Sorry, no pictures in this one, just long, boring text. You'll find out why toward the end.
This will be the first of a few posts trying to get up to date. All summer I was moving around a lot and didn't have a permanant place to live. It all started on a whim the last day of April. I had to decide whether I would stay where I was living or leave it to chance, trusting that I’d find a place in due time. I decided to risk it. May was my last month in that apartment. Connor came to visit the last week of May and stayed with Bryan. By the end of the month, I was, too.
June 1 will go down as one of the most stressful days of my life. We hadn’t communicated well enough, I guess, and we ended up leaving Bryan’s later that we expected, but it wasn’t a big deal because we still had plenty of extra time …or so we thought. We missed the first bus to Santander, but it would be no problem to take the second bus. That bus was stuck in traffic and arrived thirty minutes late. We arrived at the airport 20 minutes before our flight was scheduled to leave. This might not have been a problem, but we had to check Connor’s giant back, and Ryanair makes a simple process ten times as complicated. We reached the front of the line and after calling the luggage-packers the woman told us, “Sorry, you’ve missed your flight.” NOOOO! After all that planning, I had no idea what I’d do next. Thankfully, one of us decided that we should go to the gate anyway. We ran through the terminal and the kind flight attendants at the gate were able to check Connor’s back for us, and we made our flight!
I was so relieved when I sat down in the plane that I struck up a friendly conversation with the Italian woman next to me. She had a fear of flying and shared her Bach Flower Remedy with me. I found out from google later what it was exactly, basically a placebo mixed with brandy.
We arrived that afternoon to Pisa, conveniently walked from the airport to our hostel, and checked in. It was probably one of the nicest hostels I’ve ever been to. Along with a ton of other services, it included a full kitchen so that you could make your own meals.
Afterward, we went to the touristy part of Pisa, the “mall” as they call it. We didn’t go up the tower (too expensive and too long of a line), but we did go into the cathedral and the baptistery. The baptistery offered a really pretty view of the cathedral and while inside, a man who appeared to be an ordinary guard started belting out a tune to demonstrate the acoustic qualities of the building. I was impressed. His one voice turned into what sounded like an entire men’s choir. I had to look around to make sure no one else was singing.
The next morning we took the train to La Spezia, a nearby city with less tourists. There I had my first focaccia, and I took advantage of the wealth of cappuccinos. We walked to the ocean and back, taking in the Italian atmosphere, before hopping back on the train to get to the first city of the cinqua terre (“the five lands”).
Despite all of the tourism, Riomaggiore was really pretty. From there we took the “walk of love” to the the second land, Manarola. This city I remember most for its incredible view of the brightly colored buildings at the edge of a steep cliff overlooking the ocean. Though they have similar views, this city’s was easily the best and most memorable. I don’t remember anything interesting being in the third city, Corniglia. The fourth, Vernazza, is known for its shopping opportunities (shopportunities? J), but I will always remember it for the licorice gelato that I tried. Yum. In the final city, Monterosso al Mare, we bought some more foccacia as a late lunch, and then we chilled on the beach. I hadn’t brought any trunks, so I bought some, and then Connor and I took a dip.
As the sun was setting we realized we still had a lot of time left in the day, so we took the train another city over, to Sestre Levante. I very possibly enjoyed this down-to-earth Italian city more than the overly-toured cinqua terre. We walked along the beach and port there for a while and then found a place to have dinner. As the sun was setting over the ocean, I had a romantic pizza dinner in Italy with my two buds. On our way back to the train station we stopped for gelato. I got the “frutti di bosco” flavor, and it was the best I’d ever had.
The next day we decided on a whim to go to Lucca in the morning. Connor thought it was really boring, but I really liked the feeling of the city. The main part of it was surrounded by a medieval wall. Nearly everyone there had a bike, and it seemed to be a city with a character all its own. I was glad we went, if for no other reason, to let Bryan see a place he’d never been before.
After Lucca, we trained it to Viareggio, a coastal town near Pisa. We walked to the beach, then looked for something to eat to bring with us. After walking in the sand forever, we realized that we were never going to reach a public beach. So we plopped down at one of the private areas and payed a little bit to use their facilities. We chilled there on the beach for a while and swam before getting rained on.
Train back to Pisa, then we took another train to Rome. I don’t exactly remember how it all went down, but we accidently ended up on the first class train and didn’t have to pay for it. It was really nice. All three of us were able to lie down 180º in a private coach.
We arrived late in the evening to Rome, but fortunately my and Connor’s hostel was nearby. Unfortunately, it was overpriced, overcrowded, and had very few services. Connor and I found an overpriced kebab for dinner.
We squeezed nearly all the sights into Saturday: P. della Republica, P. Venezia, the Roman forum, the Colosseum, P. Popolo, P. Spagna, Fontagna di Trevi, Castello San Angelo, Basilica S. Pedro. We had lunch at Sugu, my favorite restaurant from my last visit. I had fresh pasta, but I didn’t like it nearly as much as the gnocci. That night we made another pasta dinner in the hostel with Bryan before he had to leave, followed by a game of Fluxx.
The next morning, Connor and I went inside the Colosseum. One of the best decisions we made was buying the ROMA Pass, which allowed us to not only take all the public transportation without paying but also skip the line when entering the Coliseum. Afterward, we went the catacombs of San Callisto. The catacombs never disappoint.
