I'm going to have to backtrack quite a while to the beginning of February when I went to Amsterdam. Now, I realize this what quite some time ago so please don't judge me, but this will also be a rather quick post and then I can get to my extremely long vacation which will probably take me 5 hours to write a blog post about. So. I left off going to Madrid the last weekend in January. Karrah Castillo, Jake Wyffels (a guy in my program) and I had planned to go visit Amsterdam the first weekend in February. We bought our tickets and got ready to go and yada yada. I have the most supreme paranoia so when I was going to meet them at the bus stop to take the bus to the bus station (at 11 pm at night) I literally stood in this huge lighted area with my backpack on the front of me and it was just really a paranoid thing to do because their bus stop is off of this street called "Camino de Ronda" and its normally a REALLY busy street but unfortunately there is a ton of construction going on so no one is really over there anymore and thus it is scary. Anyway, I met them at the bus stop and we had to make it to the bus station to take a 12:30 am bus to Madrid because our flight was very early in the morning. The 5 hour early morning bus rides are not my favorite, and this was the first one I took. I hadn't been able to sleep much so that kind of sucked but oh well. So eventually we got to Madrid after a longggg 5 hours, and we had to wait for the metro to open at 6 am to take it all the way to Barajas. Little did I know that the metro trip would end up taking almost an hour to get there, but we were fine overall on time. We got to Barajas and checked in and went through security and hopped on our Iberia plane.
Now, I have taken Iberia a few times, including my group flight to Spain, but I wasn't expecting the extremely extremely cramped space that I would be sitting in. So, our plane was set to land in Amsterdam at about 11:30 am. I'm on the plane sleeping a bit, not worried at all. I wake up at about 11:00 thinking oh you know we should be landing soon. 5, 10 minutes pass, and nothing, no sign of us landing. 11:30 comes, and the pilot comes on the intercom and says we should be landing in about half an hour. I'm thinking, alright you know half an hour later than scheduled, not too big of a deal. However, you would think that we would kind of be descending into our destination and our ears would be popping, but rather it seemed to me and everyone else on the plane that we were just kind of chillin in the air. The pilot finally gets on the intercom and tells us we're going to have to land in Brussels because of the crazy winds in Amsterdam and only one runway being open. The intercom didn't really do the pilot justice, especially with his Spanish accent, so no one could really understand what he was saying. Basically though, it sounded to just about everyone on the plane that we had to find our own transportation from Brussels to Amsterdam. The two cities are close, but it would still be a three hour bus ride. Everyone, including myself, was freaking out at this point, and the Iberia staff wasn't really doing anything to answer any of our questions. I whip out my "LETS GO EUROPE" book (thanks Katie!) and I flipped through all of the pages to find Amsterdam transportation, and find a bus and train that go there. People in surrounding seats asked me if I had found something we could all take, and I looked at the map and tried to figure out the relative location incase we were forced to take a bus or something there. But, truthfully, if that was the case I would not have been a happy camper because I am pretty sure that wouldn't be legal to not bring us to the destination we paid for. Anyway, so we land in Brussels but not exactly what I would call a smooth landing, considering I thought I was going to die on the plane. We just kept going toward grass, no where near anything remotely resembling an airport. I kept saying "Are we seriously about to land in a field?" but luckily, we landed in the MOST remote area of the airport haha. The pilot then says "Well we don't know if it is going to be an hour or 3 hours before we are able to take off or what, so we will keep you guys on the plane until we know." The plane was extremely hot and uncomfortable, so that was fun. We all complained but then the airline gave us free water and then eventually we took off and got to Amsterdam at about 3 pm, a few hours later than planned.
We wandered around the airport and attempted to figure out how to get to central Amsterdam so we could make it to our hostel. Unfortunately a lot of the signs were in Dutch, so it was fun trying to figure it out. And, their train system is really strange and doesnt really have signs saying which train is which so we had to guess. And, we couldn't pay with cash which was really annoying.
ANYWAY, we eventually made it to downtown Amsterdam and had to wander around and try to figure out how to get to our hostel. I had written down directions but they weren't really that helpful, so we had to stop in a hotel and ask for a map and eventually asked how to get there. We finally got to our hostel, which was a Christian hostel in the middle of the red light district, so a slight contradiction I must say. We checked in and got our stuff ready and went to go explore the lovely city of Amsterdam.
