"The wheels on the bus go 'round and 'round..."

...and around...and around...and around.

This weekend I went to Santiago de Compostela. It is far away. I spent 38 hours on a bus. Worth it? Absolutely.

Santiago de Compostela is a small city in Galicia, the northwestern region of Spain. Everything about Galicia and Santiago is different from Granada - the language (they speak Gallego, not Castilian Spanish), the landscape (rolling green hills, misty rivers everywhere), the architecture (moss-covered stone with red tile roofs), and even the way the people look. Santiago is the endpoint (Compostela) of one of the most famous pigramages in Europe - the Camino de Santiago, or Way of St. James. The remains of St. James were supposedly brought here to Santiago in the early years of Christian history, and are thought to be hidden somehwere in the Cathedral still today. Pilgrams still walk the camino every day, but today it is much less of a religious act, and more of a cultural act or a time of introspection. A fewpeople (inluding my best friend Lonely Planet) told me that this was the most beautiful city in Spain, and I had a free weekend, so Megan and I set off on our epic journey...

We caught the first of many busses for the weekend Thursday night to the bus station, rode the 5 hours to Madrid, changed buses, and arrived at Santiago around 9 am Friday morning, only to take yet another bus to our hostel. The receptionist promplty greeted us with the lovely phrase, "We have a problem". Not something you ever want to hear, especially not coming from your assumed means of shelter in a cold, rainy city, but it is surprising how things like the thought of not having somewhere to sleep don't really phase me anymore. Turns out, they overbooked and we had lost our room for the first night. Normally this would mean we were just out of luck, but this hostel was really nice and had booked us a room in a real live hotel for the same price! So we went to the hotel, checked in, unloaded, and set out on a mission.

There were two things we really wanted to do on this trip: rent bikes to ride on the Camino de Santiago and go trout fishing, both of which we had seen on the Santiago website. So first thing, we headed to the tourism office to inquire about our adventures. Sadly, they had no idea what we were talking about. But they could give us a map, they said. Thanks? Both leads ended up coming up empty, which was sad, but equipped with our new map, we headed out to see the sights. We started at the Cathedral, which is really the only real sight, and stared at the pilgrams as they stared at what they had been walking towards for months. I feel no matter what it was that I was walking towards, it would be a huge let-down whenever I finally got there, but that's just me. Then we grabbed some lunch and wandered around the city some more, following the marked tour on our map. The city was absolutely beautiful. It looked more like an old Irish or Scotish city, or at least what I would imagine one would look like. I'll let you know for sure in a few weeks. That night we had a fabulous dinner of kebabs (they're invading the world, and I'm a ok with it.) and later completely our romantic evening with a delicious desert of Tarta de Santiago in our hotel room, complete with Sufjan Steven's Christmas album playing in the background.

Saturday morning, we got up, checked out of the hotel, checked in to the hostel, and finished our tour of Santiago (which, I must agree, has got to be the most beautiful city in Spain. Take a gander at the photos and see for yourself...). The city felt really homey, and it really made me want to curl up in one of those houses in front of a fireplace with a big mug of real coffee and American football (specifically Alabama football) on the TV. Soon, soon. Around 12, we headed back to the bus station to take a bus to the coast. Even though we couldn't go fishing, we wanted to see the coast, and the tourist lady said it was only 30 minutes away, so off we went. There were 2 towns we were going to visit - Muros, the larger and more developed of the two (supposedly), and Noia, which was a little closer. We drove on back roads, passing through a bunch of tiny little towns in the middle of nowhere Spain on the way to the coast, which was absolutely amazing - even better than renting bikes! After about an hour, we finally reached the Noia bus station, but decided to go on to Muros and stop in Noia on the way back. Expecting another 15 minutes max, we waited to arrive at the Muros bus station. After another hour or so, and a landscape (and a bus) that increasingly lacked population, we became suspicious that we had missed our stop in Muros somehow. But the bus was supposed to be ending in Muros, so we decided to wait a little longer before deciding how the heck we were going to get back. It was not long until we saw the sign (Muros - 17 km in the direction you are not going) that confirmed the fact that we were in fact lost (once again) on public transportation. Just when I think I've got it figured out, my friend PT loves to make sure I know I will never master it. So we played the stupid card (not difficult) and asked the bus driver in our sweetest, most innocent voices, "Excuse me, sir, how long until we get to Muros?". He was not pleased to tell us that Muros was 30 minutes ago, but he reluctanlty called his bus driver friend who was going in the other direction, and he stopped and drove us back to town. Turns out, we didn't stop at the bus station in Muros (why? don't know.), but if we had, we wouldn't have known because it's basically a pier with a bus or two parked on it. We walked around Muros for about 15 minutes, saw a really cool rainbow, lots of pretty boats, and then got nervous about getting back to Santiago, so we got back on the bus and watched the tide go out as we drove along the coast.

