus in this little machine thing. We got on the bus, 1,10 euro in hand and then realized this soooo we ended up getting to our stop and just hopping off. I know, I felt terrible but at that point, we were too far deep into this little mistake that it was just best to bite the bullet and escape ( we found out later on account of this happening to some Bulgarian guys from our hostel in Florence, that you can get fined up to 50 € for not only for not buying a ticket but also for not validating it AKA we got mad lucky) Our illegal bus trip took us to right by the Leaning Tower of Pisa which was quite the site to see but more about that a little later. We found out way to our hostel, which was super close, without a problem. 

The hostel we stayed out was called Hostel Pisa Tower. It just opened in June of this year and it used to be an old villa. It was such a good first hostel experience; the owners were super nice and helpful and the hostel itself felt like you were in someone’s adorably decorated apartment. The 6 of us filled one of the 6 bedrooms at the hostel which was nice because it was just us in the room. There were 3 bunk beds and 6 lockers to keep our belongings in if we wanted (more useful though for when you’re staying with randos) When you looked out our window, you could see the top of the Leaning Tower and the top of the church there as well so we were only about a 1 minute walk from it. One of the hostel owners gave us a map and showed us how to get places and also places where he would recommend going. After a tour of the rest of the hostel, we were off to be the ultimate tourist and go take pictures holding up the Leaning Tower!

 The awesome view from the window of our hostel

 Appropriate flags to be hanging outside our window

 Our bedroom!

The view of downstairs/entrance from the stairs

The kitchen/dining room area

The living room

 The backyard and Starlight Terrace

 Me and Lorelyn walking past the tower

 Definitely almost got squished by the Tower

Standing in front of the Tower was very neat. It was so big and impressionable; it really did feel like I had just intruded onto the front of a postcard. The weather was cloudless, cool, and sunny and there were people hustling and bustling everywhere. It was entertaining to watch everyone gathering on the grass in front of the Tower taking their leaning pictures.

What up, tourists

So much for that!

About 10 minutes after we got here (and subsequently were on the grass) the police came with their whistles to make everyone vacate the grass. Good thing we got our pics holding up the Tower just in time!

After the Tower, we went walking to the river which was gorgeous. It was just about sunset so everything had a golden pink glow to it. Then we walked around the shopping areas a little bit and finally decided to get some good ol’ Italian grub. One of the owners of the hostel recommended a restaurant that was on the other side of the river. We tried to find the one he recommended but the map wasn’t so keen on showing the multiple alleyways so we ended up stumbling upon a different restaurant. We were a little weary at first because there was NO ONE in the restaurant but, then again, we were early in the Italian eating schedule. Well, what do you know; there I ate possibly the best gnocchi I’ve had, ever. I wish I was exaggerating but I’m not. It was pistachio and pancetta gnocchi. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm, my mouth is salivating just thinking about it. Molly and I also got a pizza and split the both of them. Delish. 

My mouth is salivating at the thought of consuming this

The sunset in Pisa along the river that eventually will lead into Florencia

After dinner, we wandered the streets a little bit and then made our way back to the hostel and turned in for the night.

                The next morning we got up and were off to Florence! We had a 2.50 € breakfast from the hostel that, for 2.50, it was pretty good. After asking one of the hostel owners which mode of transportation to Florence was best, we decided upon a public bus to the train station and then a train to Florence. We had to ask a few people to make sure we didn’t miss our stop but we made it to the station! A train to Firenze was leaving in about 15 minutes so we quickly bought tickets and hopped on.

Ciao Pisa, Ciao Firenze!

Lagos, Portugal

Vale, I now realize that it has been an actual month since I've posted on here. Now that everything is winding down for a few days after lots of traveling, you're going to be ambushed with some awesome blog posts. Starting with........... LAGOS!

Fui a Portugal con muchas personas de API! A bunch of us went with an organization called DiscoverGranada. We left Granada at 6 am which meant that we all decided not to sleep (we’re young; we can do this stuff, right?) The bus ride was 7 hours long and my intention was to passsssss out on the bus ride after not sleeping… well, that didn’t quite pan out the way I had hoped so I was a bit tired once we got to Lagos—nothing a nap on the beach couldn’t fix though. 

We got to our hotel which was 4 stars and so awesome. Marcela, Colleen, and I had an apartment in the hotel (which was made of luxury apartments). We had a terrace, a living room, a small kitchenette, a breakfast table, a bathroom, and a bedroom. There was a paradise in the center of this hotel that had 2 pools, palm trees, grass, and lots of reclining pool chairs. 