That afternoon we met with our first Couchsurfing host of the trip. His name was Andrew, and he was a post-graduate student from Colorado. He’d been living in Italy a while, so he knew Italian very well and was familiar with the local haunts of Rome. After getting settled into to his amazing apartment, we went out for bruschetta, pizza, and beer at a restaurant east of Termini, followed by gelato, of course. This time I chose the cinnamon, another excellent choice.
On Monday, Connor and I packed some lunches and headed to the Vatican museum. We spent several hours exploring all the galleries. Finally, in the courtyard area of the museum, we sat at a table and gobbled up the sandwiches we’d prepared. Then I let Connor take the reins. He wanted to get some souvenirs, so we tracked down the Disney store and the Hard Rock Café. For dinner that night, Andrew took as to a restaurant famous for its artichokes. Yum. We also got various pastas that were simple yet satisfying. Then we went to yet another gelato place. At this one, I finally found my favorite flavor that I hadn’t been able to find since I left Buenos Aires. I forget the Italian word, but in Spanish it’s called sambayon.
The next morning we successfully made it to the airport and out of Rome to the Spanish city of Valencia. From my first jaunt through the city, I loved it and could see myself living there. We walked around the central part of the city for a while, and then I let Connor experience the Spanish “menu del día”. He ordered some sort of pork dish that begins with an “o” and he wouldn’t stop talking about how much he enjoyed it. Our Couchsurfing host wouldn’t be able to meet us until later, so we decided to go to the famous aquarium. When we arrived, we only had an hour to see the whole place and it started pouring down, so it was a faced-paced trip through the exhibits, and when we went outside, we nearly became fish ourselves. It was, however, an incredible museum, the best I’ve been to. There were several parts that you could walk through or crawl into, and you’d be completely surrounded by water and fish.
After that we finally met Pablo. It was his first time to host a Couchsurfer, and he was really enthusiastic. There was an interesting dynamic because Pablo didn’t speak English, and Connor didn’t speak Spanish, so I had to, or got to, go back and forth, and play translator from time-to-time. I enjoyed having the power to tone down anything embarrassing or inappropriate that Connor said. After talking a while, Pablo took us to a really fancy restaurant on the beach, where we had an authentic Valencian paella, complete with rabbit meat. As starters, we also had some little clams that were pretty good.
The next day, Connor and I wondered around the City of Arts and Sciences to look at the other buildings, and then we went to the beach, where we got rained out for the third time on Connor’s trip. We went back to the city and explored the Lonja and the Central Market. Later, we met up with Pablo and a few of his friends. He wanted to show us off to his coworkers and prove that we were normal, since many people are skeptical of the kind of people who travel via Couchsurfing. All of us went to the neighborhood called “horchata”, where the famous drink originated, and we drank the drink, made of chufas, translated into English as “tiger nuts.” Between these and fartons, a sweet bread stick that you dip in the horchata, Connor and I had many a giggle. For dinner, Connor and I made Pablo some quesadillas and guacamole. Pablo seemed to be especially impressed with how easy it was to make guacamole, and he planned to make it again in the future.
On Thursday morning, too soon, Connor and I left Valencia by bus, arriving in Madrid five hours later. We crammed a lot into our first day here as well. We saw the Puerta del Sol, Plaza Nueva, el Palacio Real, and more as I played tour guide to Connor and some girls we met in the metro. I think they were Russian. As we were looking for a place to have lunch, we ran into a professional tour guide, and we spent the rest of the afternoon following her. At first she showed all the same stuff I had just showed, but with more detail, of course. She showed us La Latina, the suicide bridge, the cathedral, the palacio, puerta del sol, and the tour finally ended in the barrio called Letras, which was filled with all sorts of names that I recognized from my Spanish literature classes. Then Connor and I went to the Prado museum, where I got to see all the Goyas that I missed last time. After the museum, we strolled through Retiro Park, ending at the Puerta de Alcalá, so that I could look at the bullet holes.
Finally, we went back to the bus station to get our luggage, and from the bus station we went to our last Couchsurfer’s house. On the way, the unthinkable happened. As I boarded our final metro train, a man started shouting at me. Before I knew what had happened, the metro doors were closing, and I no longer had my camera. This was the camera I’d bought after my last one was stolen in the Buenos Aires metro. Ugh. Duped twice. I was really angry and disappointed in the world the rest of the day, but I tried to remain pleasant. After all, it could have been worse.
Emilio and his girlfriend Paloma were really cool. Our first night there, Emilio was already making us spaghetti.
The next morning, I filed a report at the police station, more as a formality than anything else. Then Connor and I went on a mini food tour. We had napolitanas, bocadillos de calamaris, and chocolate con churros. We also went to the Plaza de España, and the Templo de Debod, where Connor and I relaxed on a park bench and played Word Scramble on his iPhone. Out of ideas, we went back to Emilio’s apartment and had a siesta before dinner. Emilio and Paloma, took us to Lavapies for tapas en lavapies. First we had a giant Galician sandwich and Galician wine, followed by patatas bravas and real sangria. We joined the two to a concert that one of their friends was in. It’s interesting to note that English is the language of rock, so even Spaniard rockers still use English lyrics, even if their audience has no idea what they’re saying.
The next day, a Saturday, I accompanied Connor to the airport and then I took a bus back to Bilbao. I stayed at Bryan’s for a few more days before coming to Oklahoma. I spent the remainder of June and the beginning of July with my family before returning to Spain for more adventures.
