Sudie

On the bus from Seville to Faro, Jenny turned to me and said, "Sudie - why are we going to Faro?" "I don't know," I said. "Emily read a travelblog about it." Thus we ended up in Faro. Quite frankly, I'm still not sure why we made such a stop. The town was nice, yes . . . and it had a beach . . . about 20 minutes by bus from our hostel. But really there was nothing special about Faro. I guess I need to track down this travelblog Emily read and see what sounded so tempting. There is one thing that made Faro absolutely, 100 percent, hands-down worth the one night stop. Apparently there had been some sort of national band competition at the same time we were there. I have no ... read more

The land of the labyrinthine medina continues in Morocco’s “grandest imperial city.” Fés has a very different feel from Marrakesh; while the latter is alive with a vibrant (yet slightly contrived) energy and the colors of a desert sunset, Fés is more subdued. The city’s medieval medina is also its greatest attraction, so the hassle is definitely still evident. By the time I had spent 2 days in Marrakesh I was getting more annoyed with (and thus more sensitive to) the constant bombardment of shopkeepers begging for business. I think my impression of Fés may have suffered from this reality . . . had I had a break (say for a camel ride across the Sahara), I think I would have been more ready to tackle another medina. There was one thing about the Fés ... read more

As much as I wish we could say we found Humphrey and Ingrid in Casablanca, I think we're some decades and a reality away. We did, however, find the third largest mosque in the world. This was actually our only reason for stopping in Casablanca since we had heard the city itself was a dirtier and less charming Rabat. From our walks between the train stations and the mosque, with the exception of a few nicer streets, we found this statement to be pretty accurate. The Hassan II Mosque is quite stunning; King Hassan II, who was inspired by the verse from the Quran that states God's throne was built upon the water, developed the idea for this mosque right on the ocean and made the project his crowning achievement. The guided tour (the only ... read more

Oh Granada . . . Of the four Spanish cities we visited, this is the one I had been looking forward to the most. I had only heard wonderful things about Granada - home to the Alhambra, one of Europe's most visited sites. However, this is also the city that seemed to pass by in haze. After getting a mediocre night's sleep on our bus from Valencia (I was amazed to actually nab a broken 4 or 5 hours) we arrived at the Granada bus station around 6 am. We hopped a local bus as dictated by our hostel's directions, navigated the streets in the dark (since it gets light surprisingly late), dropped off our bags at the Oasis Backpacker's Hostel, and rushed up to the Alhambra. Before we arrived in Spain we hadn't realized ... read more

After frantically writing a total of 13,000 words in about two weeks, I turned in 5 final papers and officially ended my term at NUI Galway. Thus, it was time to celebrate with our three week Easter break whirlwind tour of Spain, Morocco, and Portugal. On March 30th four of my friends and I caught a Ryanair flight into Barcelona (well. . . Girona, technically, since Ryanair doesn’t exactly fly into the most convenient airports). After catching a bus from the airport to the city center and then navigating the metro system, we made it to the Sant Jordi Diagonal Hostel. I was quite pleased to find that my Rick Steves’ Spain guidebook, which my brother had purchased from the British Amazon and had mailed to the hostel, was waiting at the reception desk when ... read more