Portugal (part 2)

Well today was just another wednesday.  Not really anything worth mentioning.  But there's still plenty to tell about portugal so you still have something to read for the day.

I believe I left off with our visit to the fairytale land of sintra.  Which was beautiful and amazing.  Then we headed out to the coast to cabo da roca which is the western most point in continental europe.  That was the closest I will be to home in the next couple of months.  But besides that the area is absolutely beautiful.  The water was so blue and the weather was perfect.  The sun was shining and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.  I'll let the pictures do the rest of the describing though.  I don't really think there are words for it.

After that we had our typical portuguese lunch.  It consisted of what I believe was a cabbage soup, it was something green anyway, and bread and cheese and chorizo.  There was also some codfish and shrimp in some fried batter and wine to go with it.  Overall it was pretty good.  But I was a little more excited about the next stop in a town called cascais which had this amazingly delicious gelato shop.  It's specialty is fruit flavors and you get to choose two flavors which they twist together in a single scoop.  So I had a lovely combination of chocolate chip and strawberry.  The best part though was getting to eat it down by the beach and getting to walk on the beach and stick my feet in the water.  The water was pretty good but it still felt amazing to be walking around barefoot on the beach.

Our next stop was back in Lisbon.  It was still on the water but we were back at the area where the water is the river and not the ocean.  We walked around in the area of Belem where we saw some of the discovery monument which are dedicated to the people that were a big part of the discovery era like henry the navigator I believe he is called.  Also in the area is the monasterio de jeronimos I believe it is called.  It is no longer a functioning monastery but it is a museum and the church attached to it I believe is the biggest in the city.  Unfortunately the monastery and the church are not open on mondays.  We did however get to try the famous pastry that was created by the nuns that used to live in the monastery.  It is this little custard pastry that is made using egg and sugar and I think there was some cinnamon in there.  It was really good.

That was our last stop and then our tour came to an end.  It was a great experience though and I was so glad I went.  We did have a few hours left before our bus left though so we walked around a little more i n the rossio and baixa-chiado area.  While walking around we came across a little bar that had this drink that our guide had mentioned that morning while we were in sintra.  It is a cherry liqueur but the best part is that it is served in a chocolate cup.  So of course I had to try it.  And it was definitely worth it.  

After that we walked down to the water again and sat by the river as the sun was setting.  It was a lovely end to a wonderful weekend.  When it started getting dark we took the metro back to the area by the hotel and got dinner in the huge department store that they also have here in sevilla and other big cities in spain called corte ingles.  The place is indescribably huge.  This one was the biggest we've seen though. I'm pretty sure it had twelve stories and had everything from clothes to electronics to a supermarket, cafeteria, and movie theater.  It was crazy.  It was also our first struggle with the language barrier.  Basically everyone we had encountered up to that point spoke at least some english but the guy at the restaurant we ate at definitely didn't.  I was able to understand some things he said because it sounds a little like spanish and he understood better when I used a little bit of spanglish.  It was a little rough but we got what we wanted so it all worked out fine.  Then it was off to pick up our bags at the hotel and head to the bus station.

We got on the bus which left at 9:30 and were expecting to have a similar trip to the one we had on the way here.  Well it seemed to be going that way at first.  We went for a couple of hours and then had a stop for 45 minutes which seemed kind of long but we were all under the impression that it would be the only stop so it didn't seem too bad.  What we didn't realize was that we were also going to be stopping in this town in the southern part of portugal to pick up some other passengers.  And for some reason this required us to stop for almost a whole hour I believe.  It was one of the longest hours of my life.  We were so confused and didn't know when we were going to get going again.  I really just wanted to get back because I was so tired and the guy in front of me had his seat reclined all the way so I was super uncomfortable and couldn't sleep at all.  It was a rough night.  

But we got into sevilla finally some time between 5 and 6 I believe and got back to the house and went to bed.  Tuesday was a public holiday here, andalucia day, so I got to sleep basically all day long.  It was wonderful.  I didn't get up til 1 or 2 and since I was gone all weekend and missed some meals I got to have lunch at the house and it was lasagna which was really good.  Then I just got to relax all day which was nice after so many busy weekends of traveling.  As much as I have enjoyed the traveling and I definitely don't regret any of it, I am excited to have a more relaxed weekend this weekend with nothing big planned.  We might do a day trip with the school or take a bus to one of the beach towns on the coast for the day but that will be all.  It will be so nice to have at least one day to sleep in and do nothing, or if we do something it will just be going to a museum or park or something.  It's hard to believe my time in spain half way over.