After we got there, we went to the supermarket to buy water and some food for the beach. We walked to the beach, Don Meia Praia. Madre mía, que bonita! I felt as if I was living in a postcard. Funny story too: at one point, the background on my computer was a beautiful picture I found online of this beach in this city called Lagos, Portugal. Then I ended up visiting this city and seeing this computer background in real life. My life is falso, I know. We spent the day at this beach until around 5 when Molly, Allyson, and I decided to head back to the hotel to take showers and rest a little bit. 

 

The beach that was my computer background that I saw in real life!

Don Meia Praia

At Don Meia Praia

Around 8, our tour guides from DiscoverGranada walked us to the city center to a restaurant called NahNahBah that had one of the best burgers I’ve eaten in a LONG time. According to FoodNetwork, this place is in the top 10 best burgers in the world. But what was REALLY amazing, besides this delicious burger, were these potato things that we got with them. I can’t even call them fries because that would be insulting to them. They were sliced potatoes baked and fried in a way that was, mmmmm, and then had garlic on them. I know that just sounds like I’m describing garlic fries, but trust me… they were magical. Luego, fuimos a hotel para irnos de marcha a un bar con DiscoverGranada. (Later, we went back to the hotel and then out to a bar with DiscoverGranada!).

El día siguiente, we went to a place where we would have taken our Sangria boat cruise if the waves hadn’t been crashing against the rocks like it was their job. The original plan was to take the little sail boat all throughout the caves but since the waves were too rough, we just went to the same place via bus and then walked around where we would have sailed. It was still so cool (and to be honest, I’m glad we still went via bus since we got to see how rough the waters were and made me less bummed since I could see firsthand that we would have been a shipwreck in exactly 1.2 seconds) We got to climb down around the caves which was awesome. Después, fuimos a otra playa donde podíamos jugar futbol, voleibol, todo. Unfortunately, the wind was very very forceful and the sand was whipping around. A group of us ended up staying there for a little but then took one of the buses back to the hotel early. I rinsed all the sand off of me (enough to form a little beach) and then went to siesta by the pool. Later, a few of us went into the city center to grab some late lunch. 

 The caves area where we would have done our boat cruise

Out on the rocks of the caves! ( I SWEAR I didn't greenscreen this... this is actually real)

At 6:30pm, everyone met up in the hotel lobby to go watch the sunset at the End of the World (Cabo Sao Vicente). It was a little cloudy/foggy so we didn’t see the clearest of sunsets but the view was spectacular. It really did feel like the end of the world; it was a straight drop off into the ocean.

The sunset at the End of the World

*Tilt head* Me at the End of the World

We stayed there for about 45 minutes and then headed back onto the bus to get dropped off either in the city center or back at the hotel. Rachel, Carrie, and I decided to get off in town and find someplace to eat dinner there. We went to a restaurant where we all split a pizza, grilled salmon, and grilled swordfish. Can you guess how it tasted? Yup, delicious. We met up with some more API people once we got back to the hotel and went out to a bar called Joe’s Garage that was affiliated with DiscoverGranada. We spent the rest of the night dancing and singing out hearts out!

On Sunday, we went to the West Coast of Portugal to go surfing! I say ‘we’ but I did not go surfing, though I did go to the west coast. We could go surfing if we wanted to but if we just wanted to see the west coast, then we could do that too! So, we checked out of the hotel, left our luggage in one of their luggage storage rooms and took the bus over to the gorgeous west coast beach of Praia do Amado. The ones of us who weren’t taking surf lessons had a great time drawing in the sand and taking tons of pictures of everyone who was surfing. We had lunch at the only restaurant on the beach (it’s a good thing it was tasty!) and got some burgers and fries. Luego, we left for the hotel and then started our 7 hour journey back to Granada!

The West coast of Portugal

 GO PITT!

Even though the weather wasn’t always on our side with the wind, I still had an amazing first experience in Portugal. I was with great people and made some more great memories!

Next adventure: Italia!

Abrazos y besos a todos :)

San José/Cabo de Gata

 Last weekend, fuimos a San José y Cabo de Gata con API! (we went to San José/Cabo de Gata with API!) We went for two days, one night and stayed in a hostal that was very nice: clean, had a pool with a turf grass area with lounge chairs, AND my room had a little balcony with table/chairs that looked out onto the pool.

 View from my room window

 Our balcony

 Poolside view!

