I. Am. Tired.
This weekend has taken everything out of me. I was trying to create a lovely post with pictures from my excursion this weekend, but for some reason Blogger is being difficult and keeps ruining my words when I add photos, so I have decided to ignore the photos for now.
On Friday we had our Picos de Europa excursion which involved four stops - a monastery, the Picos, a town called Potes, and a really old church (10th century old). The excursion got off to an unpromising start as I was feeling incredibly bus sick...I'll spare you the details.
We went to the monastery where we got to touch a piece of the cross Jesus died on. Yeah, right. Not to be a Doubting Thomas or anything, but I just don't understand how anyone can claim such a thing!
Next we headed to the Picos de Europa, were we crammed into tiny cable cars to go up the mountain. We were rewarded for this death-ride (my already being nauseous plus my claustrophobia does not lead to a good experience) with a view of fog. We could barely see 10 feet ahead of us, it was that foggy.
Next we headed to a town of Potes. At this point we were all dragging and most of us would have been content to stay on the bus. Instead we wandered into tourist shop after tourist shop, buying last-minute Spain gifts for family and friends.
Next we headed to a teensy little church that was built in the 10th century before hitting the road to Santander. I was exhausted and slept the entire way.
Once back in Santander I had dinner then headed over to Kyla's in the hopes of doing homework. On a Friday night. There's a reason this group calls me "Grandma". Obviously.
Her host mom (best host mom on this trip, hands down) took us out for Sangria with the two girls from University of Texas who just moved into Kyla's house. Their program just started and they'll be here for the next six weeks. These girls are the sweetest girls I have ever met in my life. Since Kyla and I have been here longer and have been taking Spanish longer, we were able to play translator for them when Kyla's host mom was talking, which made us feel like Spain has really been teaching us.
We returned to Kyla's where I decided to abandon homework for the evening and just go home and go to bed. I'd been getting sick (some bug had been going around among my class) and was feeling pretty tired so I thought if I wanted to go out on Saturday, I better save my energy.
On my way home I stopped at the plaza where everyone was meeting and ended up running back home to change before heading back to go out with them. We sat on the steps for a while, where everyone was drinking bottles (or boxes) of one-euro wine (I refused to drink any, informing everyone that it tasted like church) before we went on to the next destination.
While we were in the plaza the group from Texas showed up and I ran over to say hi to the girls staying with Kyla (Kelsey and Kendall). They (and some other people from their group) came to the shot bars with us, and joined us in our random wanderings of the city. Our group got separated so many times, and everyone's phones are out of minutes so we would wander pretty blindly trying to find people. Whenever we ran into someone, the first thing out of their mouth would be, "Abbie you're still here?!"
It was late.
I finally got home at 4:00 a.m. with absolutely no voice - I was squeaking like a teenage boy going through puberty. Bars are loud!
On Saturday morning I got up, wrote three papers (go Grandma!), wandered to a few stores, had lunch, then spent a few hours at the beach. The weather was absolutely perfect, but my fear of skin cancer led to me using too much sunscreen to get tan. I suppose my skin will thank me later...a lot of people were looking like lobsters.
After the beach I headed home to shower, then went to the market to Skype Jonny and then my family before dinner. After dinner I watched a movie before going out at 11:30. I only lasted an hour-and-a-half last night - didn't even make it off the plaza steps! My voice was still gone and I was completely exhausted.
I woke up this morning after eight hours of sleep, ate breakfast, then immediately went back to bed to take a nap. I have a terrible cough and a stuffy nose. I haven't tried my voice yet, but I'm betting I'm still squeaking like nobody's business.
Today is going to be a lazy day - I'm going to go home and read and study and go to bed early early early!
This week is our last week of school plus our finals week, so I really need to be on top of my game! I have a presentation on Tuesday and finals on Wednesday and Thursday, plus have to fine-tune those three papers I wrote this weekend to turn in.
I can't believe I only have five days left here. My time here has really flown by and it seems like I haven't been here very long at all, but at the same time I feel like it's been forever. I have gotten so much out of this trip, and I'm definitely ready to be home.
Hope you all are having a great weekend!
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