Mary : Hola. Que tal? Brianna, Dillon y yo estuvimos diez dias en Espana. Lo pasamos estupendamente. Fuimos a Madrid en el centro del pais, y a Guadix, Granada, Cartegena y Aguilas en el sur. Madrid nos encanto. Es una ciudad muy hermosa. Andamos en muchas partes de Madrid con Eric, mi sobrino. Eric quiere que andar muy rapido. Salimos por el tren desde Madrid hasta Guadix, una ciudad con casas en cuevas. Nos dormimos en una cueva. El hijo del proprietario era nuestro guia. El nos enseno las cuevas en las colinas.
Grant nos encontro en Almeria para quedarnos una semana en la playa. Aquilamos un piso en una ciudad muy pequena se llama San Juan de los Terreros en la Costa Calida. Nuestro contacto en San Juan nos enseno su ciudad del castille lo alto de una colina. El eligio volver despues de 35 anos en Barcelona . Esta orgulloso de su ciudad. En Espana, Brianna y Dillon prefieron las playas, y Grant y yo preferemos los edificios y las cuidades muy antiquos. Hay calles muy estrecho y viejo. Nos gusto muchisimo Espana. Muchas gracias a mi hermano Roberto para haciendo esta pagina!
Grant: So I missed Madrid and Guadix and cousin Eric as I was hard at work in London . As you can see I missed a lot, but I did catch these gypsies at the train station in Almeria at the start of the second week. I flew into Almeria and picked up a rental car for the second half of the trip. When I found them we drove to San Juan de Los Terreros where Mary had rented our apartment. Our apartment was beautiful, right on the Mediterranean . It was quite reasonable, and the owner who is Spanish and lives in the area was extremely friendly and helpful. We negotiated an arrangement with Brianna and Dillon whereby we rotated between beach days (their choice) and so called abbey days (our choice, although we never saw a single abbey that I can remember, more just incredibly beautiful old cities).
Granada was fascinating and shed some light on the ancient Moorish history of Spain . The brutal expulsion of the Moors from Spain under Queen Isabella in the 15 th century explains a lot about the complicated relationship between the Europeans and their Muslim citizens. Aside from the stunning views of the Mediterranean and the impressive Sierra Nevada mountains the thing that struck me the most was just how old this country is and how different it is from the rest of Europe . In Cartagena we saw the walls built by the Carthaginians to defend their city from the Romans (they lost the city to the Romans in about 260 BC). All in all we had a great time and Mary's Spanish is quite impressive and was very useful. We are still on Spanish time but we are adjusting.
Dillon: This week's article: Beautiful Beaches vs. Old Abbeys Grant: Old Abbeys are magnificent and educational. Me: Old Abbeys bore me to death. Now done with the debate let's get on to the story, the water was warm enough to swim but my mum was too afraid about getting sunburn that she only came down to the beach on the last day (she smothered herself with suntan lotion even though there was no sun) but over all the visit was great.
Well I'm needed in my busy life so, adios. Dillon
Brianna : I really enjoyed our trip to Spain even though we did have to go by some old Moorish things. We started off in Madrid where we say my cousin Eric (can you believe he hadn't even heard of the Maggie Blogs?) In Madrid the Spanish eat a lot of pork and ham and bacon and… Pig! After that we headed down to an old cave town called Guadix. During the day my brother Dillon and I climbed the high muddy mountains while my mum sat in the sun (then she complained that she got sunburn for no reason!). That night we slept in a cave house-a house built into the mountains. Around midnight some small rocks fell down onto the roof of our cave house and instantly I thought “Cave in!” But I am still here, being forced to write this so you know there was no cave in.
The next morning my mum, brother and I headed down to the coast where we met my dad. On the coast we spent half the time on the beach, half the time gawping at crumbling bits of rock. I preferred the beach. The water was so clear you could see the bottom even if it was 12 feet deep! All too soon our trip came to an end and so we reluctantly got back on the plane to cold, rainy, foggy, London . But all and all the trip was very fun!