Portugal Trip!

So, last Thursday, Ashly, Krista and I departed for Madrid to catch our flight to Portugal.  Although traveling took a really long time, the flight was only about 45 minutes long! So short.  It is in the Iberian peninsula with Spain though, not super far away. 

We flew into Porto, Portugal, a northern coastal city in Portugal that is famous for it's Port Wine (sweet and strong!).

After arriving at the hostel and freshening up a bit, we decided to explore Porto on foot.  It's a small city, so everything is relatively close, but there are a lot of steep hills, so my calves got a great workout for a couple of days.  

Porto is a really beautiful city mized with very old and very new architechture.  I thought it was a neat contrast, and also really enjoyed the area near the river.  

We slept in a little the next day, exhausted from traveling the previous day, had some free breakfast at our quaint hostel, and then left for the day again.  The first place that we went to was a bookstore where J.K. Rowling was allegedy inspired for the architecture of Hogwarts and for the wizarding world with the winding staircases, tall book shelves, etc etc.  Needless to say I was really excited and made Ashly and Krista go there with me first before we did anything else haha.

After a cheap (and delicious) bacalao (codfish) lunch, we walked around some more--this time to the University area, which was one of my favorite places.  I thought it was so beautiful!

We rode a trolley around until Helen arrived, then we went back to the hostel and met up with her!  We rested for a little bit, and then went to the grocery store to get food for dinner.  We are cheap and poor so we ate out a few times, but we tried to cook for ourselves when we could!  It was super easy to do at the hostel we stayed at.  It was like a family kitchen feel, everyone was cooking stuff and sitting down at a big table to eat dinner.  It was really nice!

There was a pub crawl going on not too far from our hostel, so to aquaint ourselves with the nightlife, we joined up!  I was hesitant because we had to pay, but I am really glad I did because we met some really great people and had a lot of fun.

While Thursday and Friday were beautiful days to walk around, Saturday wasn't.  I mean, it wasn't all bad, but it rained all day pretty much.  We walked around while it was sprinkling and decided that the time had come to try to famous Porto sandwiches, the Franchesina.  The Franchesina is a sandwich, well actually our waiter told us it is not a sandwich...so, the The Franchesina is a non-sandwich with 3 types of meat between 2 slices of bread, a fried egg on top, with melted cheese covering the non-sandwich, and a gravy poured over the non-sandwich.  It. Was. Delicious.

Franchesina--traditional of Porto!

I ate the entire thing and didn't even regret it.  Although I am 100% positive that it will be the only one I eat in my lifetime because I think my arteries will be unclogging from this non-sandwich for the rest of my life.  Not really, but one was definitely enough :).

We walked around in the rain some more, found a cute artisan store and bought jewelry, and then met up with Helen and Hugh to go wine tasting-  Unfortunately we were too late for a tour, but we got to taste Taylor's port wine, which was really good!  I had tried a different type earlier and didn't like it so much, but Taylor's was really nice and not too overpowering.

Ashly, Me, Helen, and Hugh at Taylor's Wine Cellar

We all went to dinner later that night at a WOK place, which was a little sparse on food, but I thought it was tasty nonetheless!  I had sushi, which I hadn't had in forever, so that was really nice, and it wasn't terribly expensive, so that was great too.  It actually wasn't that expensive of a trip.  The biggest thing I splurged on was an earlier train ticket back to Villarrobledo from Madrid because I felt ill due to my 2 hours of sleep and many hours of traveling back to Spain.  I couldn't even leave the train station to get a bocadillo de calamares--que lastima! haha

Ashly, Krista, and me walking back to the hostel on our last night in Portugal!

Anyway, it was a really lovely trip, I enjoyed it so much!  Portugal is a beautiful country, from what I have seen at least!  

My next big trip will be London during Semana Santa (Easter or Spring Break), with some of my friends from Villa--I am pumped!  I'm saving up money because I know it is going to be expensive, but also totally worth it!  

