Sierra de Cazorla

Without a whole lot going on in the month of March and me becoming more and more aware of the financial restraints that I may have during my travels this summer and upon returning home in July, it was a wonderfully cheap way to spend a day in the mountains here in Jaen. The area that I am referring to is the Sierra de Cazorla, a mountain range very near Baeza and a national park of Spain.

We set out around 11:00 on a Sunday morning headed for our destination. In our group were Ellen, Caroline, Justi, Mary Beth (from Úbeda), Miguel Angel, Jose, Lola (Justi and Miguel Angel’s dog), and myself. The drive took us about an hour and a half and would have taken much less if it weren’t for our getting a little lost at one point and Lola throwing up in the backseat almost ten times. Not an exaggeration. It was her first car trip and we were constantly turning on those mountain roads. She didn’t handle it well. Luckily though, as we found ourselves a little bit lost, we ended up at the Parador de Cazorla, a very fancy mountain hotel and restaurant. After taking a couple of pictures and stopping for coffee, we were back on our way.

When we arrived at our spot for most of the afternoon, we unpacked our things and set up at a picnic table near the grills. The area was a big open picnic spot with the origin of the Guadalquivir River off to the side. Children played soccer while various friends and families enjoyed the day. There was also a steady flow of nearby residents coming to fill their water jugs with the water straight from the mountain. After spending some time relaxing by the water, we got our food out and began preparing our barbecue. We had salmon, pork, beef, and many other snacks and drinks to enjoy the afternoon. For the most part, us men cooked while the girls prepared the picnic area and relaxed. When the food was finally done, we enjoyed a wonderful meal and then a short rest and siesta in the grass nearby.

To finish up our time here, we embarked on a hike up the mountain to a lookout point called La Garganta del Diablo (The Throat of the Devil). It was not too long of a hike and when we arrived, we were rewarded with an incredible view of the valley below and the mountains beyond. We decided to sit for awhile and enjoy the sights and the sun as it began to set. Finally, we returned to our cars for the return trip home. After stopping for a drink in the town of Cazorla nearby, we completed our day’s journey at around 9:00 that night. The end to a wonderful day in the mountains.

Belgium/Amsterdam

My latest adventure took me to the exciting and never before (at least for me) visited lands of Belgium and The Netherlands. However this time, I was headed there as a part of the largest group we’ve had yet this year. Six of us, Julie, Ellen, Lucia, Justi, Caroline, and I, traveled from Baeza for a long weekend at the end of February. Once again, I have plenty to tell.

On Thursday, February 26, we all hopped on an afternoon bus to Madrid. Again I was destined to spend some sleepless nights in airports and train stations. Our flight was at 6:30 am the next morning and since there are no Metros running yet at the time we would need to get to the airport, we chose to sleep in the airport. If you can avoid it, I don’t recommend it, but I suppose we saved a bit of money. After arriving in Madrid, we took the Metro to La Latina and met one of Lucia’s friends for dinner at a nice little pizzeria there. A very nice part of Madrid that I would recommend to anyone. After finishing dinner, we got back on the Metro and made our way to Barajas (the name of Madrid’s airport) for a long night ahead of us. After picking out a nice little corner and settling down onto the cold hard floor we tried to get some sleep. I do not sleep well in airports, train stations, on planes, on buses, on trains, and especially on cold hard airport floors. I believe I managed a couple hours of sleep, which I was happy with.

After our 5:00 am wake up call, we checked in, went through security, and boarded our flight to Brussels. Many hours later, after a bus ride and a couple train rides, we arrived in Amsterdam, exhausted but ready to do some exploring. After finding the place where you can leave your luggage, we set out. Unfortunately for us, the day was a bit of a gloomy one with rain on and off. That doesn’t mean that we didn’t see our fair share of interesting things though. The architecture there is so different from the US and from Spain. That was interesting enough for me! After walking the streets for awhile, we headed towards the Anne Frank House. It was a very interesting and moving experience that I recommend. They have done a great job of keeping the house intact and at the same time, converting it to a museum. Although pictures were not allowed, I have some memorable and sad images from there. Following our stop here, we then headed to the Van Gogh Museum, only to find on arrival that admission was 15 euros. I was still willing to go in, but was the only one and so to my disappointment we did not go into the museum. I really would have liked to see that one and I’m sure some of you might be disappointed in me, but I’m sure I have already seen and will see many more great museums this year. I was very surprised to learn that the price was so high, especially when I paid zero euros to enter the Prado in Madrid and only six euros for the Vatican Museums, maybe the greatest collection of art in the world.

