Round 1
 |
| New Album 3/14/09 6:11 PM |
Round 2
 |
| From Carnival... |
14 March 2009
13 March 2009
Tour de Andalucía, Parte 2
Okay, one more!
After hanging out in Cádiz Monday through Thursday so I could “work” (I’ll explain the need for those “ “ marks some other time…), we headed off to Granada, one of the most bragged about cities in Andalucía … or maybe it just seems that way to me because Rosa is from G. and has an extremely high opinion of just how amazing the city is. Despite all this build up and my somewhat inflated expectations, I’m happy to say my I was still impressed with the city and had a fun escape away from the beach to the mountains! We got there Thursday night, so we weren’t able to see too much of anything, but we had time to wander around the city a bit the following morning before going up to the Alhambra for our afternoon ticket entry. That’s right, there are so many tourists who come to see the Alhambra each day that it’s necessary to book tickets in advance and sign up either for the morning (8:00-2:00) or afternoon (2:00-8:00) visiting sessions. I find Lisa’s description of it as a playground/amusement park for adults to be pretty appropriate. Reasons why:
1. The long line you have to wait in forever before entering
2. You really should probably have a map to efficiently navigate from one part to the next (we didn’t).
3. There are new and exciting things around every corner… intricate architecture, beautifully painted tiles, expansive green gardens, oh my!
All kidding aside, it was a really cool place to get to visit and I don’t really have a lot of words to explain everything. I’ll put up the pictures I have of it (and the rest of my recent travels) when I have a little more inspiration… the one downside of our visit is that we had icky weather for it – clouds and intermittent rain do not make for the prettiest of views or the best of pictures, but oh well, not a whole lot we could do to change it!
Fortunately, the rest of our days there were much nicer (i.e. sunny and spring-like), so it made wandering around the Albayzin (one of the old Moorish neighborhoods) and the view of the Alhambra with the Sierra Nevada mountain range in the background quite nice. Other things we saw/did while there include: seeing the cathedral where the Reyes Católicos (i.e. Isabel and Ferdinand) have their mausoleum, going on a tour of this obscure little convent with an unintentionally hilarious tour guide (not anything you’ll ever find in Lonely Planet or any other guide book, but so worth the 5 euro), enjoying some delicious free tapas (as in they come automatically when you order a drink), and relaxing on a park bench in the completely un-touristy and wonderful Parque García Lorca a little outside the city center.
Come Sunday, it was time to head back to Cádiz, go to school on Monday during the day, then go hang out in Sevilla for a night and day so Lisa could catch her flight back to Germany the following afternoon.
Whew! I guess I actually have been kinda busy over the last while! This weekend I am definitely staying here in Cádiz and hopefully going to enjoy some relaxing beach time if the weather holds out! Hasta luego!
After hanging out in Cádiz Monday through Thursday so I could “work” (I’ll explain the need for those “ “ marks some other time…), we headed off to Granada, one of the most bragged about cities in Andalucía … or maybe it just seems that way to me because Rosa is from G. and has an extremely high opinion of just how amazing the city is. Despite all this build up and my somewhat inflated expectations, I’m happy to say my I was still impressed with the city and had a fun escape away from the beach to the mountains! We got there Thursday night, so we weren’t able to see too much of anything, but we had time to wander around the city a bit the following morning before going up to the Alhambra for our afternoon ticket entry. That’s right, there are so many tourists who come to see the Alhambra each day that it’s necessary to book tickets in advance and sign up either for the morning (8:00-2:00) or afternoon (2:00-8:00) visiting sessions. I find Lisa’s description of it as a playground/amusement park for adults to be pretty appropriate. Reasons why:
1. The long line you have to wait in forever before entering
2. You really should probably have a map to efficiently navigate from one part to the next (we didn’t).
3. There are new and exciting things around every corner… intricate architecture, beautifully painted tiles, expansive green gardens, oh my!
All kidding aside, it was a really cool place to get to visit and I don’t really have a lot of words to explain everything. I’ll put up the pictures I have of it (and the rest of my recent travels) when I have a little more inspiration… the one downside of our visit is that we had icky weather for it – clouds and intermittent rain do not make for the prettiest of views or the best of pictures, but oh well, not a whole lot we could do to change it!
Fortunately, the rest of our days there were much nicer (i.e. sunny and spring-like), so it made wandering around the Albayzin (one of the old Moorish neighborhoods) and the view of the Alhambra with the Sierra Nevada mountain range in the background quite nice. Other things we saw/did while there include: seeing the cathedral where the Reyes Católicos (i.e. Isabel and Ferdinand) have their mausoleum, going on a tour of this obscure little convent with an unintentionally hilarious tour guide (not anything you’ll ever find in Lonely Planet or any other guide book, but so worth the 5 euro), enjoying some delicious free tapas (as in they come automatically when you order a drink), and relaxing on a park bench in the completely un-touristy and wonderful Parque García Lorca a little outside the city center.