It was pretty inevitable that we would walk through the Red Light District to go places and stuff, and I mean it is a tourist attraction so it was something we needed to see. It was very strange. Prostitution is legal there, so there were women in windows all through the few streets that were the red light district. We took a bunch of pictures and stuff of some beautiful churches and the buildings which are actually really really cool. Since we had gotten there later though, we didn't really have time to do that much, so we kind of walked around and explored and got some dinner and walked around some more and called it a night. The Red Light District at night was literally crazy. We walked through it to get back to our hostel and I kept saying that I felt like I was in a fun house because there were tons of people EVERYWHERE with a lot of bright signs and it was just kind of strange. A good experience for sure, but very odd.
The next morning we got up and went to the old Heineken factory for a tour. The actual brewery was moved outside the city, but it is a really cool set up and it was extremely interesting. They had all of the history of Heineken, how it is brewed and stuff, and then more modern stuff going on with their company. The cool thing was we got to taste the wort before it was turned into beer, so it was pretty cool to see that. After, we grabbed some lunch and went on a canal cruise. Amsterdam is famous for being built around TONS of different canals, so it was actually a beautiful city set up around all of these gorgeous canals. It took as all over and gave us some of the history of Amsterdam, so it was really really cool to see. Later, we went to the Anne Frank Huis. I had no idea before I went to Amsterdam that it was there, but I found out from some people when I was trying to figure out what to do there and stuff, and people recommended it. Luckily we bought tickets before, but the line was hugeeee, so we didn't have to wait. The house was done sooo well, it was really sad but really interesting to see at the same time. I hadn't known the entire story of everything, so it was really cool to see how the family was hiding in a big annex with another family, and find out what happened to all of them. Anne Frank's father actually lived and went back and eventually published her diary and set up the Anne Frank Huis in Amsterdam. It was very cool, and definitely my favorite part of Amsterdam.
Sorry, this was not so detailed because we didn't have tons of time to do stuff there, but I am moving on to blog about our super long trip because I have tons to talk about and little time to blog before I leave yet again!
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Well I suck at blogging
Well okay, I apologize because I am probably the worst blogger in the history of someone studying abroad. I am really sorry because I haven't actually updated anyone on what I've been doing. Rather, I have been giving you updates on the Top 10 list of Spain. But, it's time I will tell all of you what I spend my time doing.
So the last thing I think I blogged about (about what I do in Spain) was going to the Sierra Nevada. I apologize because that was like 3 weeks ago. So, I had class the second week, and then I made plans to go to Madrid the last weekend of January. I had already been there from when we visited my sister, Katie, who studied abroad in Spain, so I kind of had a general sense of what was there and where things were and stuff. I went with Audrey, Danielle Smith, Lauren Pusateri, and Caroline Argall. We took a bus at 7 am on Friday to Madrid. Sidenote - the bus system is really popular in Spain, which is actually pretty cool because it's cheap and efficient (kind of). Anyway, we left at 7 am to get to Madrid at about noon. This was our first of many 5 hour bus rides to Madrid, because most flights go out of Madrid, so in the future (including this weekend) we have to leave at midnight on Thursday night/Friday morning to take a really early flight on Friday morning. ANYWAY back to Madrid.
On the 5 hour bus ride to Madrid, we have a half hour stop at a bus station on the way there. The bus station we stop at seriously is like the Wildfire of Spain. Not really but, it's so nice, its pretty close. They have pastries and sandwiches everywhere and all of this stuff, kind of strange but SO nice, especially compared to bus stations I have seen in my lifetime. Anyway, we got to the Madrid bus station at about noon, and figured out how to get to the metro stop that was right by our hostel. The metro is such an efficient system, I wish they had something more like it in Barrington, but that's probably not really realistic. We have the El in Chicago but its kind of sketchy, in my opinion. Anyway, we took the metro (cautious for pick pocketers), and got to our hostel at about 1. Our hostel was in the PERFECT location, right in between Palacio Real/Plaza Mayor and the museums, kind of directly in between the two. We couldn't check in until 1:30, so we waited in one of their common rooms for about half an hour. We checked in and were able to go to our room, which was this..