Portugal (part 1)

Very early this morning I got back from a wonderful weekend in Portugal.  I had such a wonderful time and loved everything that I saw and everything that I got to do.  But let's start at the beginning.

Friday night at midnight was when the bus left.  We were taking a bus because it is cheaper but also, when it comes to getting to Portugal from Sevilla, it's also more convenient.  Because with layovers and different things it basically takes longer to get there by plane than bus.  So Lisbon was our destination.  We left at 12 and were supposed to get in at 7 in the morning.  Well, I don't know why they put that time on the ticket and the schedule, maybe there was supposed to be another stop or something, but it did not take us that long to get there.  We actually got in at 5:30 in the morning.  But the fun thing is that  Lisbon is an hour behind Sevilla so it was actually 4:30.  There's not really much going on at Lisbon at this hour.  In fact, the metro doesn't start up til 6:30 which made getting to our hotel a little difficult.

So we got to spend some quality time with the Lisbon bus station. 2 hours in the cold bus station with less than 5 hours of sleep throughout the night.  That was fun.  But we made it through and got on the metro when it opened at 6:30.  We headed towards the hotel and after walking past the street once we got there.  We knew check in was not until 2 that afternoon but we were going to store our luggage at the hotel until we could get into our room.  And then we had no idea where we would go from there.  But this was a turning point for the trip.  It got off to a rocky start with all that time sitting in the cold.  But our luck turned around and there was a room ready and available when we got to the hotel a little after 7 and we were able to check in and get a few hours of sleep before heading out and exploring the city.  It was a much appreciated nap.  It would have been a rough day without it.

Eventually we did get up and moving though.  We didn't have anything specific planned so we decided to just go into city center and just walk around and see if we saw anything we wanted to go see or do. And before that we found a little cafe where we got some chocolate pastries and a drink.  I had this really good peach juice and of course the pastry was delicious. Then when we got to the center we walked down to this plaza by the river and saw some stands set up with different things for sale.  It was a really nice day and we had actually been able to leave the room without our coats which had not happened on any of our previous trips.  So it was really pretty just walking down by the water and enjoying the sunshine.

We then walked in the other direction and saw some shops and restaurants and such.  There were also a lot of street performers around.  We walked into another plaza area and saw a guy selling strawberries.  It was really cheap and you got a lot of strawberries so we bought a bag to split.  We sat in the sun in this plaza and ate our strawberries.  It was just a really enjoyable way to spend the afternoon.

So after we had eaten as many delicious strawberries as we could, we walked up into the historic part of the city, the only part that survived the earthquake and tsunami back in 1755.  The streets are all narrow and winding, nothing like the streets in the newer parts of the city.  In this area we visited the castelo de sao jorge it might be called.  It was fun to walk around and had some really nice views of the city.  After that we walked to the cathedral that is in that same part of the city.  It is a gothic style cathedral and it was built over some other things and there have been excavations done in the cloister part of the cathedral so you can see ruins of ancient roman and islamic buildings.

We did a little more walking around after that, but we were still pretty tired.  And we were getting up pretty early the next morning to go to Fatima so we  headed back to the hotel before too long and got some much needed sleep.  When we got up saturday morning we got breakfast at the hotel and then took the metro to the bus station with the goal of making the 9:15 bus to fatima.  We got there just in time and just like that we were off to fatima.  After a quick hour and a half bus ride we were there.  It was a little difficult at first because we did not really know what all we were supposed to see exactly and everything was in portuguese so it was hard to know where to go and what everything was.  But we did go to mass shortly after we got there at the holy trinity church that was built fairly recently I believe.  It was supposed to be an international mass, but it was mostly just portuguese with a little bit of italian thrown in.