Following our brief stop here, we made our way to a bar to stop and have a drink. Unfortunately due to the time we arrived in Amsterdam, we really didn’t have much time to see much else. However, after a few drinks we did make our way over to the famous Red Light District. Quite an experience. I would not recommend this place at night to anyone traveling alone or who doesn’t really know what to expect. I’ll let your imagination run wild a little bit here but I will say that the multitude of girls in windows is definitely present and I was asked very secretly a couple of times as we passed by street corners if I would like to buy drugs. You can be proud to know that I hurriedly passed right on by!

Our plan for Amsterdam was to stay up all night there and take the first train back to Ellen’s parents house in the morning. This was a good idea at the time but after a night in the Madrid airport we were all very tired. After stopping into a few different bars, cafes, and McDonalds, we headed back to the train station and waited for our train to arrive. On this particular trip, I was able to sleep quite easily. Amazing what little to no sleep in 48 hours will do to you! After a transfer in Brussels, we arrived at Ellen’s town exhausted and ready for some sleep. Ellen’s parents and brother picked us up, took us back to their house, fed us, and then showed us to our rooms where we slept for the rest of the afternoon. To be honest, I probably could have slept straight through the night. However, we all got up around 7:00 p.m. and enjoyed a nice dinner before showering and getting back on the train to Ghent. This might have been my favorite stop and I wish we had been able to see it during the day. Its a beautiful city with a large university population, beautiful churches, a castle, and spectacular waterways. This is where Ellen went to university so we met a couple of her good friends who showed us around a bit and then took us out for the night. We had a great time at a bar that played some great music and met many young Dutch students who spoke english very well. A few hours later, we left our spot and hopped back in the cars with Ellen’s dad and brother. Although it was another late night, it was really nice to start to ease back into a normal sleep schedule.

After waking up Sunday, we enjoyed some more great Belgian food of which I cannot say enough about. I had so many good chocolates, beers, cheeses, and french fries during this weekend. I can still taste the fries! Following our meal, Ellen’s dad offered to give us all a quick ride on the back of his BMW motorcycle. It was pretty fun speeding through the streets.

We then got back in the cars and Ellen’s parents and brother yet again took us to another site. This one, Bruges, or as they say in Belgium and maybe Europe, the Venice of the north. Its a beautiful city with countless canals like Venice and is also right on the sea. After arriving, we walked around for a bit, and eventually made our way to the main plaza. A beautiful square with classic Dutch architecture. The front facades all meeting to a high point and beautiful brickwork. Following our stop here, we headed towards the Half Moon Brewery, the only operating brewery in the city today. We payed the small fee for a 45 minute tour in english and waited for our time. The tour was actually really nice and filled with lots of interesting information. We saw how they make their beer and more importantly how it was done hundreds of years ago as well. Our tour guide was an older lady who spoke very good english and was pretty funny. One of the interesting bits of information that she gave us was her explanation about why foam or head on a beer is so important. Apparently it is very poor to receive a beer without any head in Belgium. Her reasoning was that when you first receive your beer and their is foam on the top, you have to wait to drink it. During this time, you develop a relationship with your beer. You want it. You yearn for it. The foam is very important for this reason.

After the tour was over, we enjoyed a complimentary beer in the tavern. I cannot say that I felt all of these overwhelming feelings that she was speaking about, but maybe if I was a typical belgian man and drank plenty each day, I would feel differently.

Following our complimentary beer, we stopped off for a nice little canal ride through the town. I really liked this especially because the tour guide offered lots of interesting information about the history and the architecture of the city. He not only spoke English, but also Dutch, German, French, and Spanish. We were really surprised at the last one as we were floating down the river and he yelled out to a group of spanish women who had obviously taken a tour with him earlier that day. I would not be surprised if there were a couple other languages that he spoke as well.

After the conclusion of our canal boat ride, we found ourselves back in the main plaza where we stopped at a little café for a drink and a belgian waffle. It was not terribly warm that day, so I enjoyed a mulled wine with my special belgian treat. Following our stop here, we walked around a bit more (I stopped for some fries!) and finally headed back to our pick-up point where Ellen’s dad was waiting for us. When we returned home that night, we enjoyed a nice dinner with Ellen’s family before relaxing for a bit and then heading to bed to prepare for our final full day in Belgium.