The first day, about 30 minutes after we arrived, a group of us went with Curra to the supermarket to get snacks if we wanted and also bottled water (the water in San José is not potable) Afterwards, we went on a hike to a beach called Genoveses where there is nothing. No bathrooms, no shops, no restaurants, nada. The beach was gorgeous and the water was perfect. To enter the water was a painful experience due to the fact that there was an abundance of different sized rocks all along the border into the water. Though once you got past the foot or two of them, the sand was soft. We swam and walked along the beach. Even though I put on sunscreen, I still got a little burnt but alas, the life of a pale person. Some of us returned to the hostel, showered, and headed off into the town for dinner. We ended up going to a restaurant that didn’t turn out as we had quite expected. The food was cheap and not bad but we’re pretty certain we got ripped off when we ordered margharitas that ended up being 6 euro and were the size of my palm. Again, living and learning!

 

The un-realness of San José. This was on our walk to the Playa Genoveses

 At the Playa Genoveses! It was literally, UN. REAL.

En domingo (On Sunday), we ate breakfast at the hostel and then headed off to the San José beach which was significantly closer to us than the beach from the previous day. We had until 7:30 that night until we needed to be back at the hostel to take the bus back to Granada, so we staked out on the beach all day. We swam in the water (again, crystal clear and the perfect temperature), played Frisbee, played Frisbee in the water, laid out in the sun, etc. We grabbed some pizza for lunch and then went back to the beach. We went back to the hostel around 6 o’clock to swim in the pool a little and use the outdoor showers/change into dry clothes before heading back onto the bus.

After we got back from San José, I started getting a sore throat which turned into me going to the doctor on Thursday because it started to hurt so much. My glands got swollen and it started hurting my ears too.  It was a successful doctor’s appointment and I went all by myself too! I got some antibiotics and something for the inflammation too. Now, I am feeling all better and just waiting to finish up my meds over the next couple days.

In other news, I now have some European adventures booked! 5 of my friends and I are doing a 5 day tour of Italy in October, landing in Pisa to stay there for a night (just enough time to get the classic ‘Look! I’m holding up the Leaning Tower of Pisa!’ picture) then shipping off to Florence for 2 nights, and finally ending in Bologna for one more night. I also just booked a 3 day visit to my friend Michelle’s place in Germany in December! My friend, Rachel (who is also an academic year student), and I will be flying into Eindhoven and we’ll be staying at Michelle and her boyfriend, Jimmy’s, new apartment. We’re planning on going to Amsterdam as well as Cologne. With API, we still have trips to Seville and Paris planned and this weekend, I’m heading off to Lagos, Portugal! I’m looking into maybe visiting London during one of our breaks in December, which I could only imagine would be gorgeous around Christmas time.

My plans for exploring the world are in full swing! (While still studying, of course, and absolutely loving my host/now new home city of Granada :)  )

Senderismo

Hola todos! Okay, so since it has been quite a while since I have filled you in on my seemingly un-real life in Granada I’m going to split up these next few posts so that I don’t write you one big novel at once.

Senderismo is the Spanish word for hiking! On Sunday, September 11, Marcela (my roommate) and I decided to go on a hike. There is a huge book of laminated pages all about different hiking routes and trails in the API office and the API intern, Lydia, recommended a hike through a pueblo called Monachil. Unfortunately, I did not  grab the laminated pages detailing where we should go from the API office (which they more than welcome you to do) so, our senderismo adventure definitely deserves the title of an adventure.  

We looked online for the path to do in Monachil, called Los Cahorros. It had a beautiful picture of a suspension bridge and waterfalls. We decided to try to do this hike so we packed our bags and our bocadillos (basically, the love child of a sandwich and a hoagie) and we were on our way via the Granada public transportation system. The bus took us to the Barrio Monachil (the neighborhood of Monachil), then we walked about 1 km to the Pueblo de Monachil (the town of Monachil). We had a rocky start to our senderismo when we weren’t sure exactly where to go once we got to the pueblo. After asking around for a while, we started walking towards the direction of Los Cahorros. Walking a bit took us to an option of turning up a hill towards a sign that was about a marked hiking path or continuing down the road. All we really wanted to do was do some hiking so we decided to take the path where there was a definite marked sign instead of venturing down the street where we couldn’t see much of anything about to happen.   

The hike ended up being neither a waterfall nor a suspension bridge. The path was called El Camino de la Cuesta aka a very dry mountain. Though it was fun, none the less! Here are some pictures:

 The view from the beginning of our hike

 At the top!

 Another view from the top of a very dry mountain

Then, the next week, we decided to return to Monachil with a few more people and actually find this mysterious waterfall and suspension bridge. Much to my delight, we found them! The hike was much more successful and lots of fun. We went hiking through gorgeous mountains and found many tiny suspension bridges, rivers, and a little canal leading up to the waterfall. The waterfall was gorgeous as was the extremely long suspension bridge. Most of us decided to go swimming in the waterfall which was more like taking the most magnificent ice bath of my life. So. Cold. On our journey, we also ate wild almonds off of an almond tree we found as well as wild higos (figs) which I have discovered are my new favorite fruit.