That night, because our hostel had a kitchen, and neither Megan nor I had prepared our own food in months, we decided to cook dinner. We went grocery shopping, saw some protest about something regarding the Polish press, and returned to make some made delicious pasta and natilla, our favorite Spanish desert. Once again, we had a nice, romantic night (Ellen, you've got quite an evening to top, here.), and headed to bed early. The next morning we packed up and headed back to the bus station (the part of Santiago we saw most), and hopped on the bus back to Madrid.

Riding to Madrid, though long, was amazing, and absolutly worth the whole trip. We watched while the landscape changed from green, misty hills dotted with lonely cottages and the occasional stone church, to big green mountains, carved by rivers and smattered with tiny villages and farmland, to drier, craggier hills filled with vineyards, rolling into sprawling plains, completely flat, filled with wheat and the occasional a lonely cowboy or shepherd with his flock of sheep, to huge, industrialized farms, stopping in 10 or 12 tiny towns along the way, and just after the sun set over the plains, all of that changed into the sprawling metropolis that is Madrid. I know that sounds like it's from a story book, but I kid you not - it was real. We also saw a very large bull-shaped billboard, a strange rock carving, and a few random castles. They also played the safety video after every time we stopped.


I am back in Granada for 2 days, with more papers to write than will physically fit in that time, and then I leave again Wednesday morning for thanksgiving in England! I'll be with staying with Ellen in Cambridge, cooking the best Thanksgiving feast you can imagine, then we'll be heading to London for touring and Thanksgiving feast #2, and of course the Ironbowl. Nothing will ever beat hayrides and bonfires at the lake, but this Thanksgiving may come pretty close.

I hope you all have a great time with family, enjoying American things like the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, turkey, stores that give you change, and football. I will be back in no time!



Ok, this doesn't do any justice to what we saw, but it's all I've got...

Another week gone by...

Yet another week gone by, and when I decided it was time to start listening to Christmas carols on repeat (they don't celebrate Thanksgiving, so there's no one telling me it's not time to start yet...), I realized how quickly this semester has flown by!! I can't believe I only have a little over a month left here!

Last week I played catch up on sleep and work and friends after having my parents here. I may or may not have slept for 17 hours over a 24 hour period between Wednesday and Thursday.... I got a lot of research done in (one of) the (many) University of Granada libraries for some of my papers. Researching in libraries is difficult anyway, but trying to do research in a Spanish library is nearly impossible. Especially when the books about the same topic are scattered throughout libraries all across the city. Why do the Spaniards have to make things so difficult? I've settled for using Wake library's database for English sources, and then translating the information into Spanish (which adds a step to the process, but saves money on bus tickets).

