Madrid, Spain

via pictures.

 

Madrid: The Beginning

Keeping with the theme of my life, we are switching gears and going back to the beginning. My first day in Spain.  My first Spain-ish meal to be exact.

After arriving in Madrid at 9 am Thursday morning in my zombie state of mind, we went straight to our hotel and slept until dinner. Instead of staying in the heart of Madrid we opted to stay on the outskirts of the city, hoping to enjoy a more local atmosphere.  We decided to get some recommendations for a good place to eat; the first question that we were asked is if we wanted a traditional Spanish meal or something else.  My thought process went a little something like this, “pffft, I am in Spain! I’m all in! Give me a traditional meal!”

So off we went to a local restaurant that serves traditional Spanish food. We walk in. We seat ourselves. We are asked what we want to drink. Apparently water was the wrong answer and the server is not shy of showing his disgust.  Immediately, I am uncomfortable.  Maybe he doesn’t like tourists? But no, others come in, definitely locals and he is just as rude to them. I feel much better. We order. Well husband orders, I can’t even pick out any common Spanish words I know, like pollo or carne from the menu. It is completely foreign.

Our food comes. Two plates are put down in front of us, and I am doing everything in my power not to let my eyes pop out of my head. After all, I do consider myself a “worldly” person and I am open to trying new things.  I mean c’mon I was the girl that swallowed live gold fish for a bet- but that in an entirely a different story.

So there I am staring down the food in front of me. Raw bacon looking stuff and soggy bread. Yum. The raw bacon looking stuff is called Jamon and it is kind of a big deal in Spain. I even saw Jamon museums while strolling through the cities. Every restaurant serves Jamon. You will see the pig legs hanging in every window front. There is no escaping the Jamon in Spain.  What exactly is Jamon you may ask? It is cured ham from the backs of the legs of a pig.  And to me “cured” is the same thing as “raw” to me.

After a quick little pep talk I take a piece of Jamon and place it on top of my soggy bread and dug in.  I don’t know what was worse-  the bread or the Jamon.  Is this what I was going to have to look forward to for the next three weeks?  Was all I kept thinking.

Husband loved it though. And I got a candy bar on our walk back to the hotel.  All was right in the world again. 

Catalonia, Spain

via pictures.

Cadaques

Girona

I like to travel light. I'm a master packer. For three weeks a backup is all I need.

 

Girona

Figueres: Dali Museum

Dali's "The Hallucinogenic Toreador"; Husband's favorite Dali painting.

Catalonia: There's a man in our room

After our night in Girona, we decided to visit the Costa Brava city of Lloret De Mar, a busy beach city known for it's night life.

At this point we had been in Spain for two weeks already and we had become accustomed to the noise, no matter where we stayed, it was noisy. That was just a fact of being in Spain.  Knowing Lloret de Mar had a reputation we had no expectations of having a quite night. However, what we did experience went way past what we did expect.

For the most part we were very surprised by how quiet our hostel was, especially since we were above a busy restaurant. In fact, it was more quite then most of the places we had stayed, that was, until three in the morning came around.

I woke up to what sounded like a man sitting at the end of my bed singing. Singing badly, I may add. He sang everything from salsa to Spanish opera. He sang until he left his room at 8 am.

Needless to say, husband wasn't allowed to listen to any of his salsa music on our drive to Barcelona that morning.

After our misadventures in Saint Llorenc, Figueres, and Girona, Catalonia was not getting off to a good start. Would Barcelona be any different?

Special Monday: The Inflight Flight

(lost in the "Land of Ulibarri")

On our overnight flight to Madrid from New York we were fed a questionable meal. You know typical airline food. The highlight of the meal was this pre-packaged brownie that looked edible enough. Who am I I kidding, if it's chocolate I'll eat it, no questions asked, doesn't matter what it looks like. 

Husband is passed out next to me, I can never sleep on flights. Trying to be quite and not disturb sleeping husband I muster up some strength to open up the tricky packaging on my brownie. But I underestimate my strength and as I rip open the cellophane my brownie flings across the plane.

To put this in some perspective, I drew you a picture; see exhibit A.

exhibit A

As you can see, my brownie got some distance. So what does one do, when your brownie flies across a plane? You sulk, because you were really looking forward to eating that darn brownie. 

But not is all lost... I feel a tap on my shoulder and the guy sitting behind me in the next aisle hands me his brownie and with a smile he says, "that just made my flight" embarrassed, I nod and say thank you and shamefully take his brownie, but this time I am much more careful opening it.

Shame has never tasted so good.

Catalonia: One to laugh about later

Saint Llorenc

After a brief stay in Pamplona we embarked on our six hour journey out of Basque country and into Spain's Catalonia region. First stop, Saint Llorenc, a quaint medieval village in the Pyrenees Mountains.

