Week 3 : Simply Wonderful

This last week wasn't full of any big trips or really grand events, but it was a week that I truly enjoyed.

Our first outing was a Real Madrid Game! It was so fun to experience the life of a Futbol game. We decided to get their early in order to explore the surrounding area, so it gave us a good chunk of time for pictures.

Then one of the girls in the group wanted to go to the "official" store for the team so we walked around the stadium to find it. As we got to store they weren't letting anyone in and there were a lot of people hanging around. Then all of a sudden the policemen on horses and other on foot started moving the people from the area we were in. It was so interesting to see a calm but forceful act of the police here, it was kind of fun to experience. We figured it was because of the entrance for the teams so we decided to stick around to see the buses come. I didn't get great pictures but it was fun to watch it all happen.

Then we got into the stadium which was really great! Outside we had purchased some cheap gear to wear. We had a little triplet set of Alyssa, Jake and I so we have a picture of that too!

Here is the whole group. It was so much fun and I am so glad that I experienced it. It was not at all like I would have expected. The people were very calm, when there was a good play they just clapped. Real Madrid played a Ukrainian team as part of a European championship. Madrid won 4-0 so it was great to watch!

Here are some videos to help you experience some pieces of the game!

Then here are just some random shots from our little town of Alcala! The first 2 pictures are of a cute little restaurant in the downtown area that I just thought was so cute looking!

Here is the building that we have classes in. It was built in the 17 century, but has had many renovations since then, but one of the coolest things is the doors that we walk through everyday, there is definitely a different feel to this campus than BYU.

Alyssa and I discovered this cute little courtyard/garden in the middle of one of buildings, It was a beautiful, picturesque setting. Needless to say we loved it!

Then with our free weekend we spent most of it in Madrid. On Friday we decided to do a temple session. It was a lot of fun! I was a little nervous to do it all in spanish, but it worked out really great so I am excited to go more often in the future! Here are some fun pictures!

Then we stopped at a little grocery store and I just loved that they had these in the frozen section so I thought I would share them with you.

Then we headed over to el parque del retiro. It is a huge park with multiple bonds and monuments, random museums and a glass palace shown below! It was gorgeous. I don't think it had any other purpose than to just be a beautiful building. All of the girls decided it would be a pretty amazing place to hold a wedding reception!

Katherine and I!

Then my friend Jessie took some pictures of me as people were feeding the birds!

Alyssa got to be really close to the birds and feed them, and I enjoyed watching!

Then we found a free museum of contemporary art. It seemed to be an extension of the Reina Sofia, it had a lot of cool art and here was one I decided to share!

Then we found another little pond like body of water with this huge area with statues and row boats. It was really fun to just chill there!

There were a lot of people in the park playing music so I thought I would share a clip with you of one of my favorites!

It was a really lovely day and I loved just having a chill day where we got to accomplish so much!

Then on Saturday we headed back into Madrid. First we went to the botanical gardens. Of course to make it really perfect the main flower they had in bloom was Dahlias which are my favorite flower so I took some pictures of ones that I really liked!

Then there was this cute little pond with lily pads and all and one little water lily. The funny thing is that all of the frogs were off to the side of the lily pads. Can you see them in the picture below?

Then we headed back to el parque del retiro to rent row boats!

Here is our little row boat team! We had a lot of fun just paddling around!

This week was really great. It was nice to relax a little and still do some really fun things! I am so happy to be here and hang out with all of these other wonderful students. This week we are heading to Barcelona so I am excited to see even more of this lovely little country!