April 4th, 2013
Note to self: always be prepared for anything and everything to fall through.
These 20 days off from school were supposed to be filled with outdoor adventures through Croatia, moving up through Slovenia, breaking way through Austria, and capping off with some Switzerland. Flights booked, trains bought, hostels scouted, the works. But I guess its as they say: you can plan all you want, but something will go wrong. Amidst the sudden cancelation of my trip, I was left with 2 days to salvage my vacation; too late to book flights with other students here, too dangerous to travel alone, and no one staying in Alicante. Not to mention suffering the blows of Europe's no refund policies. They'd better thank me for stimulating the European economy out of the goodness of my heart.
Therefore, this past week has been pretty tame. So I am combining it with this upcoming week :)
The only interesting thing I did during this first week was take a day trip to Murcia, a city south of Alicante. The trip was planned halfway because a friend and I were bored out of our minds in Alicante and the other half because we desperately needed to correct our sleep schedules which had taken a serious hit from staying up all night a few days prior. Apparently, we picked a bad week to try to see Murcia as Murcia - everything was closed. Instead we attended one of the largest festivals in Murcia: Bando de las Huertas. Google tells me that this is a celebration of the development and colonization of Murcia in harnessing the river as an irrigation mechanism to create a flourishing crop-rich community. How it appears to an outsider is a festival of strange parades with ladies riding on the backs of large maggots, blowing up fireworks in close proximity to spectators, and an excuse for thousands of Spaniards to dress in traditional garb and get wasted in public with no worries of police intervention.
April 10th, 2013
Finally, I escaped the monotonous lonely life in Alicante to enjoy the remainder of the spring break in the Balearic Islands. The adventure begins!
We arrived in Valencia the night before our flight on the 9th via a CouchSurfing-esque ride share program called BlaBlaCar. A driver who is going fro, point A to point B markets the extra seats in his car to travelers looking to find a ride to the same or nearby locations. My friend Will and I managed to snag a ride with a very pleasant family of three for less than half of the price of a train from Alicante to Valencia. We spent the night at a friend of a friends apartment in Valencia, and were off to Ibiza first thing the next morning.</p>
Ibiza is well-known for their discoteca scene. It is home to the second largest discoteca in Europe, and is where many big-name house artists make their mark in the music scene. Every billboard is an advertisement for shows at major clubs like Pacha, Privilege, and Amnesia. This lively party scene, however, is seasonal. Most clubs open their doors in late May, and go out with a bang as the end of the summer in September.
We didn't do any of the above, because we came out of season :P
Instead, a friend from Alicante offered for us to stay with him in his one person flat in Ibiza. Here's the cool thing: He lives inside a castle. Literally. Where most neighborhoods have a gate, he has a moat and a draw bridge. Pretty neat. Not only that, but he us our own set of keys to his place to come and go as we please.
The first two days were spent exploring the Eivissa. I bought myself a cute new skirt at one of the many shops in the touristic part of town and we meandered up, down, across, upsidedown and right side up through the streets. Without the summer floods of tourists, Ibiza is actually quite tranquil. The best part for me was the apartment. Oh how I've missed the ability to just come home, plop on the couch, turn on a movie, and just laze the night away over food and alcohol with friends! We watched V for Vendetta (in Spanish, very difficult) as well as the WORST movie I've seen in a while: Abraham Lincoln vs. Zombies. Yes, it was as bad as the title implies. Complete with cheesy lines such as, "Emancipate THIS."
My friend did introduce us to a wonderful British comedy series called "The IT Crowd," that I highly recommend to anyone searching for a laugh.
April 13, 2013
Golly, traveling without an itinerary can sure make things interesting!
We tried to find some climbing in the eastern coastal town of San Eulari on Thursday. It didn't work out well, or at all for that matter.
Therefore, this past week has been pretty tame. So I am combining it with this upcoming week :)
The only interesting thing I did during this first week was take a day trip to Murcia, a city south of Alicante. The trip was planned halfway because a friend and I were bored out of our minds in Alicante and the other half because we desperately needed to correct our sleep schedules which had taken a serious hit from staying up all night a few days prior. Apparently, we picked a bad week to try to see Murcia as Murcia - everything was closed. Instead we attended one of the largest festivals in Murcia: Bando de las Huertas. Google tells me that this is a celebration of the development and colonization of Murcia in harnessing the river as an irrigation mechanism to create a flourishing crop-rich community. How it appears to an outsider is a festival of strange parades with ladies riding on the backs of large maggots, blowing up fireworks in close proximity to spectators, and an excuse for thousands of Spaniards to dress in traditional garb and get wasted in public with no worries of police intervention.
