Nerja

On Friday I went to one of the coastal towns in Spain called Nerja.  It's located along the Mediterranean coast, and there are a bunch of beautiful beaches there.  Ashley, Amy W., Amy M., and I stayed in Nerja for two days (one night).  Let me just say that although this was not the smoothest trip yet, it was still a lot of fun and definitely worth it!

Here are some of the reasons why this wasn't the smoothest trip ever: First of all, planning our trip to Nerja was not very easy.  Since we don't have classes Monday or Tuesday of this coming week, the four of us knew that we wanted to take a short trip somewhere this weekend.  We couldn't decide where we wanted to go or how long we were going to stay there for.  We finally decided on Nerja but we originally we were going to stay there for two nights.  I found a cheap hostel online called Hostel Azahara.  It was only 10 euros per person/night and included breakfast in the  morning.  I made reservations for us to stay there from Friday to Sunday.  On Thursday, the day before we were going to leave for the trip, Amy saw on the weather forecast that it was supposed to rain all day Saturday and Sunday.  We decided on only staying in Nerja one night and coming back Saturday.  However when I called the hostel to try to cancel the second night the man working didn't speak English very well, didn't really know what I wanted to do, and told me that the only way that I could cancel the reservation was online.  After a lot of confusion, Amy finally was able to call and talk to him and get it straightened out.
Another thing that didn't go the smoothest was the bus situation.  We ended up not even buying our tickets until that day at the bus station.  That always makes me nervous, but we were able to get the 9:00AM tickets to Nerja like we had planned on getting.  The problem was that none of us realized until the next day that the lady who sold us our round trip tickets sold us return tickets for that same day and not for Saturday.  Since we didn't realize this mistake until Saturday (when the bus for our purchased tickets had already left) they made us buy new tickets in Nerja and wouldn't let us exchange our old ones! That was very unfortunate that it was pretty much 10 euros down the drain.  Oh well what can you do.

Anyways, like I said before we left for Nerja around 9AM on Friday.  After about a two hour bus ride we arrived at the gorgeous coastal city. Our hostel was literally right in front of the ALSA bus stop in Nerja which was very convenient.  Hostel Azahara was a cute little family owned hostel.  The four of us had our own room with a bathroom and a mini fridge in it, which was very nice.  After checking in to the hostel we put on our swim suits and headed to the beach.  There are little beaches all along the coast in Nerja, with a few bigger ones too.  First we checked out the Balcon de Europa, which was once a fortress in the 19th century and is now a beautiful balcony overlooking the sea.

Next we walked along the shore, exploring some of the smaller beaches and climbing the rocks and such.  We decided that we were going to walk down to one of the larger beaches to lay out. The beach that we stayed at for most of the day was called Playa de Burriana.  The weather was really sunny and nice that day.  It didn't feel unbearably hot though because it was pretty windy along the shore.  Although we all put on 50 SPF sunscreen, Amy M, Ashley, and I all ended up missing random spots and getting some pretty bad and painful sunburns. The worst for me is the backs of my legs, especially right under my knees, and the line where my tank top ended, right near my armpits. I did get my first ever watch tan line though which I'm pretty excited about.

After laying out on the beach for hours, reading, napping, and enjoying the weather, we walked back to the hostel to take showers before dinner.  We walked all the way back to the beach after showering because we wanted eat dinner at this pretty famous Paella place.  Unfortunately it was only open until 6PM and it was 8:00 by the time we got there.  Instead walked back to this Italian restaurant that we had passed on the way there to eat dinner.  When we passed it we had seen a ton of people eating there and a sign that said Pizza for 3.50 euro.  It worked out nicely though because we all got a ton of food for super cheap! Ashely and I split a pitcher of Sangria that only costs 5 euro (so 2.50 each).  I ordered pasta for 3.50 euros so I was really surprised when it was a ginormous plate.  The Amy's each got veggy pizza that was really large too for only 3.50.  Amy M. got pizza and pasta because it was so cheap so why not haha.  After dinner we went back to the hostel.  Since we were so drained from being in the sun all day went to bed somewhat early.

On Saturday Amy M. actually ended up taking an earlier bus home.  Her sunburn was really bothering her and she didn't feel like paying 8.50 for the caves that we were going to go to, 1.50 each way for the bus, and then 2 euro that they made us pay at the hostel to leave our luggage there since we had to check out by 11AM.  Unfortunately there were a lot of random added expenses like these on this short little trip.  After breakfast Amy W., Ashley and I said goodbye to Amy M. and got on the bus to go to the Nerja Caves.  It was only about a 15 minute bus ride to the caves.  The "Cuevas de Nerja" are natural archaeological caves that have the Guiness World Record for having the world's widest column shaped by the merge of a stalactite and a stalagmite.  They were definitely really cool to see because I have never seen caves before!

After the caves we walked back to the beach area for lunch.  Amy and Ashley wanted to get Paella from the famous Paella place that we had tried to go to the day before.  I actually still had one of the two sandwiches that my senora had made for me the day before, so I figured I would save the 6.50 and just eat that.  I'm so glad that I got to see the restaurant in action though because it was so cool to see the entire process as they made the HUGE batches of Paella and served them out plate after plate after plate.  It was definitely a really popular restaurant.  6.50 for unlimited Paella with a bunch of seafood and chicken in it is a really good deal.  We were watching as the cook made a fresh batch and started talking with him.  He was really nice and friendly and even let Amy come "behind the scenes" and stir the Paella with the huge paddle that he was using.

We really lucked out with the weather on Saturday because it ended up not raining much at all.  After lunch we went back to the bus station and bought tickets for the next bus home, which conveniently was in 15 minutes.  It was a really fun trip, even with all of the added complications and expenses.  Next weekend I am off to Portugal with everyone from my program! I'm so excited for that.  I really can't believe that these are my final weeks in Spain.  It has definitely been the experience of a lifetime though.