 A view at one point during the hike

 Yours truly on top of the waterfall and in front of the suspension bridge

Me and Kat going into the waterfall!

 So, so, so, cold

 Our hiking group in front of the waterfall

Overall, my first two times doing senderismo here were loads of fun and many memories made. Since we live surrounded by mountains, there is definitely more hiking to be done. I really want to do part of the Sierra Nevada Mountains at some point. API is awesome with providing information for a plethora of activities to do outside of the classroom. In the office there are thick binders full of sports, hiking, other extracurricular activites, and travel information from API and from former API students about places all throughout Europe. Our program directors here, Carmen and Curra (and the intern Lydia), are so helpful in all aspects of the imagination. Lydia went with me to Barclays with me to open up my first Spanish bank account and Curra/Carmen helped me when I needed to go to the doctor a couple days ago by giving me all the information I needed to specifically ask for in order to fill out my insurance form later. They even offered to come with me if I felt as if I needed someone there. API has been doing a great job with everything. I couldn’t be happier with my choice to study abroad with them!

Some changes I've noticed so far

Changes I’ve noticed thus far:

• ·         Handicap sign is backwards

• ·         There are practically no nursing homes. Every day I see middle aged children walking up and down the river and through the city with their elderly parents

• ·         We walk EVERYWHERE

• ·         We eat bread with EVERYTHING

• ·         Their lunches are much larger than ours and their dinner are much smaller. Breakfast is not a very big meal either: no eggs, bacon, and bagel here. I have two pieces of toast with butter and jelly every morning with either tea or coffee.

• ·         They are very conscious here of their use of electricity. They use the sunrise/sunset light when they can and at night, you only keep on one light per room and only if you’re in the room. During the day they have awnings that they put down, over their windows so that the sun’s heat doesn’t come through. They also keep their windows and blinds down to help with this and to keep all the cool air from nighttime in (At night, all the windows in the house are open so the friquito air can come in)

• ·         For how immaculately clean Granada (and Spain in general) is, you must always be on the lookout for dog poop in the streets/sidewalks. They do not have to pick up after their dogs, so they don’t!

• ·         The whole siesta thing? It’s a legitimate, recognized thing. If you are out around the city from 230-5/6, there is nothing open. Nothing. Now that I’ve been here for about 2 weeks now, I can understand why. The heat at that time of the day is almost unbearable so everyone goes home for a big lunch and then has siesta time. 

My apologies on the lack of blogging lately! I've been enjoying everything that this wonderful city/country has to offer that I've not been keeping up with the blogging. This weekend, we have an API excursion to San Jose/Cabo de Gata and today (Thursday) we don't have class! It is Dia de la Virgen (Day of the Virgin) pues, we got off today but still have class tomorrow. School is going well and I am excited for October to start because that is when I start my Hispanic Studies classes :) !

I'll play catch up blogging a little later to fill you in on all the amazing adventures I've been having.


Until then!


Katie

Vale

Let me just begin by saying that I am having so much fun and have met such cool people here. I still have to pinch myself sometimes to remind myself that, yes, Katie, this is real. Por eso (therefore), I have been slacking a little on my blogging because I have been so busy enjoying this amazing city! So this will be a long post but full of fun goodies about the rest of my first week in Granada.

Well, we have all survived the first week in Granada and first week and a half in Espana! This past weekend was lots of fun. On Friday night, almost everybody from our API early start group went out to a club called Kapital and danced the night away. And with that phrase is no exaggeration. We danced until 6 in the morning and I went to bed at 6:30 am. Here's a picture from that night:

Here is from left to right: Marcela, Colleen, Carrie, Rita, Lorelyn, Kat, me.

Saturday wasn't too exciting. I slept until noon after not going to bed until 6:30, woke up for breakfast, ate lunch, and siesta-ed. There was a music festival in the city center of Granada that we stumbled upon so we hung out there for about an hour and danced!