Saturday morning, the best part of my week arrived at the train station around 8:45... Sally came to visit!!!!! It was so fabulous to have her here!! We found her hostel (which was possibly the best hostel I've ever seen - if you're ever in Granada, stay at Hostal Oaisis!), dropped off her things, and went to wander around! We got some coffee at the IES favorite, Pilar, walked around the Cathedral/Alcaecería/tea and spice market area for a bit, as well as the free areas of the Alhambra and the Manuel de Falla park (home to a peck of "wild" peacocks!), and then we decided to rent bikes! We actually thought we were renting a scooter, and were slightly disappointed at first that it was only a motorized bike, but quickly learned that we would have died had they actually been scooters. What is a motorized bike, you ask? Well, I still don't really know, but I know it was battery-powered, and when you pedal it gives you an extra little boost, so you really don't have to exert any physical energy... it's great! We rode all around the city, only narrowly escaping being killed by cars and running into pedestrians, buildings, and/or other stationary objects. After becoming sufficiently afraid of the main roads, and when the sidewalks became too crowded for slightly out-of-practice bikers, we rode along the river out of the city a bit. It was beautiful, and so nice to be out of the city! I was surprised to find out that the algea- and trash-filled stagnant mess that Granada calls a "river" actually comes froma lush, clean, flowing brook! We took in the beautiful views of the Sierras, filled our lungs with clean-ish, smoke free-ish air, and enjoyed the beautiful day and beautiful company. We also passed some weird things, like what looked like the partial remains of a circus and a small girl pooping in a park along with her parents looking on approvingly.... Later Saturday afternoon, Sally and I watched the sunset from San Nicolas/the Mosque overlook and headed back down to the center for some tapas, and of course a visit to Mauricio for some churros!! Sunday morning we grabbed some breakfast, and then I sent her on her way after a sad goodbye! The weekend was rejuvinating - full of good times, good weather and good conversation.

Funny side note: Today, I was sitting on a bench reading, and this cat that looked like a much younger, much less fat, and much less crazy Sox, came up and started walking in between my legs like cats do. It seemed clean, so I didn't kick it. Then it jumped up on the bench and kept trying to crawl in my lap just like Sox does. I kept pushing it off but it kept coming back. Finally it settled for sitting on my bag right next to me and staring at me. It was just like I was sitting on the couch at home trying every possible way to keep Sox from crawling into my lap, except this cat was not staring and hissing at things that do not exist. Lots of little kids walked by and commented on how cute my cat was... it was not my cat.

This week, again, will be full of paper-writing, or at least feeling like I should be paper-writing. It seems that when people told me you don't have to do any work abroad, they were misleading me. It's a good thing I'm a quite practiced, nearly professional slacker. Most of my friends are going to be in either Paris or Barcelona this weekend (and since I have already been to those places, I did not feel like I needed to accompany them... although I'm sure they would have appreciated my expert guiding skillz), so hopefully I'll get most of this paper junk out of the way! My last weekends here are chock-full of traveling, which I am SO EXCITED about! I am hopefully going to Santiago de Compostela in Galicia not this weekend but the next, then Cambridge/London for a long weekend over Thanksgiving, and then Ireland to visit Molly right before we start exams... so get ready for some amazing adventure stories!! Love you all, and can't wait to see you sort of soon!!!

"Yep, the Griswolds (I mean Elliotts) are Back."

"For over two thousand years, Europe has survived many great disasters. Now for the real test. The Elliotts are coming from America!"

Yep, you guessed it! Shirley and George ventured across the big pond to the foreign lands of exact-change-loving, tight-pants-wearing , nasty-pigeon-feading crazy Europeans! It was quite a weekend, filled with some hilarious Griswold-esque moments, and a lot of quality family time!

The weekend began Thursday when, after a longer-than-planned bus trip to Málaga, I arrived at the airport about 2 hours after my parents should have landed. However, they were still not answering their phones, and they were nowhere to be found. Of course, I immediately thought they were dead, and the Air France people just looked at me like I was an idiot when I asked them where my parents were. Finally, I sneakily walked past the security guards into the baggage claim area, and there they were! Sadly, my parent's first view of Spain was checked bag-less at a dark, rainy, lonely train platform. But eventually we made it to the train station, onto our not-quite-as-romantic-as-the-promotional-video overnight train, and into our impossibly small sleeping car (along with our little brother Extrabed Elliott). Talk about some family bonding time. We spent some time in the "bar car", Daddy's fave, and hit the sack. Obvi I called the top bunk.

