Almeria

After I got back to the Tourism School from my field trip, I headed to the bus station and bought a one-way ticket to Almeria.

One of my best friends from State, Bobby (Nighthawk), is studying abroad there and I finally got to visit!

Yesterday, Nighthawk showed me around the city. Our first stop was the fanciest Mercadona, the same grocery store I frequent in Murcia, but this one was built inside an old train station so it was two stories tall!

We bought just enough food to last us through Tuesday morning when I go home to Murcia--plus some Spanish Edition M&Ms because I couldn't resist.

They have the coolest trees in Almeria--they're all groomed to be circular!

And thus, they have cool shadows.

It's been so windy here that it's almost hard to walk!

 We put on some warm clothes and set out to brave a windy day in Almeria. We found a cool photography museum and spent some time learning about Spanish history. We found an interesting bar and vintage store (they were attached) that Bobby had been looking for since the beginning. We meant to order some tea and coffee, but their machine was broken.

Inside the vintage bar; intersting Medusa-esque painting

Inside the photography museum

Tiles on the ground outside the photography museum

I enjoyed the interesting landscaping, pretty architecture, and lots of roses! Nighthawk thought I was weird for taking so many pictures of the flowers--I decided that some men just don't understand the beauty and wonderfulness of flowers (also, Ricky).

Nope, not beautiful at all

Eww, what a nasty rose!

This is Almeria's symbol. NH said it has something to do with a hieroglyph found in a cave.

Lots of shops along this street. Here's another view of the cool trees!

Painting outside the Russian shop; you can see the Almeria guy poking out.

At night, we met up with a few of Bobby's friends for tapas at Tio Tom's. If you bought a drink, it came with a free tapa. The tapas were like full meals! I got two glasses of rose wine, so it came with two tapas. The first one was a huge, loaded baked potato. The second was "Superpollo" a slab of chicken, a fried egg, bread, and a mini-salad.

Believe it or not, Almeria is actually a beach town! It's just been freezing and windy every day..

Thought this was cute: "I am an orange, planted by...Carmen Loipez Ruiz" in front of an orange tree!

Yup, that's a marijuana grow shop...No worries, it was closed!

Nighthawk in front of the City Museum

Me with Bobby's friend Katie as we explored Almeria's nightlife scene

Just me and my sunburnt BFF

GPS fails, fake bricks, and amazing sunsets--Toledo

One of our "Madrid days" was spent visiting the lovely town of Toledo, about a fifty minute drive. We left late, so we had less than a full day to explore, but it was very well spent! I wasted the ride to Toledo stewing about how angry I was that Ricky blew me off on Skype the night before. I had waited up til almost 2AM, a fact that my parents were not excited about.

Later that night I found out that he had a seizure and, obviously, was not at fault for "blowing me off." It just goes to show you that you shouldn't freak out about something before you get all the facts first...I remember my parents trying to convince me not to make judgments until I had heard from him...

Later, skyping my principito :)

Ricky spent a few hours in the hospital and has an appointment in Charlotte on Friday. The Raleigh docs said it may have been stress or dehydration-related, but hopefully the doctors in Charlotte can give him a better picture. Glad that he is okay now though!

The car ride there was also full of loud tummy-growlings and pretzel-snackings. The second Dad parked the car, we flew into a restaurant. I had previously researched Restaurante Fabula on TripAdvisor, and it got a great rating. We arrived pretty late, somewhere around 4pm; also, coincidentally, pretty much right when lunchtime ends for Spaniards.

Luckily, the waiter was incredibly friendly and understanding and told us they could fix us lunch if we ordered quickly! We ordered way too much food, as usual, but it was all yummy!

Just above Restaurante Fabula--lovin the flores!

I love the horizon in this one!

Afterwards, we headed in whichever direction we decided looked more intriguing. I really wanted to see a synagogue or mosque, rather than a cathedral (since I had already seen so many), even though the cathedral was really the main attraction.

We wondered what all the hanging chains were for

We went inside the second synagogue we came across; I had just seen it in some postcards across the street. It was free for me to get in! We were surprised to see a pretty substantial museum portion accompanied the synagogue.

Mom really wanted to try and catch the El Greco painting (in a separate museum) and the Cathedral, but we made it to each of them at about the exact time that they closed. Woops!

Dad was also very disheartened

We browsed some interesting shops--the quintessential Toledo knife, sword and armor stops, some "Marzapan" bakeries, and a few unique ones in between.

Copy of the castle...made entirely of Marzipan!

Little nun babies cooking up some Marzipan...only semi-creepy

On our way down  the mountain back to the car, we had a semi-stunning realization. Many of the walls were painted!

I know that doesn't sound that interesting or unique, but what I mean is, the bricks and molding, etc, were all painted on! They were fake! I don't know how we didn't realize this before; I started freaking out a little bit!

here's a giveaway that the bricks are fake...they peel off?

Reality...hits...hard.

 After we had pretty much gotten our fill of the beautiful little pueblo of Toledo, we marched back down to the car to head home. As we began to drive toward Madrid, our GPS decided to take us through Toledo. Toledo is not like a typical Spanish city, but rather like a small European town, in that all of its streets are tiny, random, and sometimes end in stairs.

A few times we had to fold the mirrors in, in order to avoid scraping the walls. My Dad said that it was one of the tightest driving experiences he had ever had and he is a pro at driving in Europe. We recalled that the tiny streets were originally constructed solely for horse, carriage, and foot traffic, made long before the time of automobiles. So, at least that part makes sense.

Eventually, some nice Spaniards helped direct us back down the steep and narrow hill-street. One man came out and opened up a garage for us so that we could pull in and turn around!

