On Sunday
it was time for us to continue our trip to Seville, the capital of Andalusia. After
a refreshing bare foot jogging on the beach me and E headed to north. We had
the whole day to find our way to Seville, so we made a pit stop in Jerez de la
Frontera, a city with a population of 210.000, to have a coffee in the sun in
the ancient market square and enjoy the local flea market atmosphere.
Once again,
our unbelievable luck with finding places without a map didn’t let us down, so
we had no problems returning the rental car and finding our hostel The Garden
Backpacker amidst the labyrinth of narrow alleys in the Seville city centre. We’d
found the hostel in hostelworld.com and would highly recommend it to all young travelers!
The price (13.95/person/night in a 6 bed female dorm) had free breakfast, WIFI,
laundry, bed clothes, sight-seeing walking tours, pub crawls, etc included - and
free sangria every night! They also organized paella tastings, flamenco nights
and other kinds of activities, but we were so busy to discover the city on our
own that we decided to skip them this time.
The stay in
Seville didn’t start the best possible way with my tummy not liking the tapas
we ate in a local place on Sunday evening. I spent the most of the night having
the weirdest nightmares and sitting on the bathroom floor (and when I finally
was able to go back to bed a couple of French girls started some kind of show
in the dorm so nobody could get any sleep). Anyway, by a miracle I woke up
feeling surprisingly fresh and was ready to explore the city!
On Monday
we did nothing but shopping (I bought 2 pairs of jeans, a cardigan and some
underwear to replace those I guess I’ve forgotten somewhere along my trip), on
Tuesday we went jogging early in the morning, visited the most important sights
(Plaza de España, the palace Reales Alcazares and the Cathedral) and spent the
rest of the day sitting in a park or by the river or in a café sipping a jug of
sangria – and since the sun was shining from a cloudless sky, we totally burnt
our faces.
Even after two days my face is still glooming in the dark like
Rudolph’s nose. E’s Spanish roommates laughed their heads off of the sight of
us (but E’s sun burn is already turning into tan). On Wednesday we’d planned to
rent city bikes and make a bike tour round the centre, but the price was pretty
high (12 € fee + 1 €/hour. In the hostel we would’ve got the bikes for
9€/3hours but we hadn’t made a reservation and didn’t have time to wait for the
bikes to arrive) so we decided to make a couple of hours’ power walk instead
(and burn our faces in the sun even more).
Oh yes, on
Tuesday night we were in a local tavern having a huge cheese and ham cocktail
plates with bottles of wine (the whole meal cost less than 9€/person) and
watching El Clasico (a cup match Barca – Real Madrid). I’ve timed my trip well
because on Saturday night there’s a La Liga El Clasico played in Madrid – and I’m
in Madrid then!!!
Yesterday
(Wednesday) we flew from Seville to Zaragoza, where I’m staying in E’s place ‘til
Saturday. I haven’t seen a lot of Zaragoza yet, but from what I’ve seen so far,
it’s very different from the Southern Spain. In Andalusia the houses were more decorated
(and looked like they’ve been in need of renovation since the Second World War:
you could really tell people are poor down there) and cities more Mediterranean,
chaotic and labyrinthine with their narrow allies. Zaragoza reminds me more of
German big cities like Cologne. I can’t tell which style I like more, both are
great in their own ways!
I lost
my gloves somewhere in Seville. It’s not too bad, ‘cause I guess I won’t need
them until in Dublin next week. Lost items so far: camera, make-up bag,
underwear, gloves (luckily the camera is on its way to Spain per mail, as I
wrote in the last post).
Budget so
far:
Flights:
112 €
Other
transport: 195 €
Accommodation:
102 €
Food: 100 €
Shopping: 70
€
Others: 10 €
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=589 €