We arrive tired, hungry, and with full bladders but are taken back by the charm of this tiny village. We park and make our way to our hotel.  I was anxious to see where we were staying as I let husband book this one and he wasn't giving up any details.

When I saw the hotel I knew why. It was something out of a dream. My usually-not-so-romantic husband booked us a honeymoon worthy destination. He wanted to surprise me.

We come to the giant door and knock. And knocked some more. No answer. Doors are locked. Okay. What now? We walk around the village trying to find a phone we could use with no such luck.  Trying to find someone that spoke Spanish also proved to be tricky as everyone that we came across spoke only Catalan. Finally, we find someone and we learn that the hotel owners have taken a holiday to France.

We didn't know whether to laugh or cry. It was getting late and all we wanted to do was cozy up in a bed and eat a hot meal. Luckily, the next city on our list wasn't too far away, so off to Figueres we go, home of the Dali Museum.

Driving through Figueres, we quickly decide this is not a place we want to stay. Not an attractive, nor a safe looking place. I pull out my trusty Spain edition of Lonely Planet to see where they recommend staying in the next city, Girona, 45 minutes away.

To Lonely Planet's credit they also say not to stay in Figureres. So off we go again, still tired, hungry, and with full bladders.  Going on almost 9 hours in the car, we arrive in Girona. I loved it at first glance but was too exhausted to really take it all in. We find parking, pull on our backpacks, and with our Lonely Planet book in hand, we set off to find our hostel.

Girona is in full swing, it's their annual Flower Festival, their biggest festival, and it's crowded. As we try to make our way through the crowds trying to read our map in the dark, and getting contact high from all the marijuana we smell, we finally find our hotel.

And you wouldn't believe it. No one is there. Can this really happen twice in one day? Without even giving it a second thought we head across the street to the first hotel we see, it's way out of budget, but at this point it doesn't really matter.

The hotel is beautiful, an ancient castle restored into a historic hotel. We are shown to our room, two twin beds, separated. Oh well, at least it is somewhere to sleep. I risk flesh eating disease and soak my limbs in a hot bath and make way to bed. Where I discover my pillow is as ancient as the building. It not only feels but weighs like a pillowcase full of bricks.

Oh well, at least is somewhere to sleep. And above all else, I am in Spain. Can't beat that.

San Sebastian, Spain

via pictures. 

Basque flag.

Arrived in Basque country! 

The bay.

On our hike to Monte Urgull

Statue at the top of Monte Urgull.

our hostel balcony.

Epilogue: The Meal

Epilogue? Or more likely an afterthought? Halfway through devouring this oh-so-delicious-yet-simple meal I decided it needed its picture taken. 

After the intense run in where I thought my life was going to end. (I'm into dramatics at the moment- bare with me). Hunger set in. Naturally. 

In the middle of nowhere like a mirage we see a little sign that says "jatetxea" or in other words, "restaurant" in Basque.  We pull up to this eh, restaurant? That looks much more like someones home. We nervously walk up the steps and peek our heads in the door, where we meet a woman who eagerly ushers us in and takes us to her dining room.  Still not sure whether this is really a restaurant or her home we reluctantly take a seat and before we can say anything she is gone. 

Not too long after she leaves us sitting there- unsure of what may come next- we hear her shouting outside, then the stop of a lawn mower, and a man comes in. Her husband. A sweet old man that makes my heart squeeze just a little as he reminds me of my favorite person in the whole world- my grandpa, who left this world way to soon. The reason why I am so fond of my Basque name. 

He greets us and my husband engages him in conversation. I love hearing my husband speak Spanish. It's beautiful. He tells us his wife has three meals prepared today that we can choose from. We choose something simple. Eggs, fries, chorizo, and beans. 

This meal may not seem like much and maybe that's what made it so special. For something so simple to have so much flavor was something truly unexpected. Much like this trip. 

From the stunning drive, to seeing my sign, and the excitement of men with guns, to capping it all off with a delicious meal given to us by a man that reminded me of my Basque grandpa all while being in the land of Ulibarri is certainly something that won't be soon forgotten. 

I couldn't have asked for better way to end one of the most meaningful and memorable days of my life- and I couldn't think of a better person to have shared it with then my husband.

Thank you husband for making this all happen. 

Part III: All for a Sign

probably my favorite picture- like ever. 

After leaving the Ulibarri village with the double "L"'s we headed out down the narrow road of the curvaceous mountainside on our way to seek out the other Ulibarri village- the one with the right spelling.

At one of the turns, I got a glimpse of what was down the road and what I saw made me freeze. Wait, was that men with some heavy duty guns that I just saw? No way. Was it? 

So I say, ummm husband, I think I just saw some men down there with guns. And of course in typical husband fashion he gave me that dubious look- and it was then, at that moment we rounded the bend and bam there we were, face to face with about 15 men- all equipped with what would appear to be Halo type weapons.

The road was blocked by some crazy spiky barbwire craziness. 