Audrey and I stayed in 8 person room, and Danielle, Lauren, and Caroline stayed in a different 6 person room. There was a girl from New York staying with us, a couple girls from France, a couple girls from Italy and a girl from Ireland. Very interesting to try to communicate when your only common language is Spanish. It wasn't hard, just kind of funny. Anyway, we got all settled in, and then decided to go get some lunch, the menú del día to be exact, because it's such a good deal. I said it before but you get an appetizer, a main course, dessert, beverage, and pan (bread). The girl from New York in our hostel came with us, and we got a delicious meal. Actually to be completely honest I got scared when our main dish was coming out because I got fish, but it wasn't just a filet of fish, it was literally a GIANT slab of fish meat with the skin half on. I gagged, but tried it and it was delicious. For dessert I got an orange. By the way, I forgot to mention in my last blog post that another of the main food groups in Spain are oranges. I have eaten more oranges in the last month that I have in my life in total. They are grown here and are SO DELICIOUS, so I eat 3 a day. So tasty.
After we ate, we walked over to Plaza Mayor, the GIANT Plaza in Madrid. There are a lot of "plazas" in Spain, which are literally just like big squares but have restaurants and seating and a lot of people go there. Plaza Mayor is probably equivalent to 8 plazas in Granada put together.
GIANT. I love it though. We walked through for a while, and took lots of pictures. There are a ton of people in plaza mayor, including some very interesting street entertainers, including this fellow..
Please tell me what this is.... it's a goat type aadvark animal in a confetti suit. I don't understand what some people do. After, we walked over to Puerta del Sol, kind of the giant collection of streets and stuff in Madrid, which is in between Plaza Mayor and the museums. We walked around there for a little bit and went to some stores around there, and then went and stopped and got a café. We planned our trips to the museums around the times that they were open to the public free. We waited at a café and then went over to Museo del Prado, which is one of the most famous museums in Spain. A ton of people went while it was free, so there was a line but it moved really quickly. Museo del Prado has a lot of works of Diego Velazquez, Goya, El Greco, and more! There are a ton of beautiful paintings there, so it was great to see. One of the most famous ones is "Las Meninas", which is a painting of an infant of the royal family with some ladies in waiting helping her. It's HUGE! I learned about it in my art class freshman year of college, so when I went and saw it this time it was really awesome.
We walked around the museum for a long time, and then we went back to our hostel to rest for a little bit. We got up and got ready and then went over to to a nearby plaza to get dinner. The prices in Madrid are kind of expensive, but we got sandwiches and drinks. After, we went back to the hostel to have some drinks with other people staying in our hostel, and we met some French guys staying in our hostel, which was hilarious. We hung out with them, and then it was one of the guy's 21st birthday, so we went with them to some nearby bar which was kind of a club but bar. It was really really fun. We went to a couple other places, and then went home. Fun times.
The next morninggg we woke up and got ready. The hostel had free breakfast which was basically toast, and corn flakes with warm milk. Not my favorite but whatever. We decided to go on a free walking tour of Madrid that started at 11:30. We went for about half an hour and then decided to not do it because we had already seen half of the stuff that he was going to show us, and we needed the time to go do some other stuff. The guide was really cool, but we just didn't have the time. We walked over to Palacio Real to go on the tour there. Palacio Real is the royal palace of Spain. It's HUGE and BEAUTIFUL.
We took tons of pictures, then went inside and got a student discount (win). Since it was so cheap, we decided to rent these giant phone type things that were kind of an audiotour. You look ridiculous because it looks like a giant phone, but it was actually really cool. The Palacio is HUGEEEE and soo beautiful. There is so much decoration everywhere, and tons of famous paintings. It's literally gorgeous. I wouldn't mind marrying into the Spanish royal family, just saying. The tour took a couple hours, but it is so worth it. After, we walked over to a nearby restaurant and got lunch (at like 330), we were LITERALLY starving. The food was delicious. We knew we were going to go over to the Reina Sofia at 6 pm because it was free, and lunch took about an hour, so we went and walked around and went into some shops and markets. At about 6, me and Audrey went over to the Reina Sofia, which is a really interesting museum, because most of the exhibits are a lot more modern, AND you are allowed to take pictures (which is strange because I've never heard of that in a museum), but it was so cool.
Guernica by Picasso
Guernica (above) is one of the most famous paintings by Picasso and it's in the Reina Sofia. You had to stand behind a thing to take pictures of it, but it was awesome. Audrey and and I went up to this other exhibit that was temporary, but it had some of the COOLEST things I had ever seen. There was a room with a photo of different people, all from ages 1 to 100. It was awesome. There was another exhibit in another room with the front page of newspapers from ALL over the work from September 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks. It was so cool. Very moving.
