Week 2 : The Beach, France, the french beach and more!

Here is a picture of me in La Plaza de Cervantes. 

It is the main hubbub of our little town of Alcala. I thought you all would live to see it.

We just had 2 days of class last week before we headed out on our 4 day excursion, so we didn't do much earlier in the week.

This first picture takes us to Burgos.

We were heading up to the north of Spain and apparently our bus driver has to take a break every 2 hours so we got to get a quick little tour of Burgos on the way to San Sebastian. We had a tour guide that took us around the town and gave us a tour of the large cathedral there.

Here is the river outside of the main entrance into the city

La Puerta de Santa Maria (gate to the city)

So there were having this huge bike race through the main part of town so we couldn't take a very good picture in front of the cathedral, but Alyssa can also get in a quick selfie of the 2 of us.

Here is a bad picture of the rose window over the main entrance.

Here is the front of the main chapel. It is the Cathedral of the Holy Mary and so the scenes that you see in this picture are depictions of her life.

Here is the center part of the ceiling, I thought it was very lovely.

Right underneath it is the grave of El Cid. A work of literature was written about him and his life and we just read it in my Spanish Literature class.

One of my favorite parts of this cathedral was the Choir. They are always really beautiful, but having a tour guide helped me see even more details. In the squares above each seat scriptural scenes are depicted. The row on the bottom is old testament and the row above is the new testament.

Then there was this special entrance for the pilgrims that was just beautiful that I thought I would share.

Just to the side of the stairs that had a painting by Leonardo Da Vinci, Which was of course super cool to see. Here is a picture I got from the internet. Our tour guide said that it resembled the Mona Lisa.

Here is a miniature of the Cathedral.

Then there was this lovely courtyard which showed some of the wonderful detail of the cathedral.

Here is a cute little street in Burgos that we found with a little free time.

Then we finally made it to San Sebastian. Some in the group decided to get in the water, but I did not. It was fun to be on the beach.

Then in the center of town there were these cute little kids playing soccer, so I just snapped a shot of them.

Then on Thursday of our trip we were so close to the french border that we just decided to cross it. we stopped in 2 little towns. Here is the first one. I took a picture of a sign, just to prove that I was in another foreign country.

Here is a picture of the French Beach!

Then I just thought I would capture some of these cute little parts of town.

Then I saw this cute little pastry shop and so I thought we should go in, as I was deciding which french pastry to buy, since I couldn't really miss the opportunity, I want to talk to one of the attendants and she didn't speak an english so I just pointed to one that looked good and I gave her the money and we were on our way. I had no idea what I had purchased, it ended up being a little pie with apples and walnuts, but it had this delicious caramel like filling, it was really fun!

Then we headed over to Biarritz another french town. This time we were dropped off right on the coast. As part of the cultural experience our teacher took us out to eat crepes. So I got a french hot chocolate and a crepe of course!

More French Coast

Some French Chocolates

Cathedral by where we waited for the bus to pick us up. It was a lovely experience being in France, but I did not like being lost when it came to the language. I definitely came to the right foreign country in order to feel comfortable.

After we headed back to San Sebastian, that was when we officially went swimming, no pictures but I did have one of the beautiful beach as the sun was setting that night!

Then on Friday we headed over to Bilbao, which is a cute little town with a little museum called the GUGGENHEIM! It was so amazing outside! Then as we went inside I was surprised by how little there was in the museum. The top 2 floors were dedicated to 2 contemporary artists, Jeff Koons and Jean-Michel Basquiat. Then my favorite exhibit was The Matter of Time by Richard Serra (Pictured here)

 These structures were just huge and they were really fun to walk by and to walk in!

 Then of course the building itself is quite a work of art so here are some pictures exhibiting that!

Cool Water Reflection

Spider Sculpture out front

After the museum we had a few hours of free time which was fun because Alyssa and I happened upon a museum the Basque Country. So in the northern parts of spain and southern parts of france there is a unique group of people that have their own culture and language. So on this trip we saw all of the signs in spanish and basque. The language is not latin based and is very different, but it was fun to learn a little bit more from the museum. This 3-D map shows the terrain of the area I am referring to.

Then here is some old fashioned cross-stitching!

Some other cool artifacts.

Both Alyssa and I had a little cold so we stopped in a store to get some cough drops and I found these Mentos which I thought were funny, and they really don't sound that appetizing. I don't think they have these in the states so I thought I would share.

Another cool feature of the town is a huge river that flows through it. Alyssa and I felt like we were back on the river thames, we liked it.

A cool building in the middle of the town.

Candid From Alyssa

Then we had a relaxing night at the hotel eating overpriced food and getting ready for our drive back.

Here is a snack I ate for lunch on our drive back on saturday. Almost every bar has tapas, which are little meals or appetizers that you get with a purchase of a drink.