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I have to warn you: this one might be a little lengthy! It was a crazy week!
On Saturday my friend Gill and I left for Barcelona. On Monday, we left for San Sebastian, and on Tuesday afternoon we headed to Salamanca. On Thursday afternoon we headed back to Sevilla—amazed at how diverse Spain is! But, no rest for the weary! Thursday night began "La Madrugada" which in Spanish means sunrise, and it's the biggest night of Semana Santa! Stories from that to come later!
I'll start off by saying Barcelona was amazing. So different than any other city I've been to. It's really cool how Gaudí had such a big impact on an entire city. Upon getting to our hostel, we became really glad all we were doing was sleeping there! It wasn't exactly the four-star hotel we're used to staying in with ISA (the company I'm in Spain with). We dropped off our stuff, and hit the ground running! First, we visited the Sagrada Familia—Gaudí's most famous work. I walked off the subway, and was immediately confronted by it. It was so overwhelming! Everything I see in textbooks is always 300 times bigger and more amazing than I ever could have imagined! We didn't get to go inside, but just the views from the outside were enough!
After visiting Sagrada Familia, we ventured to Las Ramblas. It's a long pedestrian walkway surrounded by stores, restaurants, and all kinds of vendors! Not to mention some of the best street performers I've ever seen! They definitely need to teach the Sevilliana ones a thing or two! There was a section where each side of the street had stalls of birds, all kinds of rodents, turtles, and I think a few snakes but I didn't get close enough to find out! There was even a stall selling pigeons—why one would want to buy a pigeon…I have no idea. The highlight of our walk down Las Ramblas was definitely La Boquería! It's a huge covered market selling literally every kind of food you could imagine! Fish, poultry, meats, TONS of sausages, fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts, candies, dried fruits, wine, bread, pastries—everything! For all you Bostonians reading this, it was like Haymarket on steroids!!! Gill and I bought some delicious olives and some very tasty fresh fruit juice! I also purchased some cheese because well, I can't resist trying a new Spanish cheese! They had more varieties of dried fruits than I've ever seen or known existed; entire strawberries, kiwi, cantaloupe—they were all so good! I could have lived off of the apples we bought! My new favorites are definitely Pink Lady apples! I don't even think they exist in the states! At the end of Las Ramblas, we reached Las Ramblas del Mar—this is when we got to see the Mediterranean for the first time up close! We're both New Englanders, so the ocean was a treat to see!
After meandering up and down Las Ramblas, we headed to Plaça Espanya to see the Magic Fountains of Montjuic. We got to the plaza and saw a big fountain—so we assumed this was it. It wasn't doing anything particularly magical, so I wandered up a block to see if there was anything else. After turning the corner, I quickly realized we were at the wrong fountain! The Magic Fountains were amazing to watch and the soundtrack they played to was pretty comical—for Americans anyways. They played the song Gill and I only know as "the slow motion running song"—more commonly known as Chariots of Fire. We got a pretty big kick out of it. After watching the fountains for literally an hour and a half, we decided it was time for some dinner and to head back to the hostel for the night. It had been quite a long day and we ready for some rest!
Our second day was busy from start to finish! We woke up early and headed to Parc Guell. It was Gaudí's attempt at making a housing development, but like the Sagrada Familia it remains largely unfinished. Nonetheless, it's beautiful! Gill and I started at the top where there is a hill with 3 crosses on it. From the top of this hill there is really best place for getting a great picture of the entire skyline of Barcelona! We meandered down the paths in Parc Guell passing cactuses and all kinds of trees and flowers until we reached the main plaza. Surrounding the plaza are numerous viaducts that could only have come from Gaudí's mind! We sat on the gorgeous tiled benches surrounding the plaza for a while just people watching and enjoying the sun. We walked towards the metro stop and on the way got a quick lunch before continuing our day. We went to Plaça Catalunya to rent some bikes for a few hours! It was such a great decision! At first it was a little tricky to weave in and out of the crowds of people (and cars!) but eventually you got used to it and learned to appreciate the bells on the handle bars! We biked down Las Ramblas until we reached the waterfront, and then kept biking until we hit Playa Barceloneta! We stopped a few times along the way just to hop off our bikes, take pictures, and enjoy the fantastic views. Getting to the beach was so refreshing after a few hours of biking! We took off our shoes and I got to touch the Mediterranean Sea for the first (and hopefully not last) time! Gill and I walked up and down the beach looking for shells and sea glass and ended up being pretty successful! Of course our trip to the beach wasn't without incident…as we were biking back towards Las Ramblas we spotted a man completely naked just standing in the middle of the beach. It was a pretty rude awakening and we weren't sure if it was completely legal or not! We definitely were NOT the only ones to notice his presence. We quickly looked away in shock, and pedaled in the opposite direction! Such is Spain I guess!
