adventures!

Well I wrote a really long post about this weekend on Sunday but I accidentally closed the page before I posted it so instead of writing it again I got mad and refused to write again hoping that it would magically just come back...well it didn't, so now I forgave myself and now here I am!

Since I got to Bilbao I've been telling myself I'm going to run here and that didn't happen until today. My first run in Bilbao! Sure it was only about a mile long and the thick city air filled with smoke because everyone has a nicotine problem here made it difficult to run but I feel accomplished.

Speaking of accomplishments...

I biked up a mountain!...well sort of.

Renner and I rented bikes on Friday and went for a LONG LONG LONG bikeride.  We took our bikes on the metro to a little beach town called Plentzia and from there we rode up and down mountains until we got to Bakio, 17 miles later. Well considering I am a lazy sloth here this was probably the most physically challenging thing I have ever done. It started out fine, the roads in Plentzia are long and flat but then we came to the first incline and I have never felt such burn and pain in my thighs. I attempted to bike up but my legs felt like they were going to give out at any moment and I knew the journey that lay ahead of me was quite long and I didn't want to tire myself out immediately...so I walked. I walked and every few minutes I would try to pedal again  but my body just would not allow it. When we reached the first downhill stretch I hopped back on my bike and rode (while clutching the brake because I was scared of going so fast) down the hill admiring the beautiful countryside and all the happy farm animals. And thats how we went. Walk our bikes uphill, ride downhill. We stopped in Bakio to eat the lunch that our host parents so kindly provided yet again and took a nap on the beach. After refueling we headed up another mountain towards our destination, San Juan de Gaztelugatxe. I tried to pedal but it was no use, my legs were burning so we walked.
When we were getting close to the top and I was about ready to give up after such a long, painful, and tiring journey an old man carrying foot-long clippers approached us. Needless to say I was terrified, I don't like strangers especially when they're carrying large pointy metal objects. Turns out he was really friendly. 25 years old? he asked, no we're younger, he was 75. And you're walking? ...yes. Well he lectured us and said with our age we should be able to ride up these mountains with no problem. I essentially got forced back onto my bike and honestly if it weren't for that old man I would have turned around and I'm happy I didn't because minutes later and only a bit more uphill San Juan de Gaztelugatxe was within sight.
We chained up our bikes and continued on the dirt road downhill towards the sea. The sun was setting and we were worried about getting back to Bilbao...biking in the dark, not good..bikes needed to be returned by eight. It was about 5:30. There was no hope we'd get back in time before dark and to return the bikes and there was no way I could even physically bike back to Plentzia but we continued on anyway, we weren't going to stop when we were so close.
The island of San Juan looks like someone took the Great Wall of China and inserted it into the Caribbean yet it is in Spain. We neared the steps and began to climb..I don't know how my legs were still working. We got to the top after about 300 steps and admired the views and the small church that sits on the rocky island. It was closed and the holy water was all dried up but we still got to ring the bell. We did it. And it was well worth it.
After making our way back down the long staircase and climbing back up the dirt path we got to our bikes, got on and went up to the top of the hill where we rode down all the way back to Bakio, still worried about getting back to Bilbao. Well we saw a bus parked just a little farther down the road and we sped up to see if it was going to Bilbao...somehow it was. We threw our bikes in the bottom compartment, paid the four euro fare, and sat down just in time...and made it back to Bilbao just in time to return our bikes. Somehow everything works out.
Saturday we went to the Cuban ballet and Sunday we spent the day walking around up by Renner's house, it felt good to get out of the city and be active for once, a good weekend indeed.

San Juan de Gaztelugatxe

At the Cuban ballet

Barcelona

La Sagrada Familia

Inside

Park Guell 

La Boqueria- Barcelona marketplace

Barcelona harbor

Finaly! Canary Island pictures!

Rental car!

El Teide

Climbing to the top

Made it!

Sunset in Tenerife

updates!

As usual, I'm gonna apologize for being lazy and not updating this but I've been super busy this past week! Lets rewind and start with last weekend:

Friday: We went to Pamplona and toured the city famous for hosting the Running of the Bulls, or El Encierro, during the festival of San Fermin during July. It was way too cold for walking around windy narrow streets but the city is nice. Poor Renner got sick that night and I took care of him in the hotel for the rest of the night after adventuring to the pharmacy to get him some Spanish mystery drugs. Well they worked! He was better the next morning!

Saturday: After Pamplona we drove into Logrono, a city in La Rioja- Spain's famous wine region. We toured one of Spain's biggest wineries and learned all about the process and types of wines. We finished the day with a wine tasting accompanied by delicious bread, cheese, and chorizo! Yum! I even bought some wine to bring home! I'm definitely going to need to buy another suitcase here... Next we stopped outside of two more modern wineries; one designed by Frank Gehry, architect of the Guggenheim, and the other by another architect who built a very unique bridge in Bilbao close to my homestay here.