On Sunday, 6 other people and I decided to go to the beach for the day! After a slightly rocky start involving us just setting the time to meet a little to early for anyone to get there on time, we ended up at the Granada Estación de Autobuses. We originally were heading to Malaga for a beach day but Malaga is about 2 hours away and the timing didn't work out so, we randomly chose a city that they had buses going to after asking around to make sure it had a beach. We went to Almuñecar and it turned out better than any of us could have imagined. This little beach town was perfect for what we wanted. There wasn't so much sand as there were piedras (rocks). We got to the beach and staked out a spot to hang out which ended up being one of my rockiest parts of the beach but all was well. We hung out and waded in the water a little (it was so cold!). Then we wandered around the town to find some place for lunch. My host mom, Maria Jose, had packed me a lunch to take with me but since our trip was so last minute, not everyone got packed lunches. We went to a pizza place that was pretty good. Afterwards, we found a sandier part of the beach and took a group siesta on the beach (hard life, I know!) A few of us, including me, ended up going all the way into the crystal clear water but it was a short lived experience since it was so cold.

Here is a picture of the group of us who went:

From left to right: Derrick, Katie, Me, Ryan, Allyson, Kevin, and Liz


Almuñecar's bus station was close to the beach so we were able to get a lot a time at the beach without having to trek to and from the bus. We left around 6 pm and got back into Granada at 7:30. I had dinner at home with Marcela and Maria Jose. Marcela and I have come to a consensus that we have lucked out a lot with our host mom. She's a good cook and almost everything she has made us we have liked! Sunday night was a chill night with Marcela, Adam, Parker, and me just going out for some tapas since we were all kind of tired and had class the next morning.

Monday, I had my second day of class. Nothing too exciting to report about class yet. We're going over a lot of perfecto/indefinido and ser/estar. Some people from my class and I went to the API office after class to sign up for the rooming list for our API excursion to San Jose/Cabo de Gata! Marcela, Molly, Lorelyn, Kat, and I then went shopping for a little around Granada. On the way home, Marcela and I found a group of breakdancers the practice everyday except Sunday's behind our house at  8 o'clock. They are so good, it's crazy that people can move their bodies like that.

On Tuesday, API held a meeting about all the cultural activities that the CLM and Universidad de Granada has to offer. So many cool things from rock climbing to swimming to theater to salsa lessons. There are some volunteer opportunities with a school in Granada for primary and secondary school students and once I get my class schedule for the semester, I am going to go and volunteer there for a couple hours a week. They are very flexible with your schedule (aka you tell them when you can do it, what age, and what subject you would like best and they pretty much honor that). I can't wait to start doing all these activities! Most of them start in October since that is when the actual semester for the Universidad starts (I'm doing early start which is the Intensive month beforehand) so we still have a week or two to wait until everything starts up.

After the meeting, a group of us went out for tapas by the API office. That night, API had a movie night with a movie by Garcia Lorca. It was a movie held at a building really far away and it turned out being a bust. Nothing could have warned us that it wasn't going to be a success though. The movie just wasn't very good (it was actually a play that was put onto film) and 20 minutes in, it started skipping which did not help the movie's cause. We ended up leaving early, going to get frozen yogurt/gelato and sitting by the statue of Christopher Columbus and Isabella in the city center.

Last night (Wednesday night), we all went out for Marcela's 20th birthday which is today! It was ladies night at one of the clubs called Granada10 and since it was her birthday, she sent them a list of everyone in our group beforehand and we all got in for free. It was so much fun!!

Here is a picture of me and the birthday girl before we went out on the town:

 (More pictures to come. I didn't bring my camera out and the people who did have not yet posted pictures)

This morning was rough because we didn't end up getting home until 5:30 am (whoops!) and I had class at 9 and Marcela had class at 10. I only slept about 2 1/2 hours before I had to get up for class so I was a little tired (God bless cafe). Then I had a solid 3 hour siesta right after lunch when I got back from class.

Well, that pretty much sums up the past couple days! I'm having a blast here and I am 100% happy with my choice to study in Granada. I like our Intensive Language classes so far but am excited to find out more information on Monday about my Hispanic Studies classes.

Pues, hasta luego!

Katie

Algunas fotos

Here are a few pictures for you guys of my adventures thus far...

This is our second night in Madrid when we went to a restaurant para cenar (to eat dinner). Here in order we have Rachel, Samantha, Me, Juan Carlos (he was working the music/karaoke at the restaurant), Valerie, and Marcela. This night was so much fun. We danced, sang karaoke, made friends with the workers in the restaurant, and they gave us some sombreros to wear for a bit. Nos divertimos mucho! (We had a lot of fun!)

 Here are some pictures of my room with Marcela. We have two beds, two bookcases, two dressers, two night stands, and a table.

Here are the views from desk next to my window. We're right next to the Rio Genil and it's a great place for people watching/listening because there is always foot traffic along the river.


I just tried to upload more and it was taking a little too long so I will put some more up sometime soon.

Hasta luego!

Katie