More later!  Hope everyone is doing well, and a special shout out to mi prima, Rachel who just arrived in CHILE for a couple months of interning--Good luck and ENJOY every minute of it!! :)

Mary

Alicante!

A few weekends ago my friends Ashly, Haley and I decided to take a spontaneous trip to the beach in Alicante for the weekend.  It was a BEAUTIFUL weekend, sunny and in the 60's, and we spent lots of time sunbathing and relaxing on the beach.

On the train to Alicante

 It was a nice and relaxing weekend, and we had a great time with our very hospitable friends!

Carnaval, Carnaval, Carnaval, Te Quiero!

Ever since arriving in Villarrobledo in the fall, I have been hearing people just raving about Carnaval here--not one conversation that had to to with Carnaval ever had the words "boring" or "I'll be out of town" in it.  Everyone that I talked to built it up like crazy...and you know what? Holy crap, they were spot on.  Seriously, I can easily say that last week was the most ridiculous, hilarious, and fun week of my life.  Viva Carnaval!!

We kicked off Carnaval on Thursday (March 3rd), with comida at Jose's campo house where we lit up the bbq and grilled hambugers, meat skewers, sausages, every type of meat really.  That's what we do when we go to the campo, we buy a lot of meat and then eat it, haha.  I have also been told to stop saying that we need to eat vegetables, because you just don't eat them when you go to the campo for carne! duh!

Jose and I doing some pre-cooking (tortilla de patata!)

Preparing the grill! haha

We had a delicious meal, then all went back into town to prepare our costumes for the week.  There was an opening ceremony that we went to as well in the Plaza. Apparently every year the "Juanes" come and announce that Carnaval has started.  This year they were intergalactic Juanes', pretty funny! Anyway, it was mostly for kids, so we didn't stay long, but it was funny to see.

Also, the plaza looked awesome.  There were lights everywhere, a stage, a huge tent, and bars had put up kiosk stations in the tent for drinks. Here's a little bit what it looked like.

Another thing about Carnaval was that we saw about 1000 parades (defiles!), and they were AWESOME!! People have been working on their floats and costumes for the parades for months---cool costumes!! Saturday was the first parade, the Sunday the children's parade, then Wednesday the parade for the mourning of the sardines (very funny), then Thursday the wedding parades (joke weddings, like shrimps getting married...etc), Friday the 4 hour parade with every single float and floats from other, near-by pueblos, and Saturday the Children's parade again, just in case you missed it the first time ;).

My favorite costumes!! Storks bringing babies!! haha

My friend, Ana Rosa, with kids from her class in the children's parade!

The winning float from the sardines parade!

then they BURNT the sardine floats!!

My favorite wedding float--the shrimp wedding!!!

watching the big parade from Dan's balcony--great view!

So, I guess the real meat of Carnaval are all the sweet costumes that people come up with! Here are all of ours.

Saturday, my friends and I dressed up as Flamingo-Flamencos!  We were flamenco dancers from the front, and Flamingoes when we hunched over.  It was super funny, and we had a blast!

Haley and I as Flamenco dancers

Flamingos!

Needless to say, that was super funny.  We had a lot of fun racing around and acting dumb (it's okay during Carnaval, as I have been told!).

Sunday, we took a break, but Monday night we were ready to go, this time with new costumes!  Halers and  dressed up like giant babies--probably the most comfortable costume ever because we wore our onesies. YES!

Tuesday night was super windy and cold, so we stayed in, but on Wednesday we were back and ready to experience more Carnaval!  I found some stuff to be a mysterious woman at the chino store (like the dollar store), and Krista was a nerd--really funny!

Onto Thursday!  Mad Scientist day with Ashly, and Krista as the periodic table of elements!

Friday brought Helen, Jaclyn, and our CHINESE DRAGON costume!!! We were so excited, and we even won a prize that night! 

