Monkeys, Rain, and too many Cathedrals

Why hello there! It has been quite a while! Classes are going well but it's becoming hard to want to do homework since we don't really get what I'd consider homework. I can tell that my Spanish is improving though, which is great. I watched Spanish TV for the first time this weekend and I understood a lot of what I was watching! Yaye for me.

Anyway, the past few weeks have really flown by. I've had two weeks of classes since my trip to Paris and I don't even know where they went. We walked up to the Albayzin the Sunday after Paris and I noticed that some of the trees are starting to bud. Apparently it's unseasonably warm here in Granada and some places saw blooms in January.

A door on the way up to the Albayzin

This weekend was really fun. On Friday AIFS left Granada to go to Gibraltar, Sevilla, and Cordoba. Our first stop was Gibraltar. It's on the southern tip of Spain and on a clear day the African coast is visible from it. Gibraltar is actually part of the United Kingdom so they had their own form of the pound and the people spoke both Spanish and English. It was quite interesting actually because we found Reese's Peanut butter cups (they don't exist anywhere else in Spain) and they even had Yorkie bars - delicious chocolate bars from England. I bought a Cadbury egg - something that I thought I was going to have to miss this year and was very excited to find them in Gibraltar.

Anyway, like I said, on a clear day you can see Africa. However, this was no clear day. Within 5 minutes of getting off the bus and going through customs, were were all pretty much one big mess. We had to walk across an air strip with the rain coming down and the wind pushing us all over. It was a little fun, but I really didn't plan on getting soaked. Neither were our umbrellas since they failed to work and we ended up having to put them away because of the wind.

Walking across the airstrip toward the rock

After our lunch we hopped aboard mini buses to go up to the top of the rock. First we stopped at a spot that would be so beautiful in sunny weather. There's a light house and when you look out at the ocean you can normally see the Mediterranean, the Atlantic, the coast of Spain, and the coast of Africa. However, all I saw was water and rain clouds.

I don't know how we didn't blow away!

Next we stopped at some really cool caves and were greeted by monkeys jumping on the mirrors of our buses. Apparently there are 300 monkeys living on the rock and somehow they got there from Africa.

Hanging out with the Monkey

We headed back to the bus to go to Sevilla. Our hotels were interesting. They had a kitchen to make food but not enough utensils, and no soap to wash the utensils. I'm not even sure if they were clean when we got there. But we got to go to a grocery store right across the street to get our dinners. Believe it or not, I had a grilled peanut-butter-banana sandwich and it was amazing. You should try it sometime. Very delicious. The next morning we saw a big dead bug outside the door of our neighbor which worried me a little. But other than that there weren't any problems

On Saturday we went on a tour of Sevilla. Once again, more rain. But we were lucky in that it didn't start until after our tour finished. I absolutely love Sevilla. It is probably my most favorite city so far on this trip. I had really wanted to study there instead of Granada, however I realized when I was there that it probably would have been too big for me. I just like how there's so much history in the city. With all of the rain we weren't able to explore as much as I would have liked to. A few of us had lunch at this nice restaurant. I ordered paella but it was nothing like homemade paella. During the afternoon I went on a run with two girls and we got soaked! AHHH. That night everyone stayed in .... oh rain rain rain...

The Cathedral in Sevilla

Sunday we packed up our stuff and headed to Cordoba. But oh wait! We weren't allowed to leave Sevilla because THERE WAS A MARATHON HAPPENING! The city had closed off exits. Oh if I had known about it I would have done Sevilla instead of Rome and all of AIFS could have watched me. We got out of the bus for about 45 minutes to cheer on the runners and it was so cool. Most people seemed to be having fun as they cheered and so many of the runners loved having us there. They were smiling, high-fiving, and even clapping at US as we were cheering and clapping for them (I didn't see too many spectators where we were at the 19km mark). It made me really excited to run Rome!

Runners in the marathon - they were happy to have us there cheering them on

We got to Cordoba and it was SUNNY!!! We had lunch and went on a tour of a mosque with a cathedral inside of it. I forgot to mention that in Sevilla we went on a tour of a cathedral. They're nice, but I have no idea how many of them I've seen on this trip. I'm ready for something different. We had two hours after the tour to explore the city. It was such a cute little city. We each got a delicious ice cream cone that hit the spot! MMmm.

We headed home to Granada at 5 and made it here by 8. Once again, it felt great to be back in a city that I know. Every day that goes by now I realize that Granada feels more like home to me. I'm no longer counting down the days till I return home, they're now the days I have left to enjoy Granada.

I just got back from a run that was absolutely amazing. I went on the same route that we went for the hike and even though I was running up a mountain for the first 35 minutes, it was a really great run! I was the only person going up the hill the entire time and it was just so peaceful and really amazing to be able to stand there on the mountain and look over all of the land. I felt so little up there but it was such a cool feeling to know that I ran up there. I think I'll do that run more often because even though I was gone for over an hour, it didn't feel like it at all. I wasn't ready to come back down.

And before I go, I have to mention how it's like 68 degrees here but if I hadn't checked out the temperature I probably would have walked outside with my winter jacket on. I'm so used to seeing everyone here bundled up for winter weather. If I were in VT and it was 68 I'd probably have capris on and just a light sweater if anything. How strange!

Anyway, I must go shower now. Hasta luego!!