Come Sunday, it was time to head back to Cádiz, go to school on Monday during the day, then go hang out in Sevilla for a night and day so Lisa could catch her flight back to Germany the following afternoon.
Whew! I guess I actually have been kinda busy over the last while! This weekend I am definitely staying here in Cádiz and hopefully going to enjoy some relaxing beach time if the weather holds out! Hasta luego!
Tour de Andalucía, Parte 1
Recently I was lucky to have my friend Lisa came to visit me in Spain for whole two weeks! (yes the same one I met up with in Barcelona and visited in Munich… apparently I only have one friend…?) Rather than sit in my 3x5 foot room and bounce off the walls/each other, we took the time to explore as much of Andalucía as we could… over the two weeks, we were in Jerez, Ronda, Málaga, La Línea, Gibraltar (okay not really part of Spain or Andalucía), Granada, Cádiz (of course) and Sevilla. Oy oy oy that’s a lot of jumping around from place to place, but Spain’s public transport system with its (mostly) reliable bus schedule postings got us safely from place to place.
Since Lisa conveniently arrived mid-week of Carnaval (i.e. week-long vacation for me), I was able to meet her in Jerez, the closest airport to Cádiz. From there we bussed it to Ronda, a cute little white village in the neighboring province of Málaga. What makes Ronda unique from the numerous other cute little white villages of Andalucía is that the old and new parts of the city are located on opposite (separate) halves of a cliff with a dramatic, literally straight-down drop-off running right down the middle of it. Fortunately for the inhabitants and visitors of Ronda, the gorge is spanned by a bridge called el Puente Viejo, so transporting oneself from one side to the other is no big deal. However, the bridge itself is nearly as dramatic and remarkable as the gorge itself – I can’t even imagine how dangerous/difficult it was to construct. Anyway, that day we really lucked out on the weather and got some lovely blue sky and sunshine, which made wandering down the footpath to the bottom of the cliffs and looking up all the more impressive. While this is the main attraction that Ronda has to offer, we also visited the town’s bullring. Thanks to my body’s stubborn circadian rhythm/apparent inability to sleep in, we were the first ones in the bullring and got to walk around most of it without encountering any other camera-wielding tourists.
From Ronda, we went to Málaga, the capital city of the aforementioned Málaga province (sidenote: likewise, Cádiz is the capital of the Cádiz province -- I’ll let you guess which provinces Sevilla and Granada are the capitals of…). Anyway, before I share my opinion of Málaga the city, it needs to be prefaced with the disclaimer that my housemates wrinkled their noses, shook their heads, and called Málaga una caca when I previously mentioned that Lisa and I might go there. I chalked up their negative opinion of the city to the excessive amount of pride that most Spaniards seem to devote to their hometowns… that being said, I gotta admit, Málaga is a caca. True, there’s a decent Picasso museum to visit, an old Arabic fortress/palace to walk around in, and has beach access, it’s not enough to make up for the fact that the rest of the city is just kind of ugly… and a little boring… and I have to admit that in comparison, Cádiz’s beaches are far superior to Málaga’s mediocre ones. Sorry to hate on you Málaga, but I don’t plan on going back any time soon.
The last leg of our journey before heading towards Cádiz was a visit to La Línea/Gibraltar. La Línea is the Spanish city right across the border (literally) from Gibraltar. Since it’s a lot less expensive, we stayed in a hostel in La Línea, but walked across the border through the Gibraltar airport’s runway and went to see what Gib has to offer. The town itself creeped me out for some reason … I’ve never been to England, but now I kinda feel like I have. The pound, not the euro is the official currency, there are those obnoxious red telephone boxes everywhere and British flags flying, and the strangest thing of all: everywhere we walked, I kept hearing… English (gasp!). In all reality, it seemed like everyone there speaks/understands either language, but I kept getting confused and didn’t know how to talk to anyone, so I just made Lisa do it.
