Cheers!

This past weekend, Nick and I traveled to Dublin, Ireland! To me, Ireland is the land of luck, green and of course Guinness. I have to admit, I wasn't super excited at first because I prefer warm, sunny & beachy places which Ireland is the complete opposite of. But it has always been Nick's dream to go to Ireland so of course we went while we had the chance. We both LOVED it! We left early Friday morning and had some Starbucks in the airport. I had the best muffin in the entire world, strawberry with white chocolate & a caramel frapaachino. Amazing! After our flight being about 2 hours behind schedule, we arrived in Dublin around 5pm (there is a 5 hour time difference from the US but we actually gained an hour coming from Spain). Upon arriving, we were exhausted! We had already been up for more than 12 hours just traveling from bus to plane to bus again. However, everyone was SO nice and friendly it just made it that much better. A very nice, older man got off at our stop and walked us to our hotel so we didn't get lost. Once at the hotel, the people there were just as nice. Our room was great, we had a bar and restaurant right downstairs with delicious food (caesar salad and buffalo wings!) We also got free coffee and tea delivered to our room whenever we wanted, a comfortable bed, hot shower and a TV. For breakfast, we were surprised to find out that included in the price was a full irish breakfast with eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, and unlimited fruit, yogurt, cereal & coffee. How spoiled were we?

To start off our first day, the weather couldn't have been nicer for being in Ireland. There was no rain and the sun was shining all day, we couldn't complain. Since we are so used to walking everywhere now, a 20-30 minute walk to the center of Dublin was nothing for us. We stopped at the Garden of Remembrance then made our way to Trinity College and the Dublin Castle. We stopped to shop a little where Nick spoiled himself for once :) then we had Subway for lunch (even better this time). Nick found his irish roots, so awesome and then we made our way to the St. Patrick's Cathedral. The park and the stained glass windows were gorgeous. It is so funny to see when it's 40º in Ireland everyone walks around like it's summertime and when it's 70º in Spain, the people are still bundled up to their necks. Also, did I mention they have 2 level buses to take you around? So cool. They drive on the wrong side of the road! It's so weird to get used to seeing on the streets and in the cars. Twice on the walk home we were stopped by locals asking us (tourists) for directions. I guess we look like we belong in Ireland.

Finally after a long day of walking we went to our last and furthest walk, the Guinness Storehouse. What did we find...but a closed factory :( We were so bummed because we had no idea what time it closed and that was our only chance because on our last day we were supposed to take an all day trip to the Cliffs of Moher. We were torn. Since the Cliffs were an all day thing that cost 40 euro with a 3 hour bus ride there and back, we decided to pass on it and stay in the city our last day to visit the Guinness Storehouse. It was a good thing we did because Sunday it was raining all day and absolutely freezing. Instead, we slept in and this time took a bus to the factory because of the weather. We learned the history behind Guinness, how to make it, the right way to drink it, how to pour the perfect pint and got a free tasting. Once we returned to the hotel we split some hot & spicy wings. 16 wings each later....we were ready for bed.

It was so hard to say goodbye to Ireland, maybe one day we'll return. Sláinte!

Before --->

After

¡Viva la Playa: Nerja Style!

 Since the weather was so perfect for a nice, relaxing day on the beach, Nick and I decided to spend the day in Nerja. When we arrived we just started walking towards the water since we didn't really know where we were going. Once we found the water we saw these comfortable beach chairs laying under umbrellas. It said they were 4 euro a piece to rent for the day but there was no one working so we sat down for a few hours. We thought we were going to get lucky and not have to pay but eventually a woman showed up looking for money. Apparently it was a topless beach too from what we noticed :/ Before we left we wanted to explore the beach everybody talks about as being so beautiful. However it seemed really small to us. On our way back to the bus, we happened to see signs for other beaches which we didn't know existed. Apparently there is one beach with caves that is just amazing but VERY far from where we were dropped off. Hopefully before we leave Spain we will get to go back with more time to check out the other beaches with the caves that everyone talks about. Even the bus ride there and back had such beautiful, beach scenery to look at from very high up. From what I did see, I would have to agree with everyone.

La Alpujarra

This past Saturday, my program took us to hike La Alpujarra which is located in Granada and is a part of the Sierra Nevada mountains. This was my first hiking experience and I was pretty excited to try something new since Nick is such an outdoors junky. The bus ride there was as some people referred to it, the bus ride from hell. It was about an hour and a half bus ride, 30 minutes on the highway and an hour up a windy, curvy and very skinny road that led us to the mountain. It was so curvy that many people including myself felt extremely car sick. Unfortunately, some students actually got sick on the bus and some after. Others including myself made it there but had a stomach ache. Luckily, after a coffee and some water for hydration I was ready to hike! We started at the top of the mountain in Capileira and made our way down. In my opinion it seemed a bit dangerous although I am not expert hiker and didn't have real hiking boots, just my pumas. It was a very steep, wet, muddy and rocky way down. However the hike brought us through very old houses where people actually live and eventually to a waterfall. After seeing the waterfall, we then made our way back up the mountain to Bubión. I must say that I didn't enjoy the walk back up as much, very tiring! After a quick lunch break we made our way back down again to our final stop, Pampaneira. On our way to Pampaneira, half of our group got left behind and the tour guide didn't wait. We were lost in the mountain for a bit but managed to find our way to the small populated town of Pampaneira. Once there, we had around 2 hours to explore. There were so many stray cats and dogs walking around. We ended up finding a  small chocolate factory with FREE SAMPLES! I definitely got my share of chocolate there. Although they had some very strange flavors such as chile, salt, pepper and many different fruits they also had my favorites: coconut, white chocolate, mocha and so much more. After leaving the chocolate factory and shopping around a bit we wanted to sit down and have a drink. We found this patio restaurant that has a beautiful view of the mountain. I ordered a sangria and I have to say it was the worst sangria I have ever had. It was so bitter and loaded with olive oil! A drink with olive oil, weird I know. I couldn't even drink it, yuck! But it was a perfect day with beautiful weather for a hike. Even though I have never been so sore and came home with a sunburn, it was a great first time experience.  
 

Hammam

 Yesterday, Nick and I decided to take the advice of many and experience one of the most popular attractions here in Granada, Hammam arabic bath. This had to be one of the most relaxing, beautiful and romantic things we have ever experienced. After some tapas, we went to our appointment at midnight! Hammam had 3 rooms with baths, one cold, one hot and one medium. It had a steam room, unlimited tea and a 15 minute message. It was just like a spa. We spent 2 hours there just relaxing in the baths. We tried the steam room but I couldn't handle all of the heat and steam but I was plenty satisfied floating around with Nick in the relaxing baths. My skin has never felt so soft. Even after a shower, I still can't get the smell of the place out of my hair! I can't believe we waited so long to do this but now that we have I can assure that we will be making a trip back there before we leave this wonderful place.