I've been slacking on the blog a bit so now its catch up time! I'll write multiple posts today so that it's not one huge post (break it up a little for ya)
Alhambra/Festival Primavera
On Thursday, March 14th I finally got to go inside the Alhambra. The Alhambra is an old islamic palace that is the main attraction of Granada. It's part of what makes this city so beautiful as you can see it from most places in Granada. We got to go inside the palace and to the gardens of the General-Life, which is another part of the Alhambra complex. The complex that is the Alhambra is so big that it takes up a section of the city on the map. Not only are the gardens and the palace gorgeous, but from the Alhambra you get the best views of Granada because its so high up (its a steep uphill walk to get there).
The next day was Festival Primavera in Spain, which basically marks when the all the boletones (public drinking areas) open up in each city. Granada's happens to be down the street from me. I went during the day and it was CRAZY with thousands of people packed into one giant parking lot. I couldn't stay out at night because I had to go to a Tango performance with one of my classes and then go pick up Ranger Steve! :) Actually it wasn't that easy. I went to the Tango show until about 11, walked with my friend to her house because she lives much closer than me to the the bus station, and then later walked to from her house to the bus station to catch my 2 am bus (Saturday). It was then a 5 1/2 hour bus ride to the Madrid Airport where I met Steve an hour later. Was definitely worth it, because traveling with him has been the highlight of my semester.
Madrid
On Saturday the poor jet lagged kid had no time to rest. We went to the Prado Museum, Palacio Real, and a Real Madrid game his first day in Europe... Not too shabby. It was my second time to the Prado and the palace but my first time to a Real game. The Prado is one of my favorite museums and Steve really enjoyed it too. We spent about half the day there and then headed to palace. The inside of the palace is gorgeous and giant, my house would probably fit in its dining room ha. And we also visited the royal armory as a part of our palace ticket. It's crazy the amount of detail that was put into the designs on the armor, the weapons, and the ceilings of each room of the palace. In each museum and palace we visited the murals on the ceilings were always my favorite. I feel like I walked through all of them with my head strait up.
After three trips to Spain I finally made it to a Real Madrid game and was finally in the same vicinity as Cristiano Ronaldo <3 It was against Mallorca and should have been a blow out by Madrid but it ended up being a really good game. Mallorca lead for the majority of the first half and then Madrid tied it up going into halftime. After the half Madrid scored two goals right off the bat and then lead from there. The final score was 5-2.The next day, we spent the morning in an open market in La Latina (a section of Madrid) and then headed back to Granada that afternoon.
Granada
Carmen let Steve live and eat was us for his three days in Granada in exchange for an alex and ani bracelet. They aren't popular in Europe yet and she loves the two I have (He brought her a matching UConn one). We got to Carmen's around 9 had some of her amazing food for dinner and then met everyone at Hannigans for some St. Patty's day fun.
For the three days Steve was here and I had classes and midterms, but we were still able to fit a lot in before leaving for Italy. His first full day here was my birthday (March 18) and we spent the afternoon at the Alhambra. They were sold out of palace tickets but we were able to go into the gardens and up Alcazaba which the tower and highest point of the Alhambra. We got some great pictures there (all on Steve's camera) In general it was a great day for the Alhambra because we had picture perfect weather, unlike the following day. That night we went out with my friend Greg to Cafe Futbol for some birthday churros, cakes, sangria, and Alhambra Especial (a beer brewed in Granada).
The next day was cloudy all morning and then it down poured all afternoon and night. I love Granada but since we walk everywhere it really stinks when it rains. It was suppose to be our hiking day and we were able to fit one in before the down pour. We hiked up to Sacromonte which looks over all of Granada including the Alhambra. We then explored some of the paths that break off from there. We made it back down as it was starting to down pour. We went to Burger King for lunch only so that we could have beers with our burgers. Yes, all the fast food places in Europe serve beer :) We then sadly took advantage of the washed out day by me studying for my midterms that were the following day, Steve working on his wildlife project (due the day he left Europe to go back home) and taking breaks to plan Rome. I was also able to to show him different parts of the city during the small breaks in the rain.
For Steve's final day in Rome we spent the afternoon at the Arab Bathes.
http://granada.hammamalandalus.com/
It was so relaxing! There were three different baths (warm, hot, and cold) and a sauna, along with tea and massages. It was the first time either of us had been in a spa time place and the first time either of us had received professional massages. We loved it! That night after dinner we went with the rest of the UConn group to a flamenco version of the Passion of the Christ, which ended up being much better than we had expected.
Strait from the performance we all went to tapas and then to Granada10. This was the highlight of Steve being in Granada because we never have the opportunity to go out and dance back home between our two work schedules. It was great to dance all night :) What was a little less fun was waking up three hours later to catch our bus to the Malaga Airport, which started our trip to Italy!!
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