We woke up not-so-bright and early when we arrived in Valencia at about 5 am! Again, all my parents have seen of Spain so far is dark and rainy. We wandered around the main square of Valencia a little bit before finally finding somewhere to stop for a bit of breakfast and caffeine. After consulting Rick (Steves - our new best friend.), we discovered that there was in fact one place in all of Valencia open before 10am, so we headed for the Central Market. Valencia's market is one of the largest in all of Europe, and it was so cool seeing all of the chefs coming in early to get their produce and meat for the day. After exploring every aisle (Daddy made sure we went in order, from top to bottom, so we didn't miss one), we bought a delicious baguette, fresh cheese and olive oil, Valenciano oranges, and some dried fruit and nuts for breakfast and snacks. The meal was quite delicious, until this one pigeon that was hanging around us decided to call all his pigeon friends from within a quarter-mile radius to come attack our food. After that, the delicious food seemed to lose it's appeal. That morning was all kind of a blur... we saw some old famous things and walked around a bunch. We went to the art museum and Cathedral. We saw the withered arm of St. Vincent (cool? creepy? you decide.) and the Holy Grail (or at least what is recognized by the Vatican as the Holy Grail. It looked a little too Gothic to me...). We had paella at the port at the same restaurant as some famous person and got lost on the way back. We were tired and our feet hurt. So we went back to the train station and waited for our train to Barcelona.

Barcelona was, yet again, dark and rainy, but after finding our hotel located right in the middle of everything on Las Ramblas, it was a much happier dark and rainy. We immediately went to sit out at a café and do some people watching. To give you a little idea, Las Ramblas in kind of like a less-sketchy Bourbon Street... it was Halloween, and people are extra weird on Halloween. It was possibly the best people watching you could ever imagine. I could have sat there for days and not gotten bored. We finally crawled into bed around 1 or 1:30, after what could have been the longest day of my life (or at least of my parents' lives...)!!

After getting some much-needed rest, we spent Saturday doing the tourist thing. We went to Plaza Catalunya, Gaudi's la Sagrada Familia (still unfinished - "My Client is in no hurry", he said.), did a little shopping to tide us over until the luggage came (Daddy sat outside), walked up and down Las Ramblas, went to the port, etc. etc. That night we went to a nice dinner and did some more people watching. Sunday morning, we explored some cool, less touristy parts of town on the way to the Cathedral and the Picasso Museum (maybe my favorite museum so far?), headed back to the hotel and started the long trek to the airport and back to Granada.

We arrived in Granada about 9:00 pm Sunday night and grabbed some dinner before Mama and Daddy headed back to the hotel and I headed home to fnally get some clean clothes and a good shower! They toured the Alhambra Monday morning while I was in class, which they loved. Sadly, Daddy's camera met it's match with some 10,ooo-year-old stones. We met up after my classes, and I introduced them to the wonders of Doner Kebab (Moroccan fast food). We wandered around Granada and saw the sights, then headed back to my apartment for coffee and delicious cake with my madre, Sole. She was really giddie and was talking really fast, which made it difficult to translate, but it was fun nonetheless. I really lucked out and have a great host mother. Then we toured the Albaycin a bit, watched the sunset from Mirador de San Nicolas, then headed back down to meet a bunch of my friends (some of whom also had family in town) for tapas.

The next morning after breakfast, I put them in a cab, told the driver where to take them, and they were on their way! It was really fun having them here and letting them see what my life has been like for the past 3 months. And for the most part, they behaved.

Things are pretty much back to normal here. Besides that fact that Granada has turned into an icebox. I am already wearing long underwear, mittens, and a pea coat every day to class. What am I going to do in December?? This week I will be trying to figure out how to do research in a Spanish library, and then Saturday morning Sally comes to visit!!! I am so so so excited to see her... it should be a great few days!! Hope all of you are doing well!

PS-Meme, clearly the note to "Mr. Customs Officer" worked, because the cookies made it through, and have been thoroughly enjoyed!!!