My second trip out of Barcelona was two weekends ago and it was to the beautiful city of Sevilla in the south of Spain.
The trip started out to a rocky start since we had to meet on Friday morning at 4:30am and it just so happened to be St. Patty's Day Thursday, so you know everyone went out, thus most didn't go to bed at all. I wasn't one of those people though because I know how I get without sleep and I definitely did not want to be grumpy and sleepy all day. Needless to say, everyone was exhausted regardless of the amount of sleep or no sleep people got, so it was a pretty quite plan ride and bus trip.
Once we got to the Hotel, which I must say was probably the best hotel we have stayed at since arriving in Spain, we had a two hour period of free time before our tours of the Cathedral and the Palace, so we all grabbed something to eat at the nearby grocery store and headed to the hotel lobby to relax. The hotel lobby was a sight to be seen. Every chair, ottoman, couch and table was occupied by someone in our program and every one of them was knocked out. It was hilarious! I tried to snap a few photos, but I felt kind of like a creep and decided to just lock the images in my head.
After a nice little nap for most, I didn't sleep but rather played on my iPhone for two hours, we headed out on our tour of the Cathedral and the Palace. The Cathedral, which is the third largest in the world, was very beautiful. The architecture, like most gothic style building, was amazing to see and the view from the top of the tower of the city of Sevilla was breathtaking.
Cathedral in Sevilla
View from the top of the Cathedral overlooking the city and the river
Inside the Cathedral is the tomb of Christopher Columbus, well actually one of his tombs. He has five tombs altogether, which each hold a portion of his ashes. His tomb in Sevilla is held up by four statues because he said that he refused to be buried under Spanish ground.
The tomb of Christopher Columbus
After our visit to the Cathedral we headed over to the Royal Palace where the king and queen of Spain stay when they visit Sevilla. It was a gorgeous palace with so many beautiful gardens and decorations on the buildings. I will admit that during the tour I split from my tour group and wandered around with a few other students to see more of the gardens and outdoor sights because the weather was just absolutely perfect and I had no desire to stay inside, so we explored the gardens, fed ducks and fish, and took lots of photos.
Perfect example of Spanish architecture
One of the gorgeous gardens
Me feeding a duck haha
The rest of the day was spent sleeping and being lazy since everyone was so tired. Then a nice dinner and bed.
The next day we headed to the small city of Cadiz, which was absolutely amazing! So beautiful and the weather was perfect. We did a little sight seeing at first, but everyone was very anxious to get to the beach, so we soon split away from the tour guide and headed to one of the beaches. I couldn't believe how warm it was and how many people were in the ocean. I of course didn't bring my bathing suit and was stuck wading in the sandbank because I couldn't go any farther without getting my capris soaked. I really wanted to go out to the first sand back and take pictures with my friends, so one of my friends gave me a piggy back ride to the bank and we had a good time taking pictures and fooling around. Then it came time to head back to the beach and of course my friend who had gotten me over to the bank had already gone in, so I called for one of my guy friends to come get me. And of course who comes to my rescue? The birthday boy who is already a tad tipsy haha. I knew it was a bad idea from the get go, but he promised me he was fine so I hoped on his back and what do you... he drops me straight into the ocean and I am soaked. This really wouldn't have been such a bad thing except for the fact that I had my camera in my hand and that also landed in the ocean :( So since I was already soaking I waded through the water back to the beach and thankfully one of the boys offered me there shorts to wear on the ride back since there was no way my jean capris were going to dry in time. The trip was overall amazing though and even though my camera didn't make it I still had a blast and the birthday boy had the best birthday ever! We headed back to Sevilla that afternoon and that night we celebrated Peter's 21st birthday.
Cadiz!
Holding up the birthday boy!
On our last day in Sevilla we went on a bike tour of the city. Now I haven't ridden a bike since middle school, so I was a little hesitant to get back on one. It was a little rocky at first and I definitely had to get back in the rythm of peddling, but it came back to me and I had a blast. The weather again was perfect and we had a great time seeing different parts of the city and getting exercise at the same time.
Me on a bike for the first time since middle school haha :)
Par of our group on the bike tour :)
After the bike tour we had some time before we headed to the bull ring for a tour, so I met up with a friend from high school that is studying in Sevilla. It was really good to see her since I hadn't seen her since our Spanish class senior year! After a short visit and lunch with Molly, my group headed to a tour of the bull fighting ring where we saw the ring and the museum of how bull fighting came to be. It was interesting, but I have to admit I don't really think it's something I would ever watch or really approve of, but then again it's a culture thing.
The bull fighting ring
After the tour, we headed to the airport where we were informed that our flight was delayed an hour so we had a nice three hour wait for our plane back to Barcelona. We eventually did make it back though, and with enough time to catch the metro :)
Love y'all!
xoxo
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