After that we walked around the shrine area some more.  We saw the site of the apparition and we went into the basilica where the tombs of the children are.  We did end up visiting the book shop and looking for a guide though because we wanted to make sure we knew what we were seeing and how to get to everything.  After seeing the things located within the shrine we walked out towards the edge of town following a path of stations of the cross towards the village where the children lived.  We got to see the sites where the angel appeared to the children and their homes.

After all of that we went into some shops and we got a little something to eat before heading back to the bus station where we got on the 6:00 bus.  We were back in the city by 7:30 and went back to the city center to walk around and get some dinner.  Overall, another really nice day.

Monday was the day we had booked the we hate tourism tour that Julie recommended.  So we got up early again and had breakfast in the hotel before heading off to the meeting point for the tour.  The fun thing about the tour was that it took us to places a little outside of Lisbon in what are considered suburbs of the city.   The tour guide was really great and it's just a small tour for up to 8 people and the guide drives you around in a van.  There were four other people with us, a middle aged couple from ireland and a slightly younger pair, a guy from LA and his girlfriend I believe who was actually portuguese.  Our first stop was sintra and we got to get out and just walk around the area for a little while and see one of the palaces.

After that we went to another palace like place I guess you could say and we actually went in and spent some time in there.  The guide would give us information as we drove from place to place but then she would give us a certain amount of time and just let us go off on our own after telling us what she would recommend seeing and doing with the time we had.  This place was amazing, like something out of a fairytale.  It was just really beautiful.  We climbed towers and went through wells and caves and hopped across stepping stones and explored the beautiful main house on the grounds.  It was such an awesome experience.

There is seriously so much to say about the trip and we did so much more monday but this post is already pretty long and I am pretty darn tired still so I am going to make you wait to hear about the rest of it until tomorrow.  But hopefully you can already tell that it was an amazing weekend and I had so much fun and just really really enjoyed myself.

by the way

I did mention I'm going to Portugal this weekend, right?  Well I am.  And I have spent the evening packing and getting ready for the trip so I did not have much time to dedicate to this poor blog.  I'm am actually getting ready to go right now, but I will be back with lots of fabulous pictures and stories on tuesday.  ¡Hasta luego!

thursday

Just another boring day.  Nothing exciting to report.  Just that we finally got things sorted out for portugal this weekend.  So that will be fun, except of course that we are once again doing everything last minute which stresses me out a bit.  There's still so many things that I feel like I need to look up and make note of before we get there.  I'm also potentially going to fail my business test tomorrow.  But I still can't bring myself to do any real studying for it.  Which is kind of stressful.  But really all I want to do right now is go to bed.  So I think that's what I'm going to do.  I mean, I have the two breaks tomorrow to do some last minute studying, right?  I don't know why I do this to myself...

ash wednesday

Nothing too exciting to report today.  Classes were the same as always.  I'm really not looking forward to the tests I have on friday.  I don't know how they're going to go, especially the business one.  Went to mass for ash wednesday though.  It was a nice mass, but I really don't understand the spanish way of going up for communion and today ashes.  Like they all just swarm out of the pews and you can't tell if there's one line of two and they come back down the same aisle they went up so there's just a lot of pushing and shoving and seems like.  I don't get it.  What's so hard about making a nice orderly line and waiting your turn?  I think that system works pretty well.  That's all I really have to say though.  Pretty uneventful day.  Except for the fact that I'm in spain of course.

fat tuesday

Just another day.  Morning classes were the same as usual, except the second class teacher was different again.  I didn't like this one as much though.  I mean, she was nice and all, but I prefer the one from yesterday.  Business class is still kind of rough.  I just really don't care about businesses and how you start one and what their purpose is and all that jazz.  And it just requires so much concentration and focus to try to understand all this stuff in spanish.  Because it would be hard enough in english.

I didn't do anything after class.  It was really a pretty boring day.  I did get my valentine's day package of chocolates though.  So I let myself have the whole wonderful goodness of the fanny may bar because, it is fat tuesday after all.

Dinner was interesting.  Good, but interesting.  There was this rice dish.  The rice was good.  I just didn't like the fact that there were little pieces of fishy something in there.  Like little fishy somethings with tentacles.  Luckily, I only had a small tentacle piece that could be easily avoided.  One of the other girls had this big piece she had to cut up to be able to eat.  I probably wouldn't have handled that very well.  We also had these burger like things.  It was like hamburger and onion wrapped up in this tortilla like shell.  They're really good...but I'm pretty sure whatever the meat is that makes up the burger is not your typical hamburger.  That's all I'm going to say on that.

