Back from vacation!

It feels so good to be back in our little room in our apartment in Palma. We traveled for exactly 14 days and it was extremely fun but definitely felt like 2 weeks. Evan and I both got colds (and still have) but we still managed to see a lot of Milan, Nice, Montpellier, Barcelona, and Paris.

We traveled with my in-laws, Travis and Linda, for the first week of the trip because they had been here for a week before we left visiting us on Mallorca. That was a bit difficult because it was there first time traveling around Europe and they are used to warm, tropical vacations with beaches and warm weather. Using the metro and traversing large cities isn't exactly something they had done before. The beginning was pretty stressful but towards the end we all got the hang of it and had a great time.

I didn't really care for Milan that much (I thought we were going to die in a car crash on the way over to the hotel from the Milan airport) and the city was really large and didn't really have a very nice old town area to explore. I loved hearing Italian (which is incredibly similar to Spanish) and eating delicious Italian food. I am really motivated to try and learn some more Italian for when we go to Trieste and meet some of my Italian family! I adopted a new Italian grandmother on the flight over that I sat next to. We had some cute and choppy Italian/Spanish conversations (Me speaking Spanish and she speaking Italian). Like all Italian grandmothers, she offered me some of her food (the best way to show affection right?) and kissed me on the cheeks when we parted ways. A great start to the trip!

After 2 nights in Milan we took a train to Nice where we stayed for 2 nights. Nice was very nice (ha ha) and had a beautiful beach, but it kinda reminded me of Las Vegas in that it had a lot of hotels and casinos and was very big and flashy. Everyone that we met there was really nice but French is really hard to understand and reads a lot like Spanish or Italian but sounds NOTHING like it.

I was really sad because we only stayed in Montpellier for one night and it seemed like a really cool city. It was beautiful and a lot older than Nice and just had a really good vibe. There were some amazing street performers that drew huge crowds and were great to watch/listen to. It kinda reminded me of Arcata because there were a lot of young transients (probably Trustifarians) around and just had a really relaxed feeling.

The Eve of the New Year we took the train to Barcelona, where we stayed for 4 nights. Barcelona was a little overwhelming because it is a huge city and there are TONS of people there! We also stayed on La Rambla, which is probably the loudest street in the city. The most memorable thing we saw was the huge cathedral, La Sagrada Familia, that was designed by Gaudí and is HUGE and they have been building it since 1887! Que loco!

Our last stop was Paris, where we stayed for 4 days. We saw everything we want to there: Versailles, the Louvre, The Eiffel Tower, Champs-Elysee, Arc de Triumphe, etc. That amount of time was perfect because we were really burnt out and kinda sick so we were able to sleep in almost everyday and still have plenty of time to check out the sights. And it helped too that it is the off season and the lines were quite short. I was getting really sick of going out to eat at that point so we went to a really cute "patisserie" everyday to get sandwiches and delicious bread. We also bought had salami left over from Milan, cheese, and tons of fruit that I bought a close grocery store. Bon appetit!

We got in yesterday evening at 7 and I had to teach today for 5 1/2 and I did not feel so hot. Luckily my workload just goes down from Monday so I have more time to relax. I am happy to have a couple months of downtime before the next travel adventure to Trieste! Or who knows, maybe we will sneak in a weekend trip to another part of Spain. :)

Evan and I are starting a map wall in our room with all the tourist maps we have collected in our travels. I have a feeling it will be quite large by the time we head back to the States.

Cosas Buenas

Here is an update on some of the things I have been up to since my last post:

My little plants that have all been "collected", not stolen, of course not stolen, I would never use the scissors on my pocket knife in that way. 

All I had to buy was the dirt! And yes, I am wearing socks with sandals because I didn't bring my slippers :(

The terrace of our apartment where my little plants will live and grow. More to come soon hopefully!

Yesterday Evan and I went to our friend Lisa's apartment. Lisa is back in the States right now and she lives with and helps out an older German women who is really sick and lets her live there for free. We took out the trash, cleaned the kitchen, vacuumed, etc for her. She has a beautiful apartment too, which has a great view of the Catedral. She is also an artist an she made us this amazing little gift basket pictured below!

This has been 2 days of gifts! The little football on the left we got at the awesome little bar that has like 200 kinds of beer. Then the gift basket from Christine, and the little panettone from the really nice Italian family that ran the restaurant we went to yesterday.  

She cut and painted an old cardboard box to make it look like an adorable house!

All kinds of good stuff in this box: a candle, dried tomatos (the heart shaped package), 2 stir sticks for coffee covered in chocolate and sugar, a little box full of spicy chocolates, little cookies with chocolate in the middle, rosemary salt, orange sugar, orange brandy, orange oil for moisturizing your skin, a Christmas tree ornament, and a conconction of raisins, cranberries, and ginger soaking in some kind of alcohol! And all of these things are packaged by reusing old bottles, plastic bags, and pieces of cardboard! Amazing! This would easily be worth 30 euro!

Evan's parents are here right now and we have been having a really good time showing them Palma and the island. Today we are hoping to rent a car and drive around to the gorgeous scenic places on the island.