Anyway, I preferred walking around the Rock much more than being in the town of Gibraltar itself. Rather than pay for a cable car ride up, we decided it would be much better to get to the top walking, so we did. It wasn’t an especially sunny or hot day, but it was pretty humid and the road up was decently steep, so as a true recipient of my mother’s sweat genes, I acquired quite the accumulation of perspiration while trekking up to the top. Once finally there, it was fantastic. We walked around the Great Siege Tunnels, went in St. Michael’s Cave, and visited the Ape Den. I don’t feel like "den" is really an appropriate term for what it is though. When I hear the word den, I think of dimly lit animal caves that you need to duck when you walk through them… I guess it doesn’t really make sense for apes to live in this sort of environment, but that’s what I had been imagining during the laborious journey up the Rock. The “den” was actually just this open area right off the main road where a whole bunch of apes hang out and roam around freely. They are at complete liberty to sleep, eat, and play anywhere they please – and they're definitely not scared at all by humans. In fact, when one of the teachers at my school went to the rock, an ape took some snack food right out of his wife’s purse! Luckily we weren’t carrying anything edible, so we took some pictures and watched the babies jump around and play with each other. It was like going to the zoo, but better because the animals aren’t trapped in cages!
Okay, well that’s more than enough details about the Ronda/Málaga/Gib trip, so I’ll bring this entry a close. Try not to get too sad, because more Tour de Andalucía coverage is soon to follow…
Since Lisa conveniently arrived mid-week of Carnaval (i.e. week-long vacation for me), I was able to meet her in Jerez, the closest airport to Cádiz. From there we bussed it to Ronda, a cute little white village in the neighboring province of Málaga. What makes Ronda unique from the numerous other cute little white villages of Andalucía is that the old and new parts of the city are located on opposite (separate) halves of a cliff with a dramatic, literally straight-down drop-off running right down the middle of it. Fortunately for the inhabitants and visitors of Ronda, the gorge is spanned by a bridge called el Puente Viejo, so transporting oneself from one side to the other is no big deal. However, the bridge itself is nearly as dramatic and remarkable as the gorge itself – I can’t even imagine how dangerous/difficult it was to construct. Anyway, that day we really lucked out on the weather and got some lovely blue sky and sunshine, which made wandering down the footpath to the bottom of the cliffs and looking up all the more impressive. While this is the main attraction that Ronda has to offer, we also visited the town’s bullring. Thanks to my body’s stubborn circadian rhythm/apparent inability to sleep in, we were the first ones in the bullring and got to walk around most of it without encountering any other camera-wielding tourists.
From Ronda, we went to Málaga, the capital city of the aforementioned Málaga province (sidenote: likewise, Cádiz is the capital of the Cádiz province -- I’ll let you guess which provinces Sevilla and Granada are the capitals of…). Anyway, before I share my opinion of Málaga the city, it needs to be prefaced with the disclaimer that my housemates wrinkled their noses, shook their heads, and called Málaga una caca when I previously mentioned that Lisa and I might go there. I chalked up their negative opinion of the city to the excessive amount of pride that most Spaniards seem to devote to their hometowns… that being said, I gotta admit, Málaga is a caca. True, there’s a decent Picasso museum to visit, an old Arabic fortress/palace to walk around in, and has beach access, it’s not enough to make up for the fact that the rest of the city is just kind of ugly… and a little boring… and I have to admit that in comparison, Cádiz’s beaches are far superior to Málaga’s mediocre ones. Sorry to hate on you Málaga, but I don’t plan on going back any time soon.
The last leg of our journey before heading towards Cádiz was a visit to La Línea/Gibraltar. La Línea is the Spanish city right across the border (literally) from Gibraltar. Since it’s a lot less expensive, we stayed in a hostel in La Línea, but walked across the border through the Gibraltar airport’s runway and went to see what Gib has to offer. The town itself creeped me out for some reason … I’ve never been to England, but now I kinda feel like I have. The pound, not the euro is the official currency, there are those obnoxious red telephone boxes everywhere and British flags flying, and the strangest thing of all: everywhere we walked, I kept hearing… English (gasp!). In all reality, it seemed like everyone there speaks/understands either language, but I kept getting confused and didn’t know how to talk to anyone, so I just made Lisa do it.
Anyway, I preferred walking around the Rock much more than being in the town of Gibraltar itself. Rather than pay for a cable car ride up, we decided it would be much better to get to the top walking, so we did. It wasn’t an especially sunny or hot day, but it was pretty humid and the road up was decently steep, so as a true recipient of my mother’s sweat genes, I acquired quite the accumulation of perspiration while trekking up to the top. Once finally there, it was fantastic. We walked around the Great Siege Tunnels, went in St. Michael’s Cave, and visited the Ape Den. I don’t feel like "den" is really an appropriate term for what it is though. When I hear the word den, I think of dimly lit animal caves that you need to duck when you walk through them… I guess it doesn’t really make sense for apes to live in this sort of environment, but that’s what I had been imagining during the laborious journey up the Rock. The “den” was actually just this open area right off the main road where a whole bunch of apes hang out and roam around freely. They are at complete liberty to sleep, eat, and play anywhere they please – and they're definitely not scared at all by humans. In fact, when one of the teachers at my school went to the rock, an ape took some snack food right out of his wife’s purse! Luckily we weren’t carrying anything edible, so we took some pictures and watched the babies jump around and play with each other. It was like going to the zoo, but better because the animals aren’t trapped in cages!
