Monday, February 27, 2012

Jerez de la frontera

So this weekend I traveled to Jerez de la frontera.  It is a small city about four and half hours away from Granada.  They are famous for the production of sherry, horse shows, and flamenco.  We happened to go the weekend that their Festival de Jerez began, which means it was a flamenco festival.  The trip went well from day one when we checked into out hostel/hotel.  Thanks to a mix up on their part we got upgraded to an apartment and didn't have to pay any extra.  We spent the next two days exploring the town.  We visited some of the old churches, the Alcazar (or castle), stummbled upon quite a few open air markets, and saw various street performances.  We also had the opportunity to tour a sherry bodega and go to a traditonal flamenco performance.

The flamenco show that we saw was called "El aire que me lleva" and the dancers were Andrés Peña and Pilar Ogalla.  They were amazing!  I have never seen anything like it.  There is so much passion put into the dance, guitar, and singing.  By far it was one of the best experiences I have had in Spain.  Below is a sample of what the dancers can do, but it doesn't even come close to the real thing!



Here are some photos to show you the town the sherry bodega:


This is where we saw the flamenco show!


In the center of the city.  We were completly lost this entire time.  In Jerez streets are not labeled, maps are inaccurate, and the locals don't even know where to send you...quite interesting, but we worked past it!


The center of the city where we saw all of the street preformers.  Some of it was improptu flamenco, but with elements of comedy.  For example, there was a group of men dressed as aztecs throwing fake heads around and singing that we better come back or die!  They were pretty funny and drew a huge crowd.  We also witnessed a group of men dressed as old women doing the same type of thing.


The best park in the city where we hung out for a while before the tour of the bodega.


Our apartment for the weekend.  We had a kitchen/living room, bedroom, and balcony!  Not bad for about $20 a night :)



Oh and we also had roof access from where we stayed!  It was pretty cool a night...I forgot to take pictures of that though.  The weather was in the high 70s so we could hang out outside all day and night.


This is the sherry bodega that we toured.  Tio Pepe is one of the most well know sherry companies in Spain and in many other parts of the world.  Jerez literally means sherry, and the word sherry in english comes from english speakers trying to pronounce the town's name.  We decided to take the tour in Spanish since that it what we are trying to learn...we got the general idea of it, but our tour guide was one fast talker.  He found out afterwards that we weren't from Spain and asked us how we had been able to understand anything because even he knew he was talking fast.  I guess it proves that we are all getting a bit better at Spanish!


The grapes...just not in season right now, but they will be growing by April and May.



So. Many. Barrels. Of. Wine.  The funniest thing is that here they put out a mouse trap, but it isn't a typical one.  They put a tiny ladder up to a glass of sherry.  We actually saw a mouse come out and drink from it!  They do this because when the bodega was first founded Tio Pepe found out that he could make extremely sweet sherries that even the mice liked to drink.


Victoria standing with even bigger barrels of wine!


Our 4 sherry samples.  The dark one and first light one were extremely sweet and are supposed to be had with desserts.  The middle two were dry for meat dishes.  Overall they were pretty delicious!


The open air market with every type of food and handmade good for sale that you could imagine.  Spanish music was playing, tents were set up as cafes and bars, and to top it all off, it was in the courtyard of the Alcazar!


Just one of the tents with all the kinds of things they were selling (ham, cheese, bread, olive oil, etc)


This is the Equestion School in Jerez.  Unfortunately they only do shows on Thursdays in the winter and we go there on Friday.  It was still a beautiful area though and very cool to see.  Normally they have processions and shows in which the horses are trained to dance to music under the direction of their riders.


Monday, February 20, 2012

Caminando en el barrio...y mi barrio consiste de La Alhambra, Sacromonte, y La Alpujarra

So I spent and exciting weekend in Granada (mi barrio, or neighborhood in English).  It is awesome to be able to call it that, because really, some of the most amazing things are all within a 30 minute walk!