.....weekdays are boring- I go to class, eat, and sleep.

This past weekend! Ms. Trapani came to visit and we went to Barcelona! As it was her first time in Bilbao I was excited to show her around the city but I got sick, similar to what Renner had last weekend, and she had to tour Bilbao all alone but luckily I was a healthy pup just in time to hop on the six hour train to Barcelona Saturday morning!

Saturday: We checked into the hotel after arriving around 2:00 in the afternoon. Lunchtime! I had my first "fideua"- a tipcal Catalonian dish similar to paella but with noodles instead of rice and slightly different spices. So good! Next we went to La Sagrada Familia- a basilica dedicated to the Holy family designed primarily by Gaudi, but the line was so long so we went into the giftshop where I bought a book about the basilica (to put on my future-teacher bookshelf) and I was able to study up before returning the next day! Well I read the whole thing and the stories behind La Sagrada Familia are incredible. So much thought went into designing that church, every little detail on it entails some sort of symbolism from the facades depicting the birth and death of Christ down to the snails and lizards climbing down the bell towers. The thing is, its been in construction since 1882 and still isn't finished! We then walked around the gothic quarter of the city and went to mass in the gothic cathedral. It was really interesting going to a Spanish mass: virtually everything was the same except for the language. I'm seeing more and more that although cultures, languages, geographic borders and ideas separate people, we all have more in common than we think: people are people no matter what. We ended the night with a dinner consisting of churros and chocolate at a small Basque restaurant where Ms. Trapani told me about her adventures during El Camino de Santiago.

Sunday: We woke up entirely too early to ensure that we could get back to La Sagrada Familia and not wait in the mile-long line. No lie. Its the most visited place in Barcelona! I was glad I read my book the night before because I understood and appreciated the design and meaning of the basilica much more than before. We went inside and then went down to the crypt which houses the tomb of Gaudi along with many altars to other saints. After our long visit to La Sagrada Familia we headed to Park Guell, another one of Gaudi's masterpieces. Although it is overrun with tourists, the park is beautiful, especially the mosaics. Gaudi's house lies within the park and after his death it was converted into a museum, so we went there too! After walking around the museum and the park for a bit we hopped on one of those double-decker super touristy busses but according to Ms. Trapani that was the best way to see a gigantic city like Barcelona. And she was right, of course. The bus took us all throughout the city and we saw the houses that Gaudi designed along with the Olympic stadium from the 1992 Olympics, the FC Barcelona soccer stadium and many other points of interest in Barcelona. We met up with a friend of Ms. Trapani's and had coffee and tea and then headed back to the hotel to get a full night's rest. This morning I got on the train at 7:30 and was back in Bilbao before 2:00 just in time for lunch! And class. So here it is, the week...boring...Saturday though, Renner and I are going to the Cuban ballet, I love having things to look forward to!

volcanoes and bocadillos

I'm back and sunburnt! And it snowed today. I can't believe just yesterday I was on the beach in a bathing suit that I bought for 9 euros at a Chinese superstore and today there's snow all around me. I can't deny that I'd much rather be in Tenerife than in Bilbao, the trip was an adventure indeed. To keep up with my excellent travel habits (losing my passport, forgetting my most important things at home, etc..) I ripped my boarding pass in half in the airport in Santander on the way to the Canary islands. Oops! But no pasa nada, all was well and they still let me on the plane. Renner and I landed on the islands around midnight and made our way through the airport to the car rental desks to pick up our little baby blue Fiat 500 (his choice). Little did we know that automatic transmitions are very rare on the island, and Europe in general, and our car that we were so excited to rent was not an automatic at all. So what did we do having never driven stick before? We, well Renner, tried. Thank god it was 1 am and no one was in the airport parking lot where we stalled out a few hundred times and if it wasn't for a smelly French neighbor passing by we wouldn't have been able to put the car in reverse. After about two hours of learning to drive after a three hour flight after an hour and a half bus ride after a rushed morning we finally decided to hit the road and make our way to the hotel. Naturally we got lost and had to ask some local police in very poor Spanish where our hotel was, they didn't really know, but we found it, parked the car somehow and checked into our Paloma Beach Apartment fully equiped with a kitchenette, living room and our own patio!