We left and went back to the hostel and rested, and then went and got some dinner at this random place, but it actually turned out to be delicious. I got tortilla española, which is kind of like this egg quiche thing with onions and potatoes. So tasty and delicious. After we went and drank at the hostel, and then went out for a while.
The next morning, we went to EL RASTRO! El Rastro is this GIANT flea market, and it was pretty close to our hostel, so that was awesome. They have sunglasses, clothes, purses, jewelry, shoes, and tons of stuff everywhere. It is a pick pocketer's paradise, but it's so cool! I got a pair of sunglasses and some scarves. I want to plan my trips around stuff so I can go back to El Rastro because there is tons of stuff I want to go back and get. Everything is super cheap, but it's so cool. After, we grabbed some lunch, and then went back to the hostel, grabbed our stuff, and then got to the bus station to take our bus back home. On the way home our bus probably stopped 10 times, who knows why, but it went by quick, and we got home. OH! Best part, I forgot, our bus driver ran into a sign. It was hilarious. Anyway, we got home safely and life was good.
This is all for now, I will blog again later today about my week and then Amsterdam. Preview: weirdest city ever.
Love you all!
So the last thing I think I blogged about (about what I do in Spain) was going to the Sierra Nevada. I apologize because that was like 3 weeks ago. So, I had class the second week, and then I made plans to go to Madrid the last weekend of January. I had already been there from when we visited my sister, Katie, who studied abroad in Spain, so I kind of had a general sense of what was there and where things were and stuff. I went with Audrey, Danielle Smith, Lauren Pusateri, and Caroline Argall. We took a bus at 7 am on Friday to Madrid. Sidenote - the bus system is really popular in Spain, which is actually pretty cool because it's cheap and efficient (kind of). Anyway, we left at 7 am to get to Madrid at about noon. This was our first of many 5 hour bus rides to Madrid, because most flights go out of Madrid, so in the future (including this weekend) we have to leave at midnight on Thursday night/Friday morning to take a really early flight on Friday morning. ANYWAY back to Madrid.
On the 5 hour bus ride to Madrid, we have a half hour stop at a bus station on the way there. The bus station we stop at seriously is like the Wildfire of Spain. Not really but, it's so nice, its pretty close. They have pastries and sandwiches everywhere and all of this stuff, kind of strange but SO nice, especially compared to bus stations I have seen in my lifetime. Anyway, we got to the Madrid bus station at about noon, and figured out how to get to the metro stop that was right by our hostel. The metro is such an efficient system, I wish they had something more like it in Barrington, but that's probably not really realistic. We have the El in Chicago but its kind of sketchy, in my opinion. Anyway, we took the metro (cautious for pick pocketers), and got to our hostel at about 1. Our hostel was in the PERFECT location, right in between Palacio Real/Plaza Mayor and the museums, kind of directly in between the two. We couldn't check in until 1:30, so we waited in one of their common rooms for about half an hour. We checked in and were able to go to our room, which was this..
Audrey and I stayed in 8 person room, and Danielle, Lauren, and Caroline stayed in a different 6 person room. There was a girl from New York staying with us, a couple girls from France, a couple girls from Italy and a girl from Ireland. Very interesting to try to communicate when your only common language is Spanish. It wasn't hard, just kind of funny. Anyway, we got all settled in, and then decided to go get some lunch, the menú del día to be exact, because it's such a good deal. I said it before but you get an appetizer, a main course, dessert, beverage, and pan (bread). The girl from New York in our hostel came with us, and we got a delicious meal. Actually to be completely honest I got scared when our main dish was coming out because I got fish, but it wasn't just a filet of fish, it was literally a GIANT slab of fish meat with the skin half on. I gagged, but tried it and it was delicious. For dessert I got an orange. By the way, I forgot to mention in my last blog post that another of the main food groups in Spain are oranges. I have eaten more oranges in the last month that I have in my life in total. They are grown here and are SO DELICIOUS, so I eat 3 a day. So tasty.
After we ate, we walked over to Plaza Mayor, the GIANT Plaza in Madrid. There are a lot of "plazas" in Spain, which are literally just like big squares but have restaurants and seating and a lot of people go there. Plaza Mayor is probably equivalent to 8 plazas in Granada put together.
GIANT. I love it though. We walked through for a while, and took lots of pictures. There are a ton of people in plaza mayor, including some very interesting street entertainers, including this fellow..