I'm planning on going to bed soon and welcoming in the season of lent tomorrow.  We'll have to decide which of the 100 churches in this city that we want to go to mass at...

just another monday

Morning classes were more or less the same.  Except this week we have a different professor for the second part of the morning.  We met her on the trip to córdoba though and I like her a lot so it's not a bad change.  Business class was not terrible today.  I understood the majority of what the professor said, it's just hard keeping all the terms straight when I don't even know the difference between all of them in english.

I was hungry like seriously all day today.  After class we went to get some sandwiches at 100 montaditos but it still wasn't enough.  I had to get on the computer and keep doing things to keep myself occupied so that I didn't just eat all afternoon.  Dinner made up for it though.  We had a good soup with a chicken broth and rice and garbanzo beans.  Then there was some spaghetti and the fabulous tortilla española, the potato thing.  And an orange for dessert to top it off.  The norwegian girls are really sweet and we just had a great time at dinner with all of us talking and J brought out some pictures of their grandson from this past weekend when they were in madrid.  I'm really glad I have other people in the house with me.  It would be so quiet and lonely if it was just me staying with the family.

That's pretty much all I have to say for today.  Nothing exciting.  I think I might go out with the girls for a little while tonight but that's about as interesting as the day is going to get.  Hasta mañana.

Barcelona

Oh traveling.  Exhausting and stressful, but a good time nonetheless.

Thursday - I drug myself out of bed on thursday morning so I could get up and throw together a few last minute things before leaving the house to catch a cab with R and J to the train station.  We picked up Emily on the way and we were off.  We made it with time to spare.  So we boarded the train we would spend the next eleven hours on.  The train was comfortable enough but eleven hours is a long time and I swear the train made a stop about every half hour at least.  So obnoxious.  But there was plenty of spanish countryside to see and I enjoyed having the time to just sit and stare out the window and contemplate for the hundredth time the fact that I am in spain.  Everything seemed to be going fine until it got to be about 6:30 maybe.  Then we heard the announcement.  I don't exactly what it said, it was all in spanish, but what I got out of it was that there was a train with some problems at a station that we needed to go through to get to barcelona and I think there was something about having to wait at the station we were in at the time for an extra five or maybe it was fifteen minutes.  Whatever it was we got going again shortly and thought that was the end of it.  Well, when we stopped at the next stop we knew that we had not actually seen the end of this little problem.  We were stuck at that stop for an excessive amount of time and were wondering what was going to happen and when and how we were finally going to get to Barcelona.  Eventually, like probably 7:30 by now, (we were supposed to get to Barcelona by 8) one of the train people came and told us that we would be getting off the train and getting on some buses.  So it was a crazy rush of people leaving the train and trying to get a place on one of the four buses that had come to take us the rest of the way to barcelona.  We sat on the bus for awhile as everybody got on and stowed their stuff and the rest of the buses headed out.  Finally a little after 8 I believe we got going.  So after 11 hours on the train we then got to spend another hour and 45 minutes or so on a bus.  But a little before 10 we did finally arrive and the bus dropped us off at the train station.  From there we were able to get to the metro easily and the route was exactly what I had thought.  We got a little turned around when we left the metro, but we quickly got back on the right path and found the hotel.  But by this point it was between 10:30 and 11 and we were both too tired to go back out.  So we made a makeshift dinner out of some snacks we had brought with us.  The room was simple but clean and nice although almost a little bit too warm.  But feet always enjoy being liberated from the socks and shoes that usually hold them captive when we spend time in these hotel rooms.  After we ate a little something it was time for bed so that we could get up the next morning and be ready to see all the sights that the city has to offer.

Friday - We got up friday morning and walked to the plaza cataluña, or placa catalunya in catalan, so that we could find the hop on hop off tour bus.  On the way there we found a tourist information type building that said they sold tickets for this bus so we stopped in there to buy our tickets.  Then we got to the plaza and got on the bus.  The first place we got off was the sagrada familia which is this enormous church designed by antoni gaudí and it is still unfinished.  But even unfinished it is still seriously huge and impressive.  It's very unique and the architecture used is like nothing that's ever been done before.  It's basically amazing.  You can see for yourself.