Saturday night, the last official night of Carnaval, Jaclyn, Krista, Haley, Ashly and I quickly brainstormed a costume in about an hour and a half, and the end result was a statue of liberty costume!! It was so fun being lady liberty all night, and we got lots of laughs, especially when we went around asking people for a lighter to relight our torches.  Very memorable, very eventful!

Jaclyn and I at dinner on Saturday night!

Sunday, before going to church and helping my friends clean up at the local, I went to the plaza where they were having a gachas competition to close out carnaval!  Gachas are a traditional manchego dish, and it is DELICIOUS.  My friends Silvia, Greg, and I went around sampling everyone's gachas!  Here was my favorite station.

It was really delicious.  We just took some bread and dipped it in the pot.  Free dinner!

Well, as if you can't tell, it was a very very amusing week which gave me lots to do!  

Tonight I'm going over to my friend's for a tapas St. Patty's day celebration.  Unfortunately I don't think we are going to find any green beer, but we'll do our best to celebrate it like we would at home :).  Happy St. Patrick's Day!! Wooohoooo!!

More later, lots of love to everyone!

Mary

Cuenca, Part 2

Last weekend, Ashly, Haley, and I headed off to Cuenca for the weekend to see the beautiful city and to hang out with my beautiful friends!  As a welcome change from last time I went, there is now a train from Albacete to Cuenca that only takes 45 minutes as opposed to a 2 hour ride to a town outside of Madrid and then another 3 hours to Cuenca. Needless to say, the trip was less exhausting than the last one.

When we got to Cuenca, we dropped our bags off at Corinna's place and then all met up with Helen and Jaclyn for lunch.  To my delight we all shared a Tortilla de patata--pretty much my favorite Spanish dish, haha, and had a great time catching up.  The girls all had stuff do to  after that, so Haley, Ashly, and I went to go explore the old town for the rest of the day, and what a beautiful day it was!

First we started off at the Casas Colgadas, went to the modern art museum, and then walked to the top of the old town and admired the beautiful view of Cuenca as the sun was setting! It was a gorgeous day!

Me, Ashly, and Haley enjoying the day in Cuenca!

The Casas Colgadas

View from the top of the old town.

Halers taking in the view

And Ashly enjoying the view as well!

We all huddled up and watched the sun set together!

This is blurry, but I still really like it!

After that, we went back over to Corinna's and met up with the girls to go to Foster's Hollywood for dinner.  For those of you who don't know what that is, it is an American style restaurant.  Obviously, since we are in Spain, it was a little different than say, a TGIFriday's, but my Quesadillas were still pretty good. 

Ashly and Haley went back to Villa the next morning due to prior commitments, but I stayed, and Corinna, Jaclyn, and I went on a beautiful hike that gives you the view of the back of the old town.  It is called the "Camino de San Julian".  San Julian used to take a pilgrimage up the path and pray and make baskets of food to feed the hungry.  It was so cool, but sorry Mom and Siti -- I stood on some pretty high cliffs that would make you yell at me :). 

Corinna and I!

After that, we met up with Helen and headed back to Corinna's and watched an episode of Criminal Minds that still haunts me (Thank you, Jaclyn), and a movie with Catherine Zeta Jones called...No Reservations?  It was alright, a normal chick flick.  

Well, it wouldn't be a visit to Cuenca without a visit to El Quinto Pecado for some great Tapas, so we headed over there and then to a place that makes good Tinto de Verano.  Also, there was a guy at the second place that was literally sticking his face in this ice cream cake that the owners had put out for people to eat.  Needless to say, no one else ate any of it, and then the guy just took it with him when he left, leaving ice cream splattering all over the floor upon his exit.  Very strange, but also very funny. 

The next morning, all of us made a delicious brunch of Crepes, potatoes, and eggs.  Very healthy. Very yummy :).  

So, that was Cuenca, round 2! I'll definitely be going back again for my friends' birthdays in May, and I look forward to that!

More to come soon!

Mary