Our last adventure for the trip took us to Brussels. Unfortunately Ellen had some family business to attend to, so we separated from her and made our journey to Brussels alone and with nothing more than a map. About an hour and a half later, we arrived and stopped at another little café where we enjoyed a coffee or other drink before setting out. The first stop on our itinerary was the Cathedral of St. Michael, a very old cathedral that is actually on top of the ruins of an 11th Century Romanesque church. Its present-day Gothic style is really impressive with beautiful stained glass windows and a place where you can go below the cathedral to actually see the ruins of the former church.

Next, we made our way to the main plaza, another beautiful example of the strikingly different architecture that these Dutch countries offer. Just a couple of blocks from the plaza stands the famous Manneken Pis. For those who do not know, it is a statue of a small toddler who is apparently peeing into a small pool below. The reason for him being so famous lies in the history he has had. He has been stolen and moved many times throughout history and even once had to be reconstructed. Today he wears a different outfit each day, with more than 700 in existence.

After stopping for lunch, our next stop was the EU headquarters. They offer several free tours each day which we took advantage of. Although not very long, they give some good information on the workings of the EU. Justi and I elected to listen to ours in Spanish, which was good and quite easy to understand! Maybe my Spanish is getting better after all........

The last stop of the day brought us to the Atomium, a large steel structure that was made for the 1958 Worlds Fair in Brussels. Similar in this respect to the Eiffel Tower, but not nearly as well-known, it is a very popular tourist stop. You are able to go to the top, but as we were running short on time and because it is not at a very scenic part of the city, we decided to skip that and take a walk through the park next door. Finally we hopped back on the train and arrived back at Ellen’s a bit later. Once again treated to a great dinner, we ate, talked, had some final Belgium beers, and then packed our things for our early return journey the next morning.

Tuesday, our final day of the trip, was a very long one. Although you can get literally wherever you need with the public transportation in Europe, it can take some time. First we took the train to Brussels, where we then got on a bus to the airport, which is a ways out of town. Then, we boarded our plane to Madrid, where two hours later we arrived and got on the Metro to the bus station. After a two hour wait here and a small lunch, we got back on the bus for our final leg of the trip. Final destination: Baeza. Approximately 14 hours later, we were home.

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, the trip was another great one. We were all very lucky to have Ellen with us. It made the trip a lot cheaper and its always nice to have someone with you who speaks the language and knows the best sites to see. The other great thing about this trip was the large group we traveled with. I’m not sure if we will all travel again together before this year is up, but it was one that I’ll remember well if its the last. As for me and my next big trip: Paris and Berlin during the first week in April along with Russ and two of my best friends from back in Minneapolis, Zach and David. I’m sure to have quite a story after that one.

Talk soon.

Carnaval

Don’t worry. That is not a spelling error on my part. Carnival is spelled carnaval in spanish. But back to the topic at hand. I apologize again for the delay but as you may have guessed, I have been quite busy with even more travels and have either been unable to or not felt like updating this during the little rest I had in between. But here I am. Back to my stories.

A little over two weeks ago now, I went back to Cadiz for the second time to partake in the world-famous Carnaval celebration that takes place there every year. Similar to Mardi Gras in New Orleans, it is the festival that precedes Lent and is thought of by many to be a time of sin before the 40 days following that are defined by the opposite.

This time around, I decided to take a slightly different route to Cadiz. Instead of nearly missing the train from Cordoba, I hopped on a bus to Jaen, where I easily made the train departing from there. I arrived that Thursday night and met Russ at the train station with his friend Erin. From here we made our way back to Russ’s apartment where I could set my stuff down. After a quick rest and saying hi to some friends, we hopped back on the bus and headed down to one of my favorite spots from the last time I visited, The Pirate Bar. I’m not sure if I described it in my previous blog about Cadiz, but it actually has nothing to do with pirates, except for the fact that the bartender (named Lechuga or lettuce for you non-Spanish speakers) looks exactly like a pirate. Here we met some of the best friends I met before, Shane and Aoife. Shane’s older brother Paul and another friend were visiting for the week as well. After chatting for awhile and enjoying a couple drinks, we headed back to Russ’s apartment where we headed to bed.

Friday began with a late start as I was a bit tired from my day of traveling. However, after getting some food in our bellies, we did what anyone does after coming to Cadiz. We headed to the beach. Here we sat and enjoyed the beautiful view for about an hour before getting ready for swim practice. My second experience training here with Russ was just about as successful as the first one. Not very. I made it through it, but was in substantial pain as Russ can attest. Following practice, we decided to wander the streets for awhile, to look for some additions to our costumes for that Saturday night. After picking out some items and some food for dinner, we headed back to his place and started cooking.

