Blogs from El Puerto de Santa María, Andalusia, Spain, Europe

April 24thand that special day that comes around for Gretchen has arrived, her birthday! And we have to spend part of it on the road south to a town near Cadiz called El Puerto de Santa Maria. They love their long place names in Spain and it’s often fun when you are trying to make them out in their abbreviated form on the signposts. Our apartment near Espartinas just outside of Seville has been a great place to stay and again we have had everything we wanted to make life easy and at a great Air BnB price. Maria Jose (not quite sure why she is Jose as we thought that was a man’s name) has been a lovely host and we have had good conversations with her and her English is very good. She has ... read more

I didn't really have enough to talk about for two individual blogs, so this is my experience of two of the biggest festivals in the Cadiz area. Carnaval is a worldwide tradition that mostly takes place in primarily Catholic countries in the lead-up to Lent. Carnaval de Cadiz is famous all over Spain, with people flocking to the city from as far away as Barcelona and beyond for the 10-day festival. Before we went to Grazalema for the first weekend, we saw the Carnaval kick-off in style at the Teatro Falla. The streets were full of people partying in costume, as inside the theatre, the finals of the singing competition were taking place. Groups train for the whole year to sing about politics, topics in the news, and everyday circumstances, all of which are original compositions ... read more

So, we are still at my cousin's house. Her house is beautiful!!! And so are her chillins but I mean they are cute little fat tan babies. If you know me you know brown babies are my FAVORITE!! For the Sauer relatives she has twins ad they are about 10 months old. Anyways... Our second day in MAdrid Caryn and I basically just ate. We had churros con chocolate. You dip them and they are not typical churros they didnt have cinnamon and sugar but they were obviously delicious with chocolate. We also ate paella which you are supposed to have with seafood BUT the pics showed them still having their heads so we just ate it with chicke. It was good but it was basically chicken and rice so you know. The next morning we ... read more

Well, I am now in El Puerto de Santa Maria which is south Spain near the water. I am getting a crash course in Spanish. Muy dificil! I took a bus from Avignon, France to the Marseilles airport to catch a 2100 flight to Madrid. From there I had to find my way to the hotel. Once I did find it, it was worth it! The hotel was a TRUE 4 star, with the biggest king size bed I have even seen and a bathtub!! Mind you all, I have been staying in places with small showers, so this was nice. The TV had FIVE channels in English. After being in France and nothing outside of Merci, and Au Revoir, could I understand. So, I am also happy to be in Spain, where I comprendo un ... read more