After returning our bikes, we found our way to the Picasso Museum. When most people think of Picasso they think Cubism. As we learned during our visit to the museum, Picasso did a lot of art that really had nothing to do with Cubism at all! He started painting at a really young age and it was so interesting to see his less famous works. If anyone goes to Barcelona I definitely recommend stopping by! After the museum, we had some dinner and headed back to the hostel exhausted from a very long very active day.
On day three we woke up at around 6am to catch a bus from Barcelona to San Sebastian. Both of our host families had really recommended we visit this city, and we are SO glad we did! Our bus arrived at around 2pm, and during the walk from bus stop to hostel we began to wish we had planned to spend more than just one day there! The city was absolutely gorgeous, and the weather was phenomenal! We got to our hostel and it was a billion times better than the one we stayed at in Barcelona! Everyone we met there was so nice and welcoming, and we made some really good friends almost immediately! First we met Jeff who is from Utah and is spending 2 months backpacking around Europe. He felt like taking a walk up the beach with us, so the three of us set off to see the three beaches in San Sebastian. The tide was way in so there wasn't much beach left, but from what we saw we liked! When we ran out of beach we made our way to the top of one of the montes (hills) and at the top we had a breathtaking view of the whole city! More than ever we wished we could stay forever! We all took the funicular back down. As it would turn out the incline from Pitt has a twin in San Sebastian!!! It was a very welcomed sight! That night Gill and I cooked us pasta with chicken meatballs and some salad—it was good to be cooking again! We spent the night hanging out with our friends we met at the hostel which made us even sadder to be leaving the next day.
On day four, Gill and I took a train from San Sebastian to Salamanca. We got there at around 7:45pm and were starving! We got ourselves situated in our hostel, and found somewhere for dinner. After dinner, we decided to catch a glimpse of the Catedral at night. We forgot it was Semana Santa! We were lucky enough to catch one of Salamanca's Samana Santa processions as it was leaving the Catedral! As it was my first procession, I really didn't know what to expect. My first glimpse of a nazareno gave my chills. A nazareno is a member of the church whose procession it is, and they dress in full robes with a hood that covers their entire face except for their eyes. A lot of people describe them as looking like KKK members except with purple, green, black or blue robes. It was really eerie, but cool. After the procession we went to check out Plaza Mayor, and then headed back to our hostel for the night.
Our fifth and final day of our grand adventure was pretty packed! We woke up and first headed to the public library of Salamanca. It is in La Casa de Las Conchas, which is a building covered in hundreds of sculpted shells. We went inside for a little to see the patio, and more sea shell themed interiors. Our second stop of the day was at the Universidad de Salamanca. Before heading inside, we were sure to stop at the ornately decorated entrance and look for la Ranita. La ranita means "little frog" and that's exactly what is! I won't tell you where it is, but somewhere in the sculpture work of the entrance is a little frog perched on top of a skull, and when students find it, the rumor is they will have good luck on their exams! I found it, and I really hope the rumor is true! It is the oldest university in Spain (second oldest is University of Sevilla!). It was so interested to walk around to each of the rooms, and know that there have been so many famous minds that have been students, or taught there.
After our visit to the university, we went back to the cathedral to go inside and see it during daylight hours. On the outside there was another scavenger hunt! In 1993, one of the workers who was working on resurfacing the entrance of the cathedral carved an astronaut into the leaves bordering the doorway. It was much easier to find than the ranita, but it was so out of place amongst the stone greenery and forest animals! We went inside the cathedral to take a look around and were lucky enough to get to see all of the Semana Santa floats being prepared for their processions! People were cutting hundreds and hundreds of roses to be placed on each float, and making sure each figure of Jesus or Mary was picture perfect! After the cathedral we headed past Plaza Mayor to the market for some pre-lunch snacks. More olives and fresh fruit! It was so much smaller compared to La Boquería in Barcelona! As long as they have olives, fresh fruit, and cheese, I can consider it a pretty successful marketplace! After lunch we had a quick siesta before venturing out into the cold and wind to walk to the Roman Bridge. On our way there, we happened up ISA Salamanca!! We couldn't help but peep in and say hola! Teresa (one of the directors there) was so happy to meet us, and find out how ISA Sevilla is holding up! We even got to use their computers for a while to catch up with friends and family! After saying adios to ISA Salamanca, we finally found our way to the Roman Bridge. We really didn't spend too much time there because it was just too cold! We scurried back to our hostel to warm up before dinner. From such a long day, we were really pooped and went straight to bed after dinner knowing we had an early bus to catch back to Sevilla the next day.
Gill and I had such a great time exploring parts of Spain we hadn't seen before! We got a chance to look at a map and realized that we really have been all over Spain! It's a good feeling to know that we've really taken advantage of living here for the semester. We got to understand firsthand how diverse Spain is, and also that no matter how many cities we visit, we still like Sevilla best!
¡Adios y besitos!
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Aunt Marsha Sue Thanks for making me desperate to visit Spain...