Upon leaving, a gentle rain began to fall, filling the skies with enormous, dark clouds and some brilliant sunlight streaming through them. Dad had to pull over several times so Mom and I could capture the magnificent sunset.

Wildflowers!

I picked some wildflowers for Momma

The Osborne bull, symbol of España

Hopefully Mom won't beat me for posting an unauthorized picture
of her, but I thought she looked pretty!

It's really hard to tell from this streetside-photo, but the rainbow ended in a huge pink glow;
it looked sort of extraterrestrial

Holy crap, I'm in Barcelona

After several hours of night driving, my parents and I made it to amazing Barcelona! 

 

Salmon balls with cream cheese

Since we stayed up 'til 3AM, we slept in late and chilled in the apartment while it poured outside. Once the clouds had cleared, we headed out to find lunch. Nothing was open! All of the stores and many restaurants were closed due to Good Friday, an official holiday. We did manage to find a fancy bar/restaurant that served up some delicious grub! I tried pumpkin ravioli, salmon balls (filled with cream cheese) and chicken tempura. Yummy!

The sugar packet says "Cafe Sagrada Familia" with a picture on it.
Of course, I am holding it upside-down...
Note the FCB flag in the background.

We walked to la Sagrada Familia, the famous, unfinished cathedral built by Antonio Gaudi; another top item on my lifelong Bucket List.

Mom is so excited to enter the Sagrada. Do we look like sisters?

It was even more amazing than I could have expected. I felt so lucky and humbled when I looked up at the huge, almost bizarre-looking Cathedral surrounded by towering cranes. Though I don't know if everyone shares my sentiment, one of the most charming ideas about the cathedral is that it will continue to be constructed over 100 years after the architect's death. They make a big deal about Gaudi's "dream" finally being completed. Even more charming is the fact that he spent the last several months of his life toiling over his life's masterpiece, sleeping in his basement workshop, and was eventually buried underneath in the crypt.

 

Sadness on the Passion Facade

Shadow play

The golden triangle in the middle stands for the Holy Trinity

Holy Trinity up close

Gaudi was only 31 when he was commissioned to do the Sagrada Familia!!!
Makes me want to do something with my life...

One of my favorite things that I learned was that Gaudi was obsessed with perfecting the amount of lighting that entered the cathedral. While many people think that cathedrals should be streaming full of light, Gaudi thought this could be just as blinding as darkness. For the perfect religious experience, the Cathedral had to have just the right amount of light.

Shadow of the crucified Christ against stained glass windows.

Although I'm not a religious person, the Sagrada Familia had me completely in awe. Gaudi's story and ideals made it so much more interesting than just seeing the building (although that was damn awesome too).

The more joyful Nativity Facade

The brown parts show what has been finished; the beige is pending construction

We came home to grab some jackets, then headed back out to La Rambla, the must-see shopping and eating avenue in Barcelona. On our taxi ride there, I chatted up the driver; a much more succesful exchange than I had expected.

• I asked him about Semana Santa and if the stores would be closed on Saturday. He explained that not too much would happen here on Sunday and that stores should be open on Saturday (even Corte Ingles was closed on Friday!).
• I asked him if there were many people here that spoke Catalan but not Spanish. He told me that those who spoke Catalan usually also spoke Castellano (Spanish), but there are also a lot of Spaniards who only speak Castellano. There is suprisngly a lot of writing in Catalan here; I thought it would be mostly Castellano.
• When I said that I didn't know/understand any Catalan, he asked where I was from and told me that my Spanish was awesome. After constantly feeling self-conscious about my "sub-par" Spanish, that was such a great feeling! He reassured me, like 'No, really!' 
• I then asked him if he could recommend some places for us to eat dinner. He was so friendly! He recommended a ton of places. He told me about 4 Gats, a restaurant in the Gothic Quarter where Pablo Picasso had two art exhibitions! I made reservations for Saturday.

We weren't starving after our fancy lunch, so we headed out in hopes of finding a few tapas to fill us up, but not over-stuff us. We were in for an interesting surprise when the check came...

Yes, that cloud was legitimately pink!

We knew that the waiter was trying to screw us over when we entered (I can feel my blood pressure raising as I write this). He tried to order us the huge, over-priced tourist meals after louring us in with reasonably priced tapas on the menu outside. I eventually switched to Spanish and explained that we weren't that hungry and were just interested in a few tapas. After we got to the point where we thought he had backed down and was going to just give us what we wanted, I asked if we could order some cheese (Dad wanted some). At this point, I had let my guard down, so I stopped asking how much each plate would cost; we saw that most tapas were under 8 euros.

The meal was tasty: we had calamares a la romana (fried calamari), patatas bravas (brave potatoes--potatoes in a seafood-esque sauce), bread with tomatoes & olive oil, and our cheese plate. The sangria was some of the best I have had since I came to Spain! When we got the check however, we found that the waiter had charged us over $50 for the cheese plate. We all got pretty angry and my dad chewed out the waiter. Keep in mind that everything else we ordered was 4-7 euros each...NEVER EAT AT Restaurante Amatxu if you go to Barcelona. They gyp the tourists! >:( It was a relief to check them out on TripAdvisor. One star and all horrible reviews; everyone gets gyped there!

We left, pretty angry, but tried not to let it ruin our awesome first day in Barcelona. When we got back to the hotel, Aparthotel Acacia, we were greeted by our very friendly concierge. When he found out that I spoke Castellano, he asked me about how long I'll be in Spain, if I'm enjoying it, etc. It was quite a relief to speak with a nice Barcelonian after our dinner fiasco. When we asked him what would be going on for Easter Sunday, he explained that Spaniards are less religious here than in the South. No wonder Murcia's Semana Santa processions were so elegant! It does seem strange that the sweetest cathedral is here though.