Granada

Hola!

It's been a week since we came back from Granada, so sorry I haven't written yet!

inside the train station!

Granada is a city in southern Spain, and it was the location of our longest (aka overnight) art history trip.  Our whole group, including Dr. Pauwels' husband who is here for the next few weeks, travelled to Granada on Thursday immediately after Spanish class. This was my first experience traveling by train and I LOVED it. Honestly it was 500x better than the bus- can't you tell how much I love the bus. Now, I was sick on the trip down, so I probably have a skewed view of the train; I think I was just thankful to be on the smooth train tracks and not a bumpy bus ride.

walking through the Alhambra gardens

Once we arrived in Granada, Dr. Kraft showed us the hotel and gave us our room assignment. 3 beds and 3 people per room, how nice!

Friday morning bright and early we headed out walking to the Alhambra- a BEAUTIFUL palace/fortress of Granada. On the way, we passed so caves in the mountainside, which Zach claims are the gypsy caves he heard about in a tv show. Back to the Alhambra- It has housed kings and queens of the city, including Ferdinand and Isabella when they met with Christopher Columbus! I didn't learn as much history of the Alhambra as I would have liked, but I did have time to admire its amazing beauty. The Alhambra is made up of the main palace, Nasrid Palace, the "vacation" palace, Generalife, the military fortress, Alcazaba, and the gardens. We arrived at the compound around 8:30 and had until 9:45 to take our first look at the grounds. Then our whole group met back up (hurry don't be late!) to be on time for our entrance into the Nasrid Palace.

The fountain of stone lions

notice Zach in the back acting dumb:)

This main palace is heavily Islamic influenced, and so different from the many Roman and Gothic architecture we have previously visited. One unique feature of Islamic art is that they never paint people or animals in their religious art, so many paintings and architecture is decorated with intricate designs of flora and calligraphy. They also incorporate colorful tiles onto many buildings, and the Nasrid Palace was no exception. It is amazing how much detail is on every part of the walls and fountains. That's another Islamic characteristic; no matter where you are within the structure, you can always hear running water, so there are gorgeous fountains all over the gardens and inside the palace. My favorite was the fountain in the middle of the palace surrounded by stone lions. Stone lions are my favorite, but thats another story you'll just have to ask me about. All in all the palace was one of the most unique places I've seen so far!

Calligraphy and tile work

After the palace, we still had several hours to enjoys the magnificence of the Alhambra as a whole. K'Leigh, Kaitlyn, Amanda, Karen, and I strolled slowly through the gardens and even took some time to sit and enjoy the relaxing environment. If I ever get to live in a palace, I will make sure it has gardens to rival the Alhambra.


The last part of the Alhambra we visited was the military tower at the end of the whole complex. we were able to climb to the top of the watchtower and from there see all of Granada. That was such an amazing sight. You can truly appreciate the beauty of this city, even me, who is not so keen on the city life. Granada is beautiful and seeing it from an old watchtower was so different and fun.

view from the watchtower 

Also sorry for all the Alhambra pics, but it was too beautiful to accurately describe!

We had the afternoon free to ourselves, and most of us went back to rest at the hotel for a couple hours before dinner. The whole group went to a Moroccan restaurant for dinner, which again new to me. I'm not sure how to describe it other than interesting; I had a breaded meat dish covered in cinnamon and sugar- too much sweet and salty for me. But I am a picky eater. Despite the unique food, going out as a group is really a lit of fun and good bonding (we better all be good friends after spending 3 months together).

Saturday morning was our traditional trolly tour! I really love those things. This one was good, but really bumpy because the roads are steeps on the side of the mountain. We all crowded on and I ended up having to sit in the very back with a group of people I didn't know. Now everyone who's knows me knows this is not a situation I like to be in, but I'm gonna brag on myself and say I did really good! I actually talked to them; the three adults I was sitting with were from London, thankfully they spoke English, and were very nice. There also was a super cute little boy sitting in front of me who kept looking back at me:). I didn't hear a lot about the city because my headphones weren't working, but it was still a successful choo-choo tour!

Saturday night was the flamenco show. All 19 of our group, along with quite a few others were stuffed inside a very intimate show room for the night's show. I was actually very impressed with the number of people they fit in the room, hope no one needed to get up! Show time- the first act of the show was the guitarist and singer performing a song with no dancers. Let me say that this guitarist was so impressive; he was incredibly talented and played beautifully. After that first song, the dancers came out for the rest of the show. I was not a fan of the dancing, but thats my own opinion and I feel that going to the show was still a valuable cultural experience. Maybe I just don't understand what it was trying to convey.... I'm not sure. There was a break in the middle where the guitarist played solo, which I loved! The whole thing was one more unique experience to add to my list and top off the weekend, and it gave us an excuse to dress up.

Nothing much happened this past week except class and my killer art history presentation. If any of y'all nee to know about prehistoric art (cave paintings) in Spain, I got you covered.

This weekend was the first weekend we split up; half the group went to the beach in Valencia, and the rest of us stayed in Avila. It was so nice to have a lazy weekend even if I did have to take care of not so fun things like washing all my clothes. Still this weekend was great; Zach, Luke, and I got pizza and sat out by the wall (the 1000 year old wall) and looked at the stars. granted we couldn't see them very well because the city is bright, but it was still fun. Yesterday 5 of us went with about 13 other guys from our dorm to play paintball. I've never played paintball and I don't know if it was my smartest idea to play with a bunch of guys who don't even speak the same language as me, but we had a great time. My team won of course- what do you expect :) and I got to ride in a car for the first time in a month. That isn't something I thought I would miss, or even realized I did until I was in the car driving out to the place we played paintball. I mean I knew I missed driving, but I even miss just riding in any car. So if you ever travel to Spain, make friends with someone who has a car, and be careful playing paintball because I am SO sore today!

Cool reflection pic thanks to Yeslin

Hope y'all are living it up at home and eating all the Mexican food for me!

love y'all, hasta lo:)