After I finished my assignments and packed up my life in
Cork, I set off to travel around Europe for 17 days.
First, I went to Madrid to visit Maddy. Although I was only
there for a short time I really got a feel for the city by wondering around.
Each district has a distinct ambiance, so walking from one to the next was
super interesting; and since it was Christmas time every street was lined in
different lights! Maybe the best part of my visit to Madrid was being introduced
to Spanish cuisine. We went out for tapas and wine followed by churros y
chocolate. The tapas we had are called pinchos and are native to northern
Spain. They are essentially slices of baguette topped with anything from salmon
and caramelized onion to chicken and cheese.
After Madrid, I took an 8 hour bus ride over to Barcelona.
Here I met up with Shai and her sister Tom, our friends Dhiren and Wei from
Cork, and Claire, my roommate from Santa Cruz. It was surreal to have a reunion
with friends from all over the world in Spain. After meeting up at the hostel
we set out to see the city. We happened upon an extremely tall mall with a
rooftop lookout. There was an elevator to the top that cost about 2 euros each
to ride up, but being students traveling through Europe, we went into the mall
and found our way up for free. The view was stunning! I could see the entire
city, which is full of ornate buildings, spacious parks, and interesting
monuments.
After walking around for hours we had to refuel with some
native cuisine. We went to a recommended restaurant to try Paella, a rice based
dish filled with spices, seafood, chicken and cooked with a little bit of wine
(I think). It is cooked and served giant pans, and then dished out
individually. It was tasty, but the meal came with more cultural lessons than
we bargained for. Turns out if you are served bread before your meal in Spain
and do not refuse it you get charged. However, we were each given a free shot
at the end of the meal (who doesn’t enjoy a bit of liquor at 1 in the
afternoon) so it evened out.
The next day we toured the famous cathedral La Sagrada
Familia. Gaudi, an architect known for his eye for detail, designed it along
with several other buildings throughout the city. It was like no building I
have ever seen before. Every last bit of the walls was covered with patterns
and designs, and the intricate stained glass windows were strategically placed
to allow for the entire cathedral to be lit by the sun. In comparison to all of
the several other cathedrals I have seen, it was much more modern. Everything
was white and sparkling and absolutely beautiful. I think I like the medieval
style like the cathedrals in Ireland better, but La Sagrada Familia was definitely
impressive.
From Barcelona I continued onto the small town of Malaga in
the south of Spain with Claire and Shai. We had an early flight and got there
with the full day ahead of us. None of us had any real background knowledge
about Malaga but we saw a cool looking Moorish tower and decided to climb the
hill it was built on. Again, we stumbled upon an astounding view of the entire
city. We could see the beach, the bull fighting stadium, a cathedral,
mountains, and so much more! We reached the very top of the mountain at about
10:30 AM, and there was an extremely sketchy man selling shots for 1 euro 50.
Oh, Spain.
From the mountain, we strolled to the beach. It was sunny
and even hot enough to take off our jackets. We enjoyed bocadillos, mini
sandwiches much like pinchos, at a small café right along the ocean. En route
back to the hostel we came across a Christmas market. There is at least one in
every, so we made a point to explore them all.
The beach was so nice that we went back the next day to just
lounge around. Then we went to a modern art museum that was recommended by
someone at the hostel. It was weird, as much as I try I cannot understand how
some radom things can be classified as art.
After two wonderful days in Malaga we made our way to Cadiz
by carpooling with some locals through a ride share website called BlaBlaCar.
This was a great and cheap way to travel across Spain, and it gave us the
opportunity to meet and talk to local people. The man who drove us to Cadiz was
a 24 year old lawyer who surprisingly had spent a month in Cork. He was very nice
and spoke English pretty well. I was surprised at how many hills we saw along
the road, the landscape was pretty-but at times it looked like what I see while
driving up the 101. The coolest part about the drive was that we got a view of
Africa in the far distance as we were driving along the most southern part of
Spain.
We arrived in Cadiz on Christmas Eve and were greeted with a
potluck party. It was weird to celebrate this family holiday with a group of
strangers, but everyone was friendly and festive and as we ate, drank, and were
merry.
Our one day in Cadiz was Christmas Day so most everything
was closed. Since we could not explore the shops we took a walk along the beach
and out onto what I think was an old castle or fortress of sorts. My windy selfies
in Ireland are NOTHING compared to the ones we took here. It was so windy that
we could barley keep our Santa hats on our heads. The weather made the
experience 10x more fun though, and that windy beach is how I will forever
remember Cadiz.
Next, we made our way to Seville via another ride from
BlaBlaCar. This time however we encountered some small problems. The car would
not start. For the first time in my life, I spent Christmas Day pushing a car
up and down a small ally in Spain trying to get it to start. After several
attempts to fix the battery, and several more tries to start the car while we
were pushing it the guy say down at the wheel and prayed for it to start. This
worked, and we were on our way to Seville.
We arrived at the hostel the night of Christmas Day, so after
exploring for a bit me, Claire, and, Shai had a little snack exchange and card
making party to celebrate with ourselves. The next day we wondered around the
city-it is pretty modern and had a ton of stores along every street-kind of reminiscent
of 3rd street in Santa Monica. There was also an extravagant building
with a huge square and fountain, we could not figure out what it was, but we
got some great pictures of it.
Having covered almost the entire southern coast of Spain, it
was time for us to hop the boarder over to Portugal. Spain was amazing. The
little beach towns were quaint and cute, but also had interesting historical
sites scattered within them. I finally got to utilize my three years of Spanish
and taste more ethnic cuisine.
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