Our activities this night centered around the famous “chirigotas”. I’m not sure if there is an english translation but according to Wikipedia they can be defined as “well known witty, satiric popular groups which train for the whole year and sing about politics, news, and household topics, with all the members wearing the same costume.” The first Friday of Carnaval is the main competition between the top groups. From what I am told, everyone watches and I would have to say that it is pretty accurate. Just looking out onto the streets that night from Russ’s window, you could see that everyone was busy elsewhere. The competition takes place at a theater in Cadiz, with the rest of the city and I’m sure many more throughout the country watching from their homes. Starting at 9:00, the competition goes all the way until 6:00 AM. As we had a big night ahead of us on Saturday, we went to bed a couple hours before the exciting end. However, we had a great time eating and drinking with many of Russ’s and his roommates’ friends.

That Saturday was the main attraction for the weekend. After a lazy start to the morning, Russ and I made some lunch before heading back down to the beach. Here we met some of Russ’s good friends for a wonderful afternoon, all of us enjoying the weather and our good fortunes to be where we were at that wonderful time. Similar to my visit in December, we listened to music, talked, watched the ocean, and began to get excited for that night. After a nice afternoon, we parted ways for a couple hours while we each went back to our apartments to eat some dinner and prepare our costumes for the festivities in front of us.

Around 9:00, Russ and I headed over to Shane and Aoife’s apartment where we enjoyed a drink and made our final adjustments to our costumes. Mine being eye liner, courtesy of Aoife. I had planned to join Russ and some other guys as leprechauns, but due to a last minute package that did not arrive in time (thanks for the effort mom) I had a change of plans and went the easy route of pirate, with some added accessories from Russ. After quite awhile trying to get everyone organized and together, we departed from the apartment and began our journey into the night.

I’m going to preface our night with one small piece of information. The population of Cadiz is roughly 120,000. And the biggest reason for this limited population is the fact that Cadiz is located on a narrow peninsula and there simply isn’t room to expand. With that in mind, the estimated numbers that I heard after the night was that over 400,000 filled the streets for that one night’s festivities. Hopefully that will help to paint you a better picture. Due to this immense influx in population, we hopped on the bus for a short time and after realizing that we really weren’t going anywhere due to all the other traffic, we hopped off again and decided to walk. Right before you enter the old part of the city, there is an enormous entrance in the old city wall. On top of the wall, they lit up a large Carnaval sign that you can see in the picture here. Immediately after entering through this entrance, we were surrounded by crowds. We started out in one of the plazas right near the entrance before moving on to another location. What we quickly found was that literally every street and every plaza were completely filled with people. With our rather large group, we made the choice to form a human chain each time we moved so as not to lose each other.

One of the biggest such crowds of people was in one of the main plazas outside of the cathedral. Luckily we were able to maneuver ourselves onto the steps and got some great views of all the people. Simply incredible. More people than I could ever have imagined. For the rest of the evening we wandered from plaza to plaza and street to street in search of the next party. On our way we encountered many friends, made some new ones, and enjoyed the music and events of each location. Finally, early in the morning, we decided that it was time to call it a night and head back. Although that proved to be more difficult than simply leaving. First we had to make our way outside of the crowds and then we had to make the long walk back towards the apartment. Over and hour and a half later and very sleep deprived, we arrived at Russ’s apartment at roughly 9:30 AM.

I quickly hopped in the shower before gathering my stuff together and hopping back on the bus towards the train station. After a quick stop for some churros and chocolate at a Carnaval street vender and a quick survey of the destruction caused by the previous night’s activities, I said my goodbyes to Russ and got back on the train headed for Sevilla, just like my last trip back from Cadiz. I enjoyed a little walk around Sevilla during my two hour layover, although this one was a bit different as I had not slept in more than 24 hours. Finally at about 8:00 that night, nine hours after leaving Cadiz, I arrived back in Baeza. After quickly Skyping with my parents, I collapsed in bed and enjoyed a wonderful night’s sleep before reporting back to work that following morning.

Kind of a whirlwind I know, but a great trip and experience that I won’t be forgetting. Next up in just a few short days........Belgium and Amsterdam. Stay tuned because I hope to have that up here shortly!

Hoping you are all well.