Waking up and realizing you're surrounded by volcanoes and the Atlantic ocean is an exhuberating feeling and after such a long night it felt so surreal to be there. We walked over to the Superdino supermarket and did our grocery shopping: cereal, fruit, soap, paper towels, milk, water, and a baguette to make our bocadillos (sandwiches) with the chorizo, ham and cheese our host families so kindly donated to our budget. The island seems to be very confused: it is ownded by Spain but technically closer to Africa but it is inhabited by mainly English and German tourists, a very strange place indeed. Our hotel was filled with old British people and we were definitely the youngest people within 10 mile radius and definitely the only Americans. After packing up lunch we got back in the little blue car and drove around the island. Getting gas was difficult but the nice man running the place could tell that we clearly had no idea how to do it and he helped us out. We drove to the Teide National Park to make sure we knew where it was before heading there the next day to climb the mountain. We drove up the winding roads through the spacelike scenery and up towards the giant volcano where we stopped and ate our bocadillos. After admiring the astonishing views we drove towards the north of the island and looped around along the eastern coast back to our hotel. After a very American meal of hot dogs, green beans, and croquettas fried in butter we got a few drinks and relaxed. All we wanted to do was swim in the heated pool but unfortunately it closed at six.

Monday morning we accidentaly woke up at 6:30 instead of 7:30 because of the hour time difference but the extra time lent us a relaxing morning before heading back up to Teide. It took about an hour to get to the base of the mountain where we bought our cable car tickets and enjoyed some coffee before making the ascent. The cable car takes you up 9/10 of the 12,000 feet and from the drop off point we could see in the distance the silhouette of Gran Canaria, another canary island. UNESCO is trying to preserve Teide because it is a World Heritage Site and because of this they limit the number of visitors that can make their way to the top. Well Renner and I sort of got the required permits but we didn't really follow up on it to secure them. So instead of showing some man our permits that we didn't have we climbed over to the trail that goes up to the top. The thinner air and the high altitude made it quite difficult to breathe and we almost instantly stopped to eat our bocadillos that we packed. Such a great idea. After refueling we started to climb to the top. The wind picked up and I could feel my hands and face burning, I didn't anticipate the cold weather and wind and was very very unprepared but we made it to the top! The view was spectacular and as a nice British man was taking our picture I thought for a second we were going to get blown right off the top of that mountain from the harsh winds but we caught our balance. I wish we could have stayed up there longer but it was just too cold and windy to bare but at least I snatched a rock from the top! We made our way down the mountain and back to the cable car that took us to the base where we bought some souvenirs. Repeating the same route as the day before, we drove to the north where we stopped at Loro Parque, Tenerife's biggest tourist attraction. Its essentially a zoo and an aquarium in the city of Puerto de la Cruz but as soon as we entered it felt like we stepped into the jungle, it was pretty nice. We spent a few hours walking around and admirning and feeling sorry for the animals and then headed home. Across from our hotel there was a mountain that overlooked the ocean and we climbed up to the top for sunset, making sure not to step on any cactuses to any snake houses. Another amazing view. We quickly climbed down to avoid having to navigate the rocky slopes in the dark and we walked back to our little supermarket to get dinner supplies and play house again. We cooked up dinner had some wine and then made milkshakes with the tiramisu ice cream we got, yum!

Tuesday we woke later than we expected and had to pack up our stuff super fast to check out on time. Well we were late but thats okay because we went to the beach! We drove around for a half hour looking for parking and ended up at the beach closest to our hotel which was annoying but it was so nice and relaxing and it felt so good to be in the sun and not bundled up fighting the cold and rain. Well since my body hasn't seen the sunlight in months, my skin burned and it hurts but the tweety bird islands, as my dad called them, were excellent and I definitely would like to go back someday. We left around 2:30 and got to the airport with enough time for one last bocadillo before getting on our plane. We missed the last bus back to Bilbao and had to take a taxi into the city away from the airport to catch a different bus but somehow we made it and everything worked out!

We got back into Bilbao around midnight and Rosa had a full dinner waiting for us when we arrived. That woman is too sweet. I had a full day of class today but tomorrow is my last day of class for the week! Then on Friday we're off to Pamplona and Rioja!

Don't worry pictures will come soon!

Off to the Canary Islands!

Quick updates! I'm awake and my roommate and Renner are not...he stayed the night in the guest bedroom because the metro doesn't run late on Friday nights and we went out last night (plus I think Rosa likes the male company) but I'm bored and hungry but wanna wait for them to eat and Chris told me that Mom thought I'd update this blog everyday so this one's for you Bon!

It has been snowing in Bilbao the past few days which is crazy, it never snows here! My professor told me she has lived here all her life and has seen snow four times.Unimaginable. The mountains are covered in snow and the city looks super pretty although it isn't sticking to the ground. Hopefully this weather doesn't interfere with my flight today! Oh Renner and I are going to the Canary Islands to escape the cold! So we're off to Tenerife today, the largest of the islands which is home to El Teide, Spain's highest point! Hard to believe with the Pyrenees right here. Its also an innactive volcano and since it is an UNESCO World Heritage Site, there are many efforts to preserve it...this makes climbing it difficult. Renner and I had to apply for permits to access the peak of the mountain/volcano because the national park is trying to limit the amount of visitors. So this makes us really special. We'll be back on Tuesday! Canary Islands > Classes.

More updates to come after this little trip! So excited!

Hasta luego!