I am sure you can imagine the thoughts that were swirling around in my head as I relayed the fact that here we are, American tourists in the middle of nowhere (literally) in a foreign country. They could do anything to us. 


Husband looks at me and whispers, your name is going to really help us out right now.

I plaster a "I am not worried that I am going to die smile on my face" and take a Que from husband and slowly roll down my window as all 15 men with machine guns surround our golf cart sized car. Thank my lucky stars husband isn't a white guy and Spanish is his first language- is all I kept thinking.

The leader of this army/military/ETA/who-the-hell-knows group goes to husbands window and they converse- I don't understand Spanish so I have no clue what is being said, I just busy myself with the GPS pretending that everything is just dandy and that my heart isn't about to beat out of my chest. 

Then all of sudden I hear laughter and I look up and husband and this guy look to be having a pleasant conversation. I zone back in from my disturbed thoughts and hear that they are talking about Ulibarri.  The man says something to the other men guarding the road and they haul away the crazy spiky-barbwire roadblock and all 15 men depart from our car and we are free to go. Free to go!

As we slowly drive away, I look up at husband and ask him what that was all about. Husband said that as soon as he told him what we were doing and why we were there, his whole demeanor changed and he went from we are going to kill you- to wow, that is really cool and let us on our way.

Needless to say, after that little run in I wasn't about to risk running into any other militia type people. I was good with my double "L" sign picture.

More than good.

Part II: The Land of Ulibarri

Every so often when I used my credit card during our stay in the Basque beach town of San Sebastian I would learn a new little tidbit of information about my heritage and the name Ulibarri from the person swiping my card- as you can imagine this made overspending a problem as I was eager to fling my credit card all over the place to see what else I could learn.

During one of these spending endeavors we learned there was actually a village named Ulibarri and without missing a beat husband and I looked at each other and said we have to go! At that moment I was determined to get a photo next to a sign with my name on it.

From there we set out on our adventure. We drove for over 2 hours up and around through the mountains grinning ear to ear at the scenery, enjoying the breeze from our windows and the rhythm of the salsa music coming from our speakers.

We drove through century old villages- or a more accurate description would be; we got lost in century old villages, driving down streets that certainly did not look like streets, giving onlookers definitely something to ponder. It was quite obvious that outsiders are not a normal occurrence. After circling around a few times, driving down an uncertain dirt road, and our GPS completely giving up on us, we figured we'd better ask for a little help.

We came across a group of older women, that seemed to be very amused by us and we asked for a little guidance. They gave us a funny look and asked what Ulibarri are you looking for? This whole mountainous region is Ulibarri. As exciting as it was to learn that an entire region shares my name- the land of Ulibarri as my husband likes to call it-  I was disappointed to learn that I may not get my picture.

After spending a few more moments letting the locals be entertained by us we did learn that within the land of Ulibarri, there was indeed two villages with the name Ulibarri. Yes! I was going to get my picture after all and off we went.

After another hour in the car, there it was. My sign. But wait! They got the spelling all wrong- there were two "L"s in this sign, my heart sank a little but decided it was close enough and I'd snap a quick few pictures.

After talking to a few more locals, we learned that the other Ulibarri village has the correct spelling and that this village was given two "L"'s to differentiate between the two villages.

Looks like our adventure wasn't over just yet....

Part I: I may just write today...

And tell you a little story from my trip to Spain.

When husband brought up the idea of traveling to Spain- I can't say I was crazy about it. Spain was around number 13 on my list of places to see- however the draw of going to Basque Country, the land where my family tree is rooted, the birth place of my last name- the last name I refused to give up when I got married... I couldn't say no to making it my first European experience- in a sense it was like I was going home.

Spending time in the Basque region was absolutely the best part of the whole trip. From driving through the countryside and venturing out to the heart of the region- where few tourists will ever go. The calming beach town of San Sebastian, to the people and culture and of course the food. The food. We can't forget the Basque food- my dads deep love for food- and liquor makes complete sense now. 

The region of my family's name, Ulibarri, was one that was definitely off the beaten path. Deep, deep, in the Basque mountains, where the only language spoken is their native tongue, Euskara, and where our GPS was surely out of its league.

Deep in the country is also where in no doubt members of the Basque Nationalist Movement (ETA) hide from the Madrid Army.  To Madrid and other parts of Europe the ETA are known as a terrorist organization.  The ETA is a movement created to keep the Basque culture alive after the oppression they received from/after the Franco area- I don't claim to know the ins and outs of the political conflict. And I only tell you this as a back story- to the story I am about it share from our venture to the land of Ulibarri...

And how my name may have well saved us . . .

and the heart grows fonder

To my surprise, I have missed blogging. 

I have so much to share.

From:

Spain.

Those darn Fifty Shades.

Playing Dirty.

Shopping addictions.

to:

A  a splender of "Special Monday" stories to share.

But.

That is all.

For today.

xx