Not quite enough sun

After all the fun in Cordoba I was beyond exciting for a couple relaxing days on the beach.

So when I got there, the first step was get into a bathing suit and onto the beach! From there I met up with my friend Paul and we headed out to lunch. I was thrilled because we were going to have a typical Malaga lunch...consisting of all fish! Pescado frito (fried fish) is the THING you have to eat when visiting Malaga. Glad that got checked off the list!

Following that was more beach time...and possibly a siesta on the beach :)

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that it was a relaxing day on the beach which was perfect after all the commotion that had just happened in Cordoba. Since I was really only going to be in Fuengirola for 2 days, 1 night, we had to take advantage and go out for a little bit that evening. So we went out for some typical Spanish tapas (ensaladilla rusa, huevos con atun, boquerones...) and then moved on...to an Irish pub.

Normally in Spain that would be a strange thing to find but on the Malaga cost there are TONS of foreigners hence why there are so many English and Irish pubs. I was excited for this one though because, as Paul let me know, there was going to be a live band. They weren't anything big but they were playing tons of classics  (in English) that everyone there knew. In addition to that excitement I also got to try a typical Irish cider (Magners) which was pretty good.

Well our night was pretty short out because the next day we really had an adventure...picking up trash on the side of the highway! How exciting.
               
Paul actually helped organize a group together to do a variation of "adopt-a-highway." The idea was we'd go out to an area where this same group had actually planted trees earlier in the year. We headed there and with about 40 of us, we managed to clean the area with the trees in just a couple hours. Plus we got t-shirts and hats, who doesn't like that?

just some of the people that came out to help

After breaking a serious sweat we all headed to a park nearby and got some paella cooking. Unfortunately there wasn't enough time for me and Paul to wait for the paella because I had to go catch a bus back to Cordoba. We still had to eat something so we headed to a tapas bar, el Cañubo (ni caña, ni tubo), and then we were off...or rather I was off. And back to Cordoba I went...


That night in Cordoba I was going to try the feria again, hopefully this time with a little less excitement.

And it was a success!!! We went out, danced, checked out some casetas and I even ended the night (at 5am) with a loaded Spanish baked potato. What a good end to my visit in Cordoba!

Spanish loaded potato= ham, olives, cheese + corn
 different but yummy

What a night!

I know I'm behind (again) in my posts when I just finished packing to go home and I still haven't told you about the last 2 weeks...

Tomorrow morning I'll be headed home after a wonderful and adventurous three months in Europe. I've been so busy the last two weeks visiting everyone that I've found no time to write. So I'm gonna play a bit of catch up to let you know what I've been up to.

Let's start w/ NOT being on an island and back to the mainland...

After getting back from Mallorca, I pretty much turned around, packed up my bags and headed to Cordoba. I was visiting my friend Niki and it couldn't have been better timing. Starting around the second week of May is when all the festivities start happening there and I was right on time for all of it. There's so many things to do in May in Cordoba but the one thing we were counting on doing was visiting the FERIA.

the girls heading to the feria

Now, feria literally translates to the fair...and that's what it is. A spanish fair. There are rides and food stands all filled with people BUT there is quite a difference between any fair I've gone to in the states and the ones in Spain (or at least in Cordoba)...It's pretty much a HUGE party. They have tents for everyone to go into and visit. Inside are live bands, food and LOTS of drinks. Many Spanish people dress up in their traditional outfits and dance a traditional dance from the afternoon all the way into the early morning. In case you don't know...early morning here means 7-10am. yea...that's a lot of dancing. I mean people do come and go but there are literally people around at all times (except for maybe between 10am and 2pm, but that I'm not sure since i wasn't there until the evening).

the spanish women are sporting the traditional Sevillana dresses

Here they're dancing Sevillanas

The whole idea when you go is just to stay out all night, drinking fino (sherry wine), dance and enjoy the company. If you're not careful, however, you may end up drinking too much fino, dance around a toaster with a group of friends and get a ride home in an ambulance after falling down...and that was my night. Lesson to be learned? Be careful with the fino!

We and Niki got some beautiful flowers to show off

Ya gotta have a few of these for proof of a fun night

One of the live bands in one of the casetas (tents)

This was right in front of Juan 23, a frequently visited caseta by our group

 j







This pretty much describes Feria in a nutshell...














Some of the people in "our group"

Heading to another caseta

We all got home at the "normal" time...7am. That meant we were all exhausted and dedicated the next day to rest and relaxation. And took FULL advantage of it because the next day I'd be headed to another town...this time to visit my friend Paul on the beach in Fuengirola (coast of Malaga).

Still trapped on an island pt. 2

Let's go ahead and just dive right into where we left off...

3rd day in Mallorca:
Today was, again, another day of clouds (not rain luckily) so we decided to make a move and head to Palma (the main city on the other side of the island). Only about an hour on the bus and we were there! Now to explore...

Wandering the streets...

Not sure of its complete purpose but there was running water inside/under the building...

And here's what you could see if you looked right into the structure

This street just screams EUROPE!!!










Ok now let's see what time is it?

Oh its Gelato time??? How convenient because there's a place right down the street...

barely able to contain my excitement!

half raspberry, half Jamaican chocolate

Ok, now that we've had a dose of heaven I guess we should move on to see more of Palma...

Let's see, after walking on the main street we came upon some great fountains...

This one is really similar to the one found in the Alhambra

I suppose that means I should take a few pics in front of it...

And POSE!

The camera loves me!

I think we need to get serious again and look at some more statues...onward.

