So it was about time that I took a trip to visit Louis in Ávila. I managed to catch the last us and got there just in time for the trip to the kebab and then, the bars!!! Despite it's size, Ávila seems to have a healthy proportion of young people and therefore...bars! Hurray! Besides that, Shannon had appointed herself my winglady for the weekend. If perhaps I had mastered the knack of Spanish chat-up, we may have made an indestructable pair. But as it is. Im absolutely bloody useless at pulling in Spain. Ah well. It was a good night [View Full Entry]

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As much as I love La Mancha, it is always nice to get away. I spent the whole of January waiting excitedly to spend the next Puente in Lisbon and Porto. As usual it was the normal mad rush to Madrid and the the airport. I seem incapable of chilled travel. We had organised to couch surf too, and as it was my first time I was pretty nervous. Im not sure why, I had hosted without any difficulties, and looking back...there was nothing to be worried about. So we headed over to our host's neighbourhood. Reluctantly handed over our smallest [View Full Entry]

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So we have all heard of Casablanca. Humphry Bogart running a bar in French Morocco and hanging out with the ex-pats. Its a sultry image, a stylish and cosmopolitan enclave in Africa. In reality, Casablanca is nothing like its Hollywood image. But then again, what is? Real-life Casablanca is the largest city in Morocco, although not its capital (Rabat) and as such it is a busy and sprawling city with an affluent centre that gradually extends out into more residential and communal areas. Apart from the modern nightclubs and restaurants that line the coast, it is true that Casablanca is not [View Full Entry]

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As a little girl, I would sit fascinated upon my Grandad's knee as he described his adventures in the British army in Africa and India. As a poor young lad he had joined up before the war and had seen the marvels of the world before War tore them to pieces. As he would tell his stories of Tiger hunting off the back of elephants, and wandering through the sahara, I could imagine the heat of a summer afternoon, I could smell the perfume of spiced food wafting out of a kitchen window, I heard the noises of the general street [View Full Entry]

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First of all. Feliz navidades a todos! The christmas spirit is setting in here in Spain. The Christmas lights are up around the town, galaxies of stars cascade from all the shop windows and Santa's sleigh rides across ever street. All the government buildings have lost their austerity and are wishing us "feliz fiestas". Nativity scenes adorn ever church doorway, all the figurines face the empty manger, ready to gaze lovingly at the expected arrival. The Christmas lights make up a little for the cold that is setting in strongly here. Everyone is nursing their health a little with colds, flu [View Full Entry]

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A sign directed at a view point in the Parc Guell questioned proudly in prefect English..."if it is tourist season, why cant we shoot them?" It made me think. I live in Toledo, a city renowned for its historical value and beauty. UNESCO has declared the whole of the old town a world heritage site, making Toledo unique in the world. And I will admit that when I first arrived, I was as lost in the warren of smal winding casco streets as any tourist that I might have to scoot round on my way to work now. But I get [View Full Entry]

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La Viñuela is a small village in the Axarquía mountains outside Velez Malaga. Although the modern vilage dates from the 16th century, when it was on the royal road between Granada and Velez, archeological evidence sugests that people have lived here perhaps since palaeolithic times. The surrounding ladscape is a breathtaking sweep of low mountains from which the sun bursts in the mornings. At sunset, the mountains almost seem to mourn the loss of the day's sun as they smoulder away like molten copper. I personify these hills because there is no other way to describe them. Standing in these mountains, [View Full Entry]

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This weekend I spent some of the best days I have had in Spain in the company of Americans. few foreigners and I were welcomed into their Thanksgiving celebrations, far from the U.S. and our families, we made our own international Thanksgiving. And I would just like to take this opportunity to apologise for all the times I have generalised about American stupidity, or ignorance or any other Stereotype that the whole world enjoys loading onto the U.S.A. Apart from a certain girl from North Dakota who insisted on the being the exception that proved the rule, all the Americans I [View Full Entry]

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As a Brit, I am often dissapointed by my government in their lack of moral fibre and principles. I am of course proud to be British, and hail from the same land as Rhubarb Crumble, King Arthur, London fashion, Radio 1 and T4 on a Sunday morning. But sometimes, and especially recently with our 'brits abroad' foreign policy in the middle east, I fail to see how a country that spawned such articulate people such as Shakespeare, Dickens, Austen, Locke, and even blimming JK Rowling...are upstaged by the oral perfection that was the King of Spain, telling Hugo (Im telling Castro [View Full Entry]

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So as promised, at the first opportunity I got, I went to visit my Grandmother in Andalusia. As it was a puente, and Stephanie had never been to Malaga, we decided to make a road trip out of it. So, after dropping my worldy possesions off to my third flat in the month of October (the flat I found after our Columbian disaster had turned out to be a virtual OCD library) we headed off to grab our bus to Madrid, and then our bus to Malaga! Thanks to my trusty Carnet Joven, our return tickets were 20% off! Costing each [View Full Entry]

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