Granada

On the train on the way down here, I happened to sit across from 2 girls, Tizzy & Alice, one Spanish and one English, who´d gone to English boarding school together. The hostal I´d booked over the phone I couldn´t find on the map, and the guy had been quite rude, so we all got a room together in another hostal which was down near the south of the city, and then we spent the next 2 days hanging out together, so it was really good to do some things with other people after being on my own for a while.

I spent most of Sunday jumping in and out of various fountains around Granada. It wasn´t my idea, but as the day got hotter and hotter, it seemed like a very good one. We hung out for 2 days, seeing some sights, taking in some of the festival of music and dance, including a flamenco show out in the barrio where it was just us and all the locals, who were generally from the housing commission flats nearby, and also somehow I got to be part of an acrobatic show put on by some famous Morrocan acrobats.. I´m not one for audience participation, but some how I got involved, and I have the photos to prove it!! Alice & Tizzy then went back to Madrid, and I moved to a really excellent hostel, where I met heaps more great people and had a wonderful time. So good in fact that I extended my stay.. twice!! I love Granada...

I visited the Alhambra again, and it was just as good as I remembered.. I also saw an amazing photo exhibition of Jazz photos of John Coltrane, Eric Dolphy and others. The first night in the hostel I ate communal dinner with everyone, and then a whole bunch of us went out dancing and I got home in the very wee hours of the morning... Let´s just say the the next day was a bit of a quiet one ;^) But I managed to go to the Arabic Baths for bathing and a massage. Not quite as good as the korean baths back home, but you can´t have everything..

Did a big tapas circuit in Granada that night, because in Granada all the tapas is free!!! Myself and a few others left when some of the English guys started doing the shots in the shots bar where you light your mouth on fire after you drink, and one guy breathed in at the same time, then his friend set his fingers alight.. lets just say I knew that in a bar you can´t move in, where some stupid guys are playing with fire, is not such a great place to be...especially if you had a big night the day before and it´s already well into the early hours of the morning..

The next day I went on a day trip to a river in the Sierra Nevada, and you can swim in the incredibly fresh clean and a little cold water. At the village we stopped in on the way, I took some water from the town fountain which was crystal clear and direct from the mountain top. An old tio started talking to me and told me that after drinking from the fountain, I´d be married in 4 months!!! Hmmmmm...

The following day I sent another package of stuff home, helped by Alex and Leona who kept saying "do you really want to carry that?", visited the Lorca museum, went to see the caves in Sacramonte, and finally had a farewell dinner with some of the people from the hostel.

It was very hard to leave Granada.. it´s a town I could definitely live in...