Wait...what is this?

Look what we just found...a secret pond!





And if it didn't look like things could get better...a swan!

he had just dipped in for a snack...

After hanging out at the "secret" pond with Mr. Swan, we ventured around the side and up some stairs. To our surprise we found more amazing things....

The Cathedral! How amazing!

As we saw the Cathedral on our right, this view was to our left...

We just stood there for a while, looking out and admiring the beautiful place we were in.

After we came to, we headed up the stairs to the Cathedral.

(this is right above the doorway)

And to make things even better, the Cathedral was open...so we wandered inside and this was what we saw.

I just can't get over how beautiful the stained glass is in Spain.

Sisters walking around the church

That Cathedral was really quite beautiful and we all just stood in there in awe of what was before us. I mean we've all seen cathedrals before but there are just some that stand out...and this was one of them.

Once we really felt content about our visit inside, we headed back into the island sun and down to the plaza area we had gazed out onto before.

The next move: chill out

So we sat down on the steps that looked towards the cathedral and hung out for a while.

I also played paparazzi a bit...

Here were some nuns walking by.

I know this one is hard to see but it's a plane leaving Mallorca :( which would be us the next day, but enough about that, lets enjoy the day!

I have no clue who made this sculpture but I really liked it, and apparently so did my camera.

Like I mentioned earlier, this was what we were looking out towards. Oh and look what's below...

Bikers!!! So dangerous...

And no beach photo series would be complete without a seagull...

He was a very photogenic seagull I must say.

I didn't want to be a creep but these kids were just TOO cute not to take photos of.






Eventually we had to leave to catch our bus back to the other side (of the island that is)...but on the way we took some super sexy photos:

             


     I mean WHO could resist???

I also grabbed some pics of random things on the walk to the bus station:

interesting landscape idea

cute little gecko/lizard

This was just in case we forgot where we were and how beautiful it was.








That night we were exhausted and we were gonna need our rest for what we had going the next day.

4th (and last) day in Mallorca:

We had to get up "early" to get a move on to our next the final destination- Sóller (pronounced like Sawyer)

This town was a recommendation from a friend as well as the hotel receptionist. In order to get there however we needed to first head to Palma, drop off our luggage (so we wouldn't have to carry it around) and then take another bus up to Sóller.

Since the island isn't that big it only took us a few hours to run all those "errands" and make it to the town. From there it was all exploring. Fortunately there were a few signs to help us out with where we were going...

From there it was mostly easy sailing.

Pretty quickly we found our way into the town square of Sóller (which is mostly what there is there). So we sat ourselves down and got some coffee.

 Well actually only ONE of us got a coffee. Myself and another girl we feelin' the ice cream so she tried the lemon gelato while I dared to try the Sóller special, the "Sóller flip"...what a name!

if you didn't notice, there's the lemon
 sorbet in the background...

If you can't tell by the looks what this is, I guess you'll just have to go there and try it.

Ok I guess I can tell you and you can try it at home...

Its orange juice with a scoop (or two) of orange or vanilla ice cream inside and then smothered in whipped cream and topped with orange syrup stuff.

I wasn't sure what to expect but it was SUPER delicious!
TRY IT!

Beyond just loading up on sugar at the cafe we also got to experience the plaza atmosphere. What was also especially cool is that there were train tracks right next to us where a little wooden tourist train would pass by every 15min or so. It's one of those things you just "have to do" when you visit but we rebelled and instead ventured around by foot.

This is some of what you see walking into the plaza (I intentionally got that super cute dog in the pic)

Of course there's another Cathedral (or church of some sort) in Sóller.

This is just looking out from the church onto the plaza...see the train tracks?







After only 10min of wandering around we came upon a pastry shop...and since we were in a new place I HAD to try to local specialties, right? So i saw this and said YES please!

We had to keep moving before all the sweets put me into a coma.  So we started to wander down to the port. You can also take a bus there (it takes about 5 min) but we are much too adventurous for that...so we walked.

And i'm quite glad we did because we got some really GREAT pics along the way.

This was someone's garden we passed by and we all agreed we wanted to live there.



And then right after we passed another beautiful garden (pic below)...people just really have it together here in Sóller.

We were getting close BUT we had a very important decision to make. There for a fork in the road so do we go left or right?

Of course we went left...leading us upwards (should have been our first clue since we were trying to get to the ocean).

We saw some beautiful views along the way (as you can see) but at the first chance we got, one of the girls asked for directions. And they told us we needed to go right at the fork. Ok, no prob...down the hill we go.

BUT FIRST let's stop and have lunch. Not a bad view to eat your lunch too huh?

As we started to walk down the hill, after filling ourselves with bread and cheese, we saw some blackberry trees (yes these were trees). OK well we have to stop to pick some!!!

most were ripe but a few looked like this

After picking and eating our desert (the berries) we continued down hill and in the correct direction until seeing this:

PERFECT! Leaving Sóller and entering into Port of Sóller! So once again along the way we took lots of pics of our adventures. Here are a few pics:

It's pretty apparent that the trip down wasn't too bad will the flowers and all but it got even better...

This is exactly what we saw at the end of our little journey. Not a bad way to end the trip at all!

Its hard for me to even find the words for how amazing this place was. We were really lucky to finally get some sun and on such an amazing beach that we just kind of stumbled upon. By the end of the trip we were all smiles and ready for another round. I'm sure we'll all be back as soon as possible. By evening we had to head out because our flight was later that night. So we waved goodbye and were off...

literally all smiles on the bus back...