Okay, well that’s more than enough details about the Ronda/Málaga/Gib trip, so I’ll bring this entry a close. Try not to get too sad, because more Tour de Andalucía coverage is soon to follow…
12 March 2009
Oooops.
It´s official, I´m a bad blog keeper. Not that you all want to hear every detail of my life (nor do I want to share everything with everyone, no offense), I do wish I included a few more updates... if I don´t write stuff down, I just forget about it (I guess you could say I´m becoming more like my mother everyday... hehe, love you Mom). Anyway, I´ve been up to quite an assortment of things lately and would like to give a bare bones outline about what I´ve seen and done the last few weeks. To avoid making this the longest, densest post ever, I´ll split up recent events into a few more managable posts, so keep checking this over the next few days!
First thing on the list is el Carnaval de Cádiz. I think I could write multiple blog entries on this alone, but basically it is a Marti Gras a la español and amplified by about 1000. Everyone and I do mean everyone -- babies in strollers to gray haired folks dresses up in wild costumes and celebrates... what exactly, I can´t say, but for a whole week there was a constant stream of confetti, parades, musical performances and a general vibe of frenetic energy is unleashed upon the city. Forgive the bragging, but it is said that Cádiz has the best/craziest Carnaval in all of Spain, and I must admit, I fully believe it lives up to its reputation. People stay out all night in their costumes dancing, singing, socializing and drinking on the streets... all of this makes for some pretty good times because when thousands of people are packed like sardines into plazas, streets, and pretty much any other public space available AND they are wearing silly outfits AND have varying levels of sobriety, well.... complete strangers can turn into best friends after about five minutes of chatting.
One part of this that I liked was that groups of friends tended to dress up in similarly themed costumes. Examples include life sized tetris shapes, a pack of hungry hungry hippoes, various farm animals and a group of Guantanamo prisoners. Popular fall-back costumes include disney characters, pirates, fairies, and cross-dressing in general.
Saturday night/Sunday morning was the biggest night of celebration with the most number of people on the street. By 7:00 Sunday morning, all the plazas contained enormous piles of garbage everywhere, the streets smelled strongly of urine, and an unmistakeable stench of general filth hung around in the air. Don´t worry, by 10:00 city workers were already sweeping up and disposing of the garbage and hosing down streets, so by midday everything was sparkly and new again. I´m not writing this post from my computer, but when I get the chance I´ll post a couple pics for you all...
Okay, that´s all I have for now, so stay tuned for the next segment of my update!
First thing on the list is el Carnaval de Cádiz. I think I could write multiple blog entries on this alone, but basically it is a Marti Gras a la español and amplified by about 1000. Everyone and I do mean everyone -- babies in strollers to gray haired folks dresses up in wild costumes and celebrates... what exactly, I can´t say, but for a whole week there was a constant stream of confetti, parades, musical performances and a general vibe of frenetic energy is unleashed upon the city. Forgive the bragging, but it is said that Cádiz has the best/craziest Carnaval in all of Spain, and I must admit, I fully believe it lives up to its reputation. People stay out all night in their costumes dancing, singing, socializing and drinking on the streets... all of this makes for some pretty good times because when thousands of people are packed like sardines into plazas, streets, and pretty much any other public space available AND they are wearing silly outfits AND have varying levels of sobriety, well.... complete strangers can turn into best friends after about five minutes of chatting.
One part of this that I liked was that groups of friends tended to dress up in similarly themed costumes. Examples include life sized tetris shapes, a pack of hungry hungry hippoes, various farm animals and a group of Guantanamo prisoners. Popular fall-back costumes include disney characters, pirates, fairies, and cross-dressing in general.
Saturday night/Sunday morning was the biggest night of celebration with the most number of people on the street. By 7:00 Sunday morning, all the plazas contained enormous piles of garbage everywhere, the streets smelled strongly of urine, and an unmistakeable stench of general filth hung around in the air. Don´t worry, by 10:00 city workers were already sweeping up and disposing of the garbage and hosing down streets, so by midday everything was sparkly and new again. I´m not writing this post from my computer, but when I get the chance I´ll post a couple pics for you all...
Okay, that´s all I have for now, so stay tuned for the next segment of my update!
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