April 10th, 2013
IBIZA
Finally, I escaped the monotonous lonely life in Alicante to enjoy the remainder of the spring break in the Balearic Islands. The adventure begins!
We arrived in Valencia the night before our flight on the 9th via a CouchSurfing-esque ride share program called BlaBlaCar. A driver who is going fro, point A to point B markets the extra seats in his car to travelers looking to find a ride to the same or nearby locations. My friend Will and I managed to snag a ride with a very pleasant family of three for less than half of the price of a train from Alicante to Valencia. We spent the night at a friend of a friends apartment in Valencia, and were off to Ibiza first thing the next morning.</p>
Ibiza is well-known for their discoteca scene. It is home to the second largest discoteca in Europe, and is where many big-name house artists make their mark in the music scene. Every billboard is an advertisement for shows at major clubs like Pacha, Privilege, and Amnesia. This lively party scene, however, is seasonal. Most clubs open their doors in late May, and go out with a bang as the end of the summer in September.
We didn't do any of the above, because we came out of season :P
Instead, a friend from Alicante offered for us to stay with him in his one person flat in Ibiza. Here's the cool thing: He lives inside a castle. Literally. Where most neighborhoods have a gate, he has a moat and a draw bridge. Pretty neat. Not only that, but he us our own set of keys to his place to come and go as we please.
The first two days were spent exploring the Eivissa. I bought myself a cute new skirt at one of the many shops in the touristic part of town and we meandered up, down, across, upsidedown and right side up through the streets. Without the summer floods of tourists, Ibiza is actually quite tranquil. The best part for me was the apartment. Oh how I've missed the ability to just come home, plop on the couch, turn on a movie, and just laze the night away over food and alcohol with friends! We watched V for Vendetta (in Spanish, very difficult) as well as the WORST movie I've seen in a while: Abraham Lincoln vs. Zombies. Yes, it was as bad as the title implies. Complete with cheesy lines such as, "Emancipate THIS."
My friend did introduce us to a wonderful British comedy series called "The IT Crowd," that I highly recommend to anyone searching for a laugh.
April 13, 2013
Golly, traveling without an itinerary can sure make things interesting!
We tried to find some climbing in the eastern coastal town of San Eulari on Thursday. It didn't work out well, or at all for that matter.
Melissa Gets Lost: Part 1:
Despite having a guide, we (I) couldn't seem to find the crag. In fact, I am so bad at following directions that we somehow ended up at highway rotunda outside of town away from anywhere that we would ask for directions. We must have looked so lost that an older Dutch couple stopped, asked if we were okay, and offered us a ride back into town. So I guess I have officially hitch hiked? After 2 hours of bushwacking and guesstimating where in the world the climbing was, we resorted to boulder-hopping and exploring. Hey, a day outside is a day outside, and that's good enough for me.
The next day we traveled west to San Antonio. As residents of Alicante, we never see the sun set over the mar seeing that we are on the east coast. So equipped with cookies, champagne, and a hammock, we found a cozy little beach north of the more populous San Antonio to enjoy the day until the evening show. Somebody outfitted the first half of a bowed-over tree with climbing holds, so that was exciting. About halfway through the day, the quiet beach was infiltrated by a rather large party of study abroad students from Granada, thoroughly enjoying their first day on the island. We drummed up some conversation and merged groups for the remainder of our time there. Good thing too, because every last one of them became too drunk to function by the time the sunset passed and nighttime fell. We corralled them to a nearby pizzeria, assuring them repeatedly that "No, you guys aren't annoying" and "No, really, it's fine, we are happy to help." Admittedly, they were annoying when belligerent. But overall they were a very lovely group of people that added a nice little twist to the end of a relaxed beach day.
We ended up missing the last bus to the port that night. Stranded in a town on the other side of the island with our return flight to Valencia in less than 10 hours. So what are the perks of traveling with someone who is nearly fluent in Spanish? They can ask the other two people who missed the bus to share a taxi with us. What luck! Our next option was to camp overnight somewhere and hope to make our flight the next morning.
VALENCIA
12 hours in Valencia. After camping out in McDonalds for some free WiFi for about an hour, we hit the city. We couldn't have asked for a better day: cloudless skies and wonderful temps. Well, wonderful temps after we changed into shorts. Valencia is a truly beautiful city. Amidst the hustle and bustle of Las Fallas, one cannot really appreciate the stunning monuments, intricate architecture, and the energy of a city on a spectacular spring day. We even struck up some luck; two tickets to the new science and oceanography museums given to us from a couple in passing (a 60 euro value, ours free!). Will and I parted ways, him back to Alicante, and me on my way to Mallorca.
