Hola todos!
It’s Tuesday night, July 5th, and I’m writing from Barcelona with my mom! We’ve been busy traveling, sightseeing, and enjoying what’s left of Spain for the past few days. It’s starting to hit me that this time next week I will be back in the United States…eeek. Not sure how I feel about that.
Anyway, my mom arrived Saturday. Both of us were pretty tired, but I showed her around parts of Sevilla. I think I wrote about this in my last blog entry…so I’ll skip to Sunday. We didn’t do too much more exciting things on Saturday anyway.
Sunday, we woke up (at 10:15! Latest I’ve slept in in what feels like forever!). We prepped ourselves for the day because we had a lot planned. We stopped to get some coffee and a pastry on our way to la Catedral to attend the noon mass. Mass was beautiful, as always. Even if you don’t understand every word they’re saying, there is so much detail of the altar to look at!
After la Catedral, we stopped at a Starbucks because mom of course needed a bit more coffee than the little café con leches that they give you here. Then, we made our way over to Plaza de España because as I’ve mentioned before, it’s my favorite place in all of Spain. So pretty. We took a gazillion pictures of mainly the architecture. It is all hand-painted ceramic, and being the artist that she is, my mom loved it so much. After the Plaza, we went over to Parque María Luisa. Since she loves flowers and being outside too, can you guess if she enjoyed herself there? OH – might I add – Sunday and Monday were the “coldest” days I have experienced in Sevilla the entire time I was there. It had been SCORCHING hot for the past few days, and then when my mom comes (after hearing me complain about the heat) and we have to wear sweaters! Granted, it was not that cold in the scheme of things, but it was cold enough in my opinion! It made it lovely to walk around in, though.
After the park, I gave my mom a mini-tour of where I lived for the past two months. She said she liked the area I was in the most out of everything she had seen thus far. I agree with her that I lived in such a nice part of town. It couldn’t have been any more perfect for me! She saw my house, my school, the paths I took, then finally we sat down for lunch. She had caprese, I had Greek Salad, and we both got a mojito! Nom nom nom. We chatted for a bit, then went back to La Catedral just so we could look around and climb up La Giralda – which is a tower that is part of the cathedral and the highest point of Sevilla.
When we arrived back at La Catedral, the most exciting thing happened to me. I wanted to get a discount to get in because I was a student, but since I handed them my Universidad de Sevilla ID card, they let me in for FREE because I was a “native” WOOOO study abroad win. That was exciting. Anyway, we climbed La Giralda and faced a BEAUTIFUL view of the city. I started to get sad because this would be my last time seeing all of Sevilla for a while. ☹ Depressing. But we took lots of pictures then looked around La Catedral. You never seem to run out of things to look at when you’re there. It’s huge.
We went back to our hotel, washed up, and then walked by the river for a little before searching for a place to eat for dinner. I ran into my friend Becky and her parents on the way which was great because it felt good to see a familiar face! Anyway, we finally found a place to eat dinner – we got Gazpacho, Paella, and Sangria. We’re so Spain.
Monday was a rough day. We got last minute souvenirs then had to check out of the hotel by 12. We went to the airport and had a semi-hectic experience with the flight (I’ve been told before never to use RyanAir, I wish I had listened. So - FYI – don’t use RyanAir). I won’t go into detail about that, but it just made leaving so much harder. However, I couldn’t be sad for long. I was on my way to Barcelona with my mom!
We got in pretty late. We are currently staying at a rented out apartment. It’s so nice – modern and about 3 minutes from the beach. I couldn’t be happier about that because I absolutely adore the beach. So Monday night, we ate dinner near the beach and stayed there really late just talking. We needed to relax. Then we called it a night. (PS – Happy 4th of July!)
SO today. Here we are. Tuesday, we got up and made some breakfast in our room– I had toast with olive oil and tomato and my mom had toast with marmalade. Then we went to the beach and were there alllllll dayyyyyy and I was in heaven. I even got a massage from some lady that was walking around offering them. Best money I’ve spent in a while! Anyway, we just laid there, looked pretty, and got tan ☺ But around 3, we had to go clean up because we had a cooking class to attend at five!
We walked to the cooking class which was in a really cool kitchen. There were 14 total “students” – mostly foreigners that were interested in how to cool. It was interactive but you didn’t have to cook anything if you didn’t want to. We were situated around a counter and we had a teacher showing us each step. We cooked everything first, then ate. Mom & I didn’t have lunch so I was starving by the time we ate! We learned how to make a “Barcelona” version of Gazpacho, tortilla de patatas, pan con tomate, paella marisco, and crèma de catalan. Everything was soooo good and it was such a nice experience. My mom and I helped make the gazpacho by blanching, cutting, and blending the tomatoes! We got copies of the recipes so we can cook them whenever! (Like when I’m in my apartment next year….where I have access to all these ingredients…sarcasm) but still. I was so happy we went. We met a lot of nice people and learned a lot!
Well now I am absolutely exhausted writing this so I can’t elaborate more, but we stay in Barcelona until Friday, then we’re in Madrid until Monday. I feel like there’s so much I need to do before I leave Spain! Ahhhhh stressful….
Sorry this is long and kind of dry, but I want everyone to be filled in on what my mom and I have been up to! Thanks again to everyone who has been keeping up with my travels this summer. My mom was telling me that people are genuinely interested! THANK YOU! ☺
Un abrazo fuerte,
Kate
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