Please tell me what this is.... it's a goat type aadvark animal in a confetti suit. I don't understand what some people do. After, we walked over to Puerta del Sol, kind of the giant collection of streets and stuff in Madrid, which is in between Plaza Mayor and the museums. We walked around there for a little bit and went to some stores around there, and then went and stopped and got a café. We planned our trips to the museums around the times that they were open to the public free. We waited at a café and then went over to Museo del Prado, which is one of the most famous museums in Spain. A ton of people went while it was free, so there was a line but it moved really quickly. Museo del Prado has a lot of works of Diego Velazquez, Goya, El Greco, and more! There are a ton of beautiful paintings there, so it was great to see. One of the most famous ones is "Las Meninas", which is a painting of an infant of the royal family with some ladies in waiting helping her. It's HUGE! I learned about it in my art class freshman year of college, so when I went and saw it this time it was really awesome.
We walked around the museum for a long time, and then we went back to our hostel to rest for a little bit. We got up and got ready and then went over to to a nearby plaza to get dinner. The prices in Madrid are kind of expensive, but we got sandwiches and drinks. After, we went back to the hostel to have some drinks with other people staying in our hostel, and we met some French guys staying in our hostel, which was hilarious. We hung out with them, and then it was one of the guy's 21st birthday, so we went with them to some nearby bar which was kind of a club but bar. It was really really fun. We went to a couple other places, and then went home. Fun times.
The next morninggg we woke up and got ready. The hostel had free breakfast which was basically toast, and corn flakes with warm milk. Not my favorite but whatever. We decided to go on a free walking tour of Madrid that started at 11:30. We went for about half an hour and then decided to not do it because we had already seen half of the stuff that he was going to show us, and we needed the time to go do some other stuff. The guide was really cool, but we just didn't have the time. We walked over to Palacio Real to go on the tour there. Palacio Real is the royal palace of Spain. It's HUGE and BEAUTIFUL.
We took tons of pictures, then went inside and got a student discount (win). Since it was so cheap, we decided to rent these giant phone type things that were kind of an audiotour. You look ridiculous because it looks like a giant phone, but it was actually really cool. The Palacio is HUGEEEE and soo beautiful. There is so much decoration everywhere, and tons of famous paintings. It's literally gorgeous. I wouldn't mind marrying into the Spanish royal family, just saying. The tour took a couple hours, but it is so worth it. After, we walked over to a nearby restaurant and got lunch (at like 330), we were LITERALLY starving. The food was delicious. We knew we were going to go over to the Reina Sofia at 6 pm because it was free, and lunch took about an hour, so we went and walked around and went into some shops and markets. At about 6, me and Audrey went over to the Reina Sofia, which is a really interesting museum, because most of the exhibits are a lot more modern, AND you are allowed to take pictures (which is strange because I've never heard of that in a museum), but it was so cool.
Guernica by Picasso
Guernica (above) is one of the most famous paintings by Picasso and it's in the Reina Sofia. You had to stand behind a thing to take pictures of it, but it was awesome. Audrey and and I went up to this other exhibit that was temporary, but it had some of the COOLEST things I had ever seen. There was a room with a photo of different people, all from ages 1 to 100. It was awesome. There was another exhibit in another room with the front page of newspapers from ALL over the work from September 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks. It was so cool. Very moving.
We left and went back to the hostel and rested, and then went and got some dinner at this random place, but it actually turned out to be delicious. I got tortilla española, which is kind of like this egg quiche thing with onions and potatoes. So tasty and delicious. After we went and drank at the hostel, and then went out for a while.
The next morning, we went to EL RASTRO! El Rastro is this GIANT flea market, and it was pretty close to our hostel, so that was awesome. They have sunglasses, clothes, purses, jewelry, shoes, and tons of stuff everywhere. It is a pick pocketer's paradise, but it's so cool! I got a pair of sunglasses and some scarves. I want to plan my trips around stuff so I can go back to El Rastro because there is tons of stuff I want to go back and get. Everything is super cheap, but it's so cool. After, we grabbed some lunch, and then went back to the hostel, grabbed our stuff, and then got to the bus station to take our bus back home. On the way home our bus probably stopped 10 times, who knows why, but it went by quick, and we got home. OH! Best part, I forgot, our bus driver ran into a sign. It was hilarious. Anyway, we got home safely and life was good.
This is all for now, I will blog again later today about my week and then Amsterdam. Preview: weirdest city ever.
Love you all!
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