MALLORCA
Melissa Gets Lost: Part 2:
Because I was alone, I had no one to bounce my concerns and questions off of in trying to make it to my host's apartment in Mallorca. I had explicit directions: Get on this bus line, get off at this stop, call me when you get there. Either I can't read, or the bus did not solicit my stop on the overhead board. Either way, I ended up riding the bus until I got kicked off the bus in the middle of nowhere, Palma de Mallorca. I had to wait for another bus coming the other direction at 11pm at night where the only trace of civilization was the lone lightpost over my head.
Overall it was about an 1 1/2 hour detour. But my host and the other girl staying with us from Barcelona were patient with me. After a 1 hour trip to OpenCor supermarkets at nearly 2 in the morning, we went to sleep with one thing on our minds: Deep water soloing.
April 15, 2013
If there is one place I've visited thusfar that I would return to in a heartbeat, it would be Mallorca. I truly cheated myself in only allotting myself one full day. Palma alone is gorgeous; and much larger than I ever expected it to be. It (along with every other city I've been to generally) dwarfs Alicante. I can see where it can become very touristic. Apparently it is a hot spot for English and German retirees, and it shows. It reminded me a lot of Barcelona in terms of walking the streets and alleyways. But once you get out of the city, that's when it gets really breathtaking. Everything is so green! And the coasts. Wow.
We took a bus that next morning to Portocolum, a coastal town clear on the other side of the island. We had a general idea of where to find some deep water soloing, but...
Melissa Gets Lost: Part 3:
Cala Sa Nau was incredible. The water was crystalline surrounded by a cove of beautiful rock. Amongst the many beach-goers, we spotted one group that had climbing shoes and chalk by their bags. Finally! We were adopted into their group and spent the remainder of the day traversing, projecting, and laying out with our new Spanish friends from the UK. Turns out they were there just for the weekend to escape from the frigid climate of Cambridge. They even gave us a ride back to Palma! Making friends in all locations, it's just what we do.
Deep water soloing is a trip! Especially when the water is as cold as it was! I can only imagine that during the summer these locations are phenomenal. I am already looking at when my return trip will be, and look to go to Cala Barques and Porto Colum :3
After taking a short tour to the immense cathedral located in Palma the next day, I began my seven hour return trip home. As much as I love traveling, I am very excited to come home to a bed, a computer, and meals that don't consist of only bocadillos and hummus.
However, this won't stop me from going to Madrid on Thursday for five days :) Viajandoooooo!
Pictures:
We definitely reached an area that was climbable at first, but as two newbie deep water soloers, we weren't about to just jump in and ignore the inherent dangers that come with the sport. Therefore, we spent the first part of the day frantically searching the web for any sort of Mallorca DWS guide to find where established routes were. That, and praying that we would come across some climbers. I managed to scrounge up a PDF miniguide of the areas in Mallorca, and we discovered we were about two "cala's" north from an area. We ended up traversing the coastline, losing the trail a good twenty times and having to ask for directions a couple times before finally arriving on the sandy beach of Cala Sa Nau.
Cala Sa Nau was incredible. The water was crystalline surrounded by a cove of beautiful rock. Amongst the many beach-goers, we spotted one group that had climbing shoes and chalk by their bags. Finally! We were adopted into their group and spent the remainder of the day traversing, projecting, and laying out with our new Spanish friends from the UK. Turns out they were there just for the weekend to escape from the frigid climate of Cambridge. They even gave us a ride back to Palma! Making friends in all locations, it's just what we do.
Deep water soloing is a trip! Especially when the water is as cold as it was! I can only imagine that during the summer these locations are phenomenal. I am already looking at when my return trip will be, and look to go to Cala Barques and Porto Colum :3
After taking a short tour to the immense cathedral located in Palma the next day, I began my seven hour return trip home. As much as I love traveling, I am very excited to come home to a bed, a computer, and meals that don't consist of only bocadillos and hummus.
However, this won't stop me from going to Madrid on Thursday for five days :) Viajandoooooo!
Pictures:
Ibiza from the port (Cathedral on top)
Our front gate
Perfect beach setup
Sunset in San Antonio
Changing pants in public
Gulliver playground!
We are winners with cool helmets
Tortilla, wine, friends, and The IT Crowd
Camping out in McDonalds
Valencia is pretty neat
Aquarium tunnel!
Look at those cliffs!
Deep Water Soloing!
Watching some girls faceplant in water bubbles
Valencia has some really cool structures
Cala Sa Nau
What? Just hanging in Mallorca.
New friends! See you in Cambridge
Doner Kebab pizza. Oh my god.
HUGE Cathedral in Mallorca
Insane botellon-ing in Murcia
You can't go to any Spanish city without a picture of the Cathedral (Murcia)
Still can't figure out how this works
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