Spain and Beyond

Daily Lorena: Colors…Textures…Aromas…Tastes

Today was another exploratory day for Anna and me, starting off with a walk on the beach followed by a beachside lunch. Anna found the seafood paella she’d been craving, and I had some tasty salmon and veggies. We walked around the streets and metro’d it up to various places in the city. We targeted a delightful open-air fruits and veggie market (Mercat de la Boqueria), and having just filled our tummies with gelato, we followed with a fruit drink; mine was blackberry and coconut – yum. The colors combination of all the drinks together in a row were too pretty to resist. Another of our stopping points was a Gaudi house (Casa Batllo), and we could tell when we found it by the sheer number of tourists swarming the area. However, they were charging something like €27 to get in, and we just couldn’t stomach the blatant rip-off commercialism happening, so we continued on our way. I’m sure it was amazing, but there is plenty else to see in Barcelona too. Back to the pier we went, mostly to use the bano for .65 and then to hang out for a bit before a Flamenco show. This was Take II of my Flamenco experience, and I was really curious as to how our first one in Granada would compare to this one. I loved the dancing in the Granada show, but I was not fond of the singing/music at all. It was one guitarist and one singer, and I didn’t think the singer was all that good. However, it was definitely a local’s Flamenco, and this one in Barcelona was a tourist’s Flamenco. This one had two guitarists and a person that played something that looked like a box. There was still one singer, and a female dancer and a male dancer who danced one song, but then went into the band. I thought the overall music was better at this show, although the music style is still not my cup of tea. The female dancer was better in Granada, although they were both good and quite intense. They worked up a sweat. We sat in the first row and were worried that sweat droplets might be flinging into the audience, but we came out unscathed. We arrived home, delighted to find that the little box considered “internet” finally arrived. Beggers can’t be choosers though, and I’m glad to get a ‘hit’, no matter how slow. I know. The addiction is bad. But I also need it for work tomorrow!

Daily Drew: The Journey Begins

We were to meet Phillipe, our French guide, at 9am down at breakfast, so after a quick shower and packing up, we meet our two other companions for the trip: Dellon, a lumberjack from Canada, and Justin, a software developer from San Francisco. Phillipe showed up eventually and outfitted with our missing gear: climbing harness, boot crampons, and ice axe. However, after handing out the gear, he asked us if we all had ski crampons – the two others did, but Cory and I did not (we thought he was supplying all the crampons necessary…), so we said we’d go look for some when we picked up our skis from the ski shop (we dropped them off for a tune and wax after biking). Arriving at the ski shop, we found our skis, but they didn’t rent ski crampons for our skis – Cory uses the Marker binding system which apparently doesn’t have easily found compatible crampons and my skis were just too fat for what crampons they had. So, off to another shop, and another shop! We realized we just weren’t going to find ones made for our skis so we met up with the rest of the group and figured we’d just use our boot crampons and boot-pack it where crampons were needed with our skis on our back. Arriving at the lift, Phillipe started handing out even more gear (when will it stop?) of three pairs of ropes, so I grabbed one to haul up with me as I still had room in my pack. Up the lifts we went (two gondolas) to reach the top of the Argentiere Glacier and what a view it was – peaks in all directions on a beautiful sunny day. After taking some photos and getting our harnesses on, skied down the glacier a bit, Phillipe guiding us and letting us know about the crevasses and snow bridges found in the area. We reached partway down the glacier and switched over to skins to skin up the glacier to our stop for the evening: the Argentiere Hut. Welcome to the Alps – these are barely “huts” in the sense of the word that we in Colorado are used to – this place had a full on kitchen where they cook for you and it houses 91!!! people. Very different from Colorado. We tossed our gear and settled down for some lunch – since they cook for you, I ditched my granola and trail mix and opted to split a huge omelette of eggs, potatoes, ham, and cheese with the guide and Justin. This thing was massive – it came out on a silver platter and was a good foot and a half long, 8 inches wide and 4 inches tall – massive! Suffice it to say that it definitely filled our tummies for lunch. We then had a quick avy chat and a how-to on boot crampon usage, then lazed about for the rest of the afternoon, chatting the evening away before dinner. Dinner came – a three course meal of vegetable soup, lamb chops in a cream sauce with prunes, and caramelized custard. Bon apetit! It was the best meal I’ve had so far on our entire journey. After some cards with the guys, lights out were a little before 10pm, so we headed off the quarters to sleep. And that’s where my journey took a turn for the worse. Around 10:30pm, I started feeling queasy, with hot and cold spells, headache, dry mouth, and not being able to sleep. Granted, some of this was due to the rest of the guys in the quarters snoring and tossing and turning and it being about 100 degrees inside, but, I tossed and turned the entire night, not getting a wink of sleep.