Doing Well
So, life in Granada continues. Some highlights:
-I went with my group to the Sierra Nevada and walked... 9 miles? 9 kilometers? I think it was 9 miles, but however long it was, it was very exhausting.
-We went to a flamenco show. Expensive, but very fun. Want to see another. :P
-Canada girl has left the homestay. Host mom was very stressed and things just weren't getting reconciled. I'm just glad it's over cause it was very stressful to listen to.
-We went to the park yesterday with host mom's granddaughter, whom I am starting to love dearly. Also, their playgrounds are freaking fantastic and I want to play with them. We also fed ducks (which look nothing like our ducks back home) and we met up with a friend of host mom who has a dog that looks almost exactly like Rex. I loved it very much.
-Classes started yesterday- started at 8:30 am which was yuck. Dunno if I wanna keep that class cause it doesn't look so much fun? But we'll see. I think I have until Tuesday to decide? So I'll have one more day of it. I have three classes today and no time to go home for lunch, which sorta sucks, but host mom made me lunch. I just don't like that I have to be at the school for 8 hours. We'll see if I can find something to do. Might bring laptop to write? Idk. We'll see. That might be a bit too much weight.
-I signed up for Sevilla trip. Hope that it fills up, cause there's only 6 people, including me, who've signed up, and we need a loooot more. Crossing fingers.
But yes, expanding on Sierra Nevada hiking, cause that was the most important thing of the week. It was not at all what I was expecting. I was expecting a dirt trail or something, not so steep- like going for a walk, just in the wilderness. Nope. We took a bus out to a village and then had to walk out to the mountain from there. Already that was about half a mile uphill. Then we had to walk through an olive tree field (where we ran into a farmer and his two lovely dogs). Finally we reached the mountain. We began our trek, and I quickly realized I was unprepared. I was wearing jeans, a tshirt, converse, and was carrying my water/food in a messenger bag. About half an hour in, I was sweating, and tired, and was having a hard time breathing. It was very steep. The girls asked me if I wanted to stop. I did want to, but I had come all that way, and I had been so excited about going, and I knew I was going to be sad if I didn't get to the top. So I said no, I wanted to keep going. They gave me a back backpack, which helped immensely, I went a bit slower, and we started taking more frequent stops. It worked. We made it to the top at around 12/12:30, and had lunch. The view from the top was absolutely amazing. We were in the lower level of clouds, and they would roll in and out and soaked us, and we couldn't see anything when they were around us, but when they cleared we could see all the way back to the city. The girls decided to climb another small peak that was near us (I went to the base of it but didn't go all the way up) and took even more cool pictures. At last we started to go down, which was much easier on breathing/my heart, but hurt my feet a lot. Some girls slipped and it ended up being a good thing that we brought bandaids and ace bandages and hand sanitizer. We had a lot more conversation going down- ended up talking about horror movies because of the fog. :P We thought we got lost a couple times cause the path took forks and the markers weren't always so easy to find, but we eventually made it down alive.
I'm so happy that I went. It was one of the most physically demanding things I've ever done, but I perservered and had an absolutely amazing time. I'll take it as a life lesson. Few things can be harder than climbing the Sierra Nevada. :)
-I went with my group to the Sierra Nevada and walked... 9 miles? 9 kilometers? I think it was 9 miles, but however long it was, it was very exhausting.
-We went to a flamenco show. Expensive, but very fun. Want to see another. :P
-Canada girl has left the homestay. Host mom was very stressed and things just weren't getting reconciled. I'm just glad it's over cause it was very stressful to listen to.
-We went to the park yesterday with host mom's granddaughter, whom I am starting to love dearly. Also, their playgrounds are freaking fantastic and I want to play with them. We also fed ducks (which look nothing like our ducks back home) and we met up with a friend of host mom who has a dog that looks almost exactly like Rex. I loved it very much.
-Classes started yesterday- started at 8:30 am which was yuck. Dunno if I wanna keep that class cause it doesn't look so much fun? But we'll see. I think I have until Tuesday to decide? So I'll have one more day of it. I have three classes today and no time to go home for lunch, which sorta sucks, but host mom made me lunch. I just don't like that I have to be at the school for 8 hours. We'll see if I can find something to do. Might bring laptop to write? Idk. We'll see. That might be a bit too much weight.
-I signed up for Sevilla trip. Hope that it fills up, cause there's only 6 people, including me, who've signed up, and we need a loooot more. Crossing fingers.
But yes, expanding on Sierra Nevada hiking, cause that was the most important thing of the week. It was not at all what I was expecting. I was expecting a dirt trail or something, not so steep- like going for a walk, just in the wilderness. Nope. We took a bus out to a village and then had to walk out to the mountain from there. Already that was about half a mile uphill. Then we had to walk through an olive tree field (where we ran into a farmer and his two lovely dogs). Finally we reached the mountain. We began our trek, and I quickly realized I was unprepared. I was wearing jeans, a tshirt, converse, and was carrying my water/food in a messenger bag. About half an hour in, I was sweating, and tired, and was having a hard time breathing. It was very steep. The girls asked me if I wanted to stop. I did want to, but I had come all that way, and I had been so excited about going, and I knew I was going to be sad if I didn't get to the top. So I said no, I wanted to keep going. They gave me a back backpack, which helped immensely, I went a bit slower, and we started taking more frequent stops. It worked. We made it to the top at around 12/12:30, and had lunch. The view from the top was absolutely amazing. We were in the lower level of clouds, and they would roll in and out and soaked us, and we couldn't see anything when they were around us, but when they cleared we could see all the way back to the city. The girls decided to climb another small peak that was near us (I went to the base of it but didn't go all the way up) and took even more cool pictures. At last we started to go down, which was much easier on breathing/my heart, but hurt my feet a lot. Some girls slipped and it ended up being a good thing that we brought bandaids and ace bandages and hand sanitizer. We had a lot more conversation going down- ended up talking about horror movies because of the fog. :P We thought we got lost a couple times cause the path took forks and the markers weren't always so easy to find, but we eventually made it down alive.
I'm so happy that I went. It was one of the most physically demanding things I've ever done, but I perservered and had an absolutely amazing time. I'll take it as a life lesson. Few things can be harder than climbing the Sierra Nevada. :)