So we will start with Thursday, because this is when my weekend begins...no Friday classes.  Let me just tell you how Spain works though...as in how late everything occurs: We started by playing soccer for a bit first from 8 to 9pm then went home for dinner at about 10pm. We got ready really quickly and left to go to an Arab tea house...it was really cool because the atmosphere was amazing.  (It is really cool how Granada consists of three distinct sections and cultures.  There is the Arab neighborhood of course, the typical Spanish neighborhoods, and then they gypsy neighborhoods.) Then at 12:30am we decided to go to the club because girls got in free and got free drinks until 1:30am. But guess what...it was still early to be at the club!  Anyway we got our free drinks and were dancing and such, but the club did fill up until about 2am! (Now we had to get up in the morning, so we left "early" at 3/3:30am) The taxi driver was like "what are you doing going back home already!"  It was so much fun though because this club is called Camborio and it has two different rooms of music. One is just all the normal stuff, like pop, etc, but the other is salsa! Not only that, but the inside looks like you are in a cave and they have both smoke and foam machines! Furthermore, they have two or three outside terraces with a perfect view of the Alhambra (one room is completely glass so you can see it from inside the club too). But it was absolutely stunning! I can´t wait to go back when there is warmer weather so we can just hang out outside the entire night!

Friday we went to the El Barrio concert right next to my apartment at the Palacio de Deportes.  It was Flamenco/Pop concert.  It was amazing to experience a different type of music and the culture that went with it.  The entire place went wild for El Barrio (he is kind of a legend in Granada/Andalucía because of his flamenco roots, etc)  Here is one of his songs: this one is called Andalucía.  He actually sang it at the concert, as he should have considering he was in Andalucía.


On Saturday was when I actually took a walk in the neighborhood.  Victoria and I spent the entire day in the city.  We first went to the Alhambra (we actually hadn't been yet)  Then went to the gypsy neighborhood of Sacromonte with Rachel and Allie.  We couldn't actually go into the Alhambra because you need tickets for specific times, but you can walk around the outside gardens and walls.  It is a great place to just sit, relax, take in the sun and view, as well as just reflect.  It was by far the most beautiful day we have had in Granada.  When we went to Sacromonte, we toured some of the gypsy caves.  Very cool that people actually lived there/still do in some cases.  I am thoroughly impressed that they were able to hollow out the caves to live in them in the first place!  Here are a few photos:



The entrance to the Alhambra (the outside section at least) You just need to watch out for the gypsy women everywhere trying to read your palm.


View of Granada from the Alhambra (you are looking at el barrio Albaicín mostly)


This is the inner garden of the Alhambra, we can't get in there without a ticket.  It really is an impressive fortification. No wonder the Arabs held of the Christians for so long and Granada was the last standing Arab city in Spain!


The gypsy caves of Sacromonte!


Inside a typical cooking cave! SOOOOO COOOOL!

Alright so we are now finally ready to talk about Sunday!  On Sunday our whole group went on an excursion to La Alpujarra.  It is a series of towns in the Sierra Nevada.  They are the highest towns in all of the European Union and very beautiful.  We toured 3 of the towns, ate a lunch traditional to the area, and had free time to hike (this time on the other side of the Sierra Nevada, if we had continued our hike we could have walked all the way back to Granada)  Once again, here is photo evidence because let's be honest...you all love the photos more than written pages!  Anyway visuals just make it interesting, and I hope more realistic for all of you!


Coolest water fountain ever. Period. They pride themselves on their mountain water here.  It is supposed to have healing qualities, especially for the old folks (I will try to bring some home for you mom an dad)


The first white blobs are the pueblos we went to!  In the middle of nowhere, but so beautiful!


Lunch with the whole group...we had soup, ham, sausage, eggs, potatoes, bread, and peppers.  All typical foods of the Alpujarra.


A beautiful view from everywhere!


Group shot!


Oh you know... just hiking in the Sierra Nevada


Yup. There were donkeys and horses wandering around on the paths.  They got water fountains too!