After that we grabbed a quick lunch and got back on the bus.  Our next stop was park güell which was supposed to be this neighborhood designed by gaudí but the whole neighborhood thing didn't really happen so now it's a park that has a few houses and buildings that he designed.  It was nice to walk around and it's up on this hill so there was a good view of the city down below.

We then got off at these other gaudí houses.  I'm sure they're great on the inside, but we were too cheap, really the tickets are excessively expensive like everything in Barcelona, so we just took some pictures of them from the outside.  Which is still pretty cool looking.

After that we went down to the beach and got a look at the mediterranean sea.  Unfortunately it was getting dark and it was pretty cold so we didn't stay for too long.  Then we rode the bus back to the plaza cataluña and walked back to the hotel.  We went back out to get some dinner and get a yummy pastry for dessert.  Then we went back to the room and watched this spanish game show that was pretty interesting.

Saturday - We got up and walked to the plaza to get the bus again.  Our first stop was the gothic cathedral in the gothic neighborhood.  It was really pretty and it had a saturday night mass and was in walking distance of the hotel.  Score.

Next stop was this big statue of columbus.  It marks the end of the ramblas area which is this street that connects the plaza cataluña in the heart of the city with the port and the sea.  So we saw the statue and then we walked along the port a bit before getting back on the bus.

The next stop we got off at was the olympic stadium from when the olympics were in Barcelona in 1992.  There was a moment when Emily said something about that being 20 years ago and I was seriously about to correct and tell her how it could not possibly have been 20 years since 1992, but then I remembered that I'm 20 and it scared me a bit to remember that I'm so old.  But anyways...  It was really sunny and nice out so it was great just walking around near the stadium where there were some pretty fountains and grassy areas and benches and such.

We got on the bus again but got off at the first stop thinking we might go and see this architecture museum thing which is basically a bunch of buildings in all different architectural styles and they were built for the world fair when it was in barcelona in the late 1800s.  But we didn't feel like paying whatever it cost to get in there.  So we got on the bus again and observed the other sites from there.  We would have liked to have seen the plaza españa, but a lot of it was closed off for what looked like a cell phone company convention of some sort.  Something like that anyway.  So we rode the bus back to the plaza cataluña and then walked down the ramblas area.  We got lunch there and looked at all the little stands and shops and street performers.  Then we walked around a little more before heading back to the cathedral for mass.  It was really nice to have a mass with music.  And I understood the majority of the homily which was really exciting.  After mass we got some dinner and another chocolatey pastry and decided to just relax in the room after that.  And I discovered that I actually managed to get a little sunburnt on my face.

Sunday - Got to sleep in a whole hour today.  It was really nice not getting up until 9.  Getting up at 7:45 all week is going to be rough.  Checked out of the hotel and walked to plaza cataluña to get the aerobus that would take us to the airport.  We got to the airport with plenty of time to check in and go through security and then sit around for a long time.  The plane ride was quick, only like an hour and a half and mostly uneventful.  The take off and landing were pretty bumpy though.  Then when we got to the airport in sevilla we opted for taking the bus instead of a taxi.  Well the closest the bus stopped to where we live was still a good 20 minute walk at least which was kind of frustrating.  But I guess we saved some money...

Got back to the house.  Unpacked.  Chilled in the room.  Forgot to eat.  Then it was too close to supper to eat.  Wish there had been more to eat.  We had these little salmon things.  It's buttered bread with this slice of salmon on top and I think some pepper on it.  It's really kind of weird but I almost kind of like it. There was also a potato soup, one of the ugly colored soups I haven't seen in awhile, which was good.  And a pear for dessert.  I think I need to break out some chocolate...

Oh we also have two additions to our family this week.  Two girls from norway.  I couldn't really understand what their names are.  They are high school aged like the italian girls but I'm not sure exactly how old they are.  They seem nice but I don't think they speak spanish quite as well as the italian girls did.  But they still know enough to communicate pretty well.

And now I think that is finally all I have for this weekend.  I don't know how I'm going to get through 5 full days of class this week.  The whole 3 day week seems like a pretty good idea to me.