Overall, a great weekend in the neighborhood :)





Sunday, February 19, 2012

Ronda

So last weekend Victoria, Casey, Shannon, and I took a trip to Ronda. It is a small town about two and a half hours away from Granada by train. The trip was well worth it becasue Ronda was the most beautiful place I have ever been in the world. It is one of the many towns in Andalucia defined as "pueblos blancos". This is because all of the building are white. Not only that, but the town was built into an on top of a cliff/gorge. We spent the entire weekend hiking in and out of the gorge and admiring the view from the tops of the cliffs. It was a relaxing, but incredibly fun weekend! It is a place that I wish I could have shared with you so that you could understand what I was experiencing because photos and descriptions just cannot describe it. I will upload some pics to try and give you an idea of what it was like, but I truly believe that is impossible. (More description of our trip to follow via pictures)

Not only did we enjoy the town while we were there, but we met some cool people too! Especially Paul who was running the hostel where we stayed. He cooked paella for us one night and gave us salsa lessons! He is from Holland and speaks five languages at the age of 19... pretty impressive if you ask me. I'm pretty sure he enjoyed our company and playing games with us. He even wants to come visit us in Granada. And get this...he posted about us in his blog! (in Dutch)

Anyway, here is a narrative of what we did through photos...

We went on a hike down under the bridge and walked through old abandoned building and ruins.


This is Victoria and I on our terrace at the hostel where we stayed.  Amazing view of la puente nueva.


Here is the view from our hostel at night!


And during the day you could see all the way down into the gorge.


This is looking down from our favorite place to gram a coffe/snack cliffside!!!


This is our hostel from the bridge!  We were right on the cliff


On our hike down under the bridge...I could have stayed there forever :)



Salsa dancing in the hostel with Paul after a dinner of paella that he cooked us!


Just hanging out in the Arab Baths! These ones were ruined, but we are going to go to the fuctioning ones in Granada very soon.


We climbed up and walked around the old wall that used to surround and fortify the city! Great views from every angle!  It kind of felt like living in a castle
 

Lunch break outside in the sun! We got to drink fruta con leche (best juice boxes ever)

 

Going down into the Arab mines which lead to the bottom of the gorge.



Here we are at the bottom on the gorge.  It was so beautiful, almost like a different world.  On the right you can see two windows.  That is where we walked down inside of the cliff.  It was orignially built by the Arabs for slaves to bring water up.  Not only that, but there are also rooms built into the cliff.  One was for soldiers, one was called the room of secrect (because of the way sounds echo off the walls), and one was for treasure.


Plaza de Toros!  One of the oldest bullfighting rings in Spain! (of course Victoria and Shannon had to pretend to be bulls!)  Bullfights here started as training for knights under the reign of Kind Philip II as a way for them to prove their courage and become caballeros (gentleman)


Overall, we had an amazing weekend and I will absolutely be going back to Ronda sometime in the future!

Monday, February 13, 2012

Photos from Madrid y Castilla


This is the coolest door ever in Toledo! You can see each layer of civilization: bottom roman, middle Arab, top Christan from the Reconquista


Here is one of the cathedrals we toured. This one is in Toledo.


Here is Victoria, Casey, Shannon, and I waiting for the long lost bus to come find us again!


So we just sat here and ate our entire box of marzipan in about 10 minutes... it was a great view of Toledo though!


Royal military procession in Madrid in front of the place.  When I asked why it was happening I was told because the Spanish love to show off their pride in their country.  So it was a "just because we can" procession.


So we couldn't go into the bullfighting ring, but at least we got a chance to act out the statues outside...


First ice cream in Spain!  Avellana (Hazelnut) gelato YUM


Parque del Retiro! (Madrid)


Parque del Retiro!


Parque del Retiro!


The castle we toured in Segovia.


Me with cochinillo...the famous dish of Segovia.  Yikes!


Adventuring in Salamanca...we are on the Roman bridge.


Now we are below the Roman bridge.


The look out tower we discovered in Salamanca!  I liked the ruins behind me because I love old things, but the view was actually amazing from the other sides!


This is my hotel room...clearly everyone on our trip liked hanging out with us ;) there may be a few too many people here, but hey at least Victoria, Brenna, and I didn't have to go anywhere!  They all came to us!