Saturday, November 8, 2008

Sorry it has been forever

Oct 30
Context: 5:00a.m. somewhere time, I’m somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean 30,000 ft in the air in the largest airplane I have ever been in , completely full of dozing Indians (side note: we don’t get to India until late November) and I am hours away from being in another country and living a four month dream that I have had ever since my dad came home and handed me a crazy mask that he had gotten while over seas for the first time! I feel extremely blessed to have so many people to do this with. Thank you so much for all of the prayers, support, and freedom that I have been given to be able to experience life like this! I am literally living my dreams…

Oct 31
So TODAY! Wow hectic day for sure. We landed in Heathrow Airport and I was stoked! But we checked in at Customs and ended up being stuck in detainment for six hours, in a small room where they took our pictures, fingerprints, everything! I was kinda getting aggravated about the whole ordeal all we could do was just wait it out. We wasted the whole day doing that and then we had to meet Clay in Liverpool Station which was an hour ride on the Underground . So we rolled into the station about 10 hours late because our flight was about 4 behind on top of our detainment. So we got to the station and had to find WiFi in order to communicate with Clay, he was already at a hostel so we used our Ipods to get Google directions and tell him what we were up to. We took the Unground to the hostel and it is Halloween night so everyone on the Underground was our age and dressed up in crazy costumes. But we got off and found the hostel. On our way there we saw a guy playing a drumset made out of a Fixed Gear bicycle! Anyway when we walked in the doors of the hostel there was Clay. It was so good to have hunted him down from the other side of the world. He spent about three weeks in Greece, sometime in northern England, and then a couple of days in Southern Italy. So we spent the night hearing about that. He was stoked on all of the people he met and the places he experienced. It sounds like he wants to live there.
So the entire hostel scene in the UK seems to be a big social hub. I don’t really know how it works but Clay was saying all the London youth spend there time in hostels on weekend just to get out of the house and do what they want. So it’s a trip there are people from all ages here and doing the whole coed showers and sleeping arrangements together so that is something to get to camp a little more often.

Nov 1
Today we journeyed through London. It was rainy and murky, and we got to see some cool stuff. We saw the Westminster Abbey. It was crazy it had all of the dead English Kings and Queens in it. It was where all of the Kings and Queens were quarinated, pronounced King or Queen. Charles Darwin was buried there, and Sir Issacc Newton was buried there. The structure amazing, full of decorations and ornate statues. I never knew such a place existed, there was an evening service going on so we went in and checked it out. It kinda blew my mind I didn’t know what to think of it. Our packs were so heavy so we didn’t want to walk much with them. We saw Big Ben and a bunch of cool architecture as we walked. We sent Aaron a message telling him to meet us in the Liverpool Station. London is so clean and tidy, it seems fake, even the train cars seem like something out of Disneyland. I was kind of blown away. The guys didn’t want to spend a lot of time there so we all decided to but a plane ticket to out next destination. We have been debating whether or not to go to Paris. We all agreed that there is a good chance that we would be able to check out Paris and that whole scene some other time in our life. So we all decided to get to a place that is not so cold so we will be able to camp outside. London is also the most expensive place I have every been. It costs sooo much to be there. I thought I could get away with not spending much but was hit off guard so much. I am enjoying Europe, as a whole, sooo much. I am learning so much about the root of so many different cultures. Anyways we decided instead of heading to London We would go to Barcelona, Spain because many people have told us that it is such an amazing town. So we are going to head to the airport and spend the night there so that we don’t have to spend 20 Pounds (almost $40) on another hostel. The night in the hostel was cool but it was a really nice hostel. Something I noticed about the hostel that was stayed in was that there were people of every age there, and there were a lot of people from London there. There seemed to be a definite sense of community there too. This little 15 year old teold us everyone her age hits us up the hostels during the weekend, getting away from there parents, and then during the weekdays the hostels are like barren. So that seemed interesting, ours was bumpin because it was Halloween I believe.

Nov 2
So last night we stayed in the London Stranton airport. We bought a Ryan Air ticket. It cost us like 90 pounds which is like $100 I am so bummed that it cost so much but we had to buy it…So Ryan Air only allows one checked bag and it cant be more than 15kg which is like 35lbs or something so we had to disperse weight. Our carry on are only allowed to be 10kg so we spent like an hour figuring that out. Then we decided to go to sleep right in front of the check in place. The airport was weird cause it was like empty. No one was there it seemed like, so we just went to sleep and I woke up in the night once and saw tons of people walking around and the I woke up again like three hours later and there were people sleeping everywhere, it was like some weird storybook story. We woke up got checked in and flew into Spain, I didn’t get much sleep so I was kinda cranky today. We got to Barcelona and it was raining which was so inconvient. We ran got off of the bus and got something to eat at this nice little restaurant, and took in the fact that everyone speaks Spanish. We drove by some really huge skyscrapers when the bus drove in, and we were stoked to see the city. We started walking around and our minds were blown, our first encounter with people here were two chicks from Radondo Beach, and that was the tip of the ice berg in terms of the artistic scene that we were about to stumble upon. This city, seriously, is the one of the most amazing cities I have ever been to. Every corner we round is another massive square with a huge statue, or some out of control structure. We had a bit of preparation before we got here, Clay was raving about this architect by the name of Gaudi, who lived in the mid 1800s and was just producing architecture that was very far ahead of his time! We got glimpses of that today.
So we find ourselves fully psyched that we are in one of the most amazing if not the most amazing city we have ever heard of and we are being poured on packing 55lb packs each and not knowing where we should be going. So we look on out map and try to scope the best looking camp sites. Camping wasn’t looking too promising but we don’t want to buy a hostel so we decided to check out this park that we saw on the map. It ends up not being a very flat park but a hill with some trails on it. We find a place to put our bags and by this time the rain has stopped and the sun is about to set. So we climb to the top of this hill over looking the ocean and the entire city. I took some of the most amazing pictures I have ever taken! It was so cool, and an awesome change from the murky London streets we were checking out a few says before. So the sun went down and we cruised the streets for a few hours, found this really cheap market, that sold fresh hot Italian bread for a buck, we scored that with some fruit and we were soo stoked to be where we are at doing what we are doing the way we are doing it! So cruised back and to our bags that we were a little nervous about, and set up our tent. Aaron wasn’t expecting to be sleeping outside so he didn’t bring a sleeping bag and is going to try to rough it with a bunch of clothes. The tent is only a three man but we are squishing

Nov 4
Barcelona is the coolest city I have ever been in, every corner, every square, everything! Clay and I woke up and took pictures of the sunrise; we squished like four guys in a three man tent. It was crammed. Aaron didn’t have a sleeping until late he walked around the city at 3 a.m. Clay & I went to eat at this amazing little restaurant . It was so cool. We bought the BEST croissants of our lives! Then we talked about how great the city is. I have been thinking a lot about how amazing it would be to live in this city. I would love it and it is so close to France. It would be an amazing place to learn Spanish. So many cultures come through here also, the city breathes the creativity. Everywhere I go see stuff about Salvador Dali, Gaudi, and Pablo Picasso! The city breathes their influences! There is so much to see here I know I wont get to see it all :( we are going to spend another day and then head to Marseille, France. I am so pumped to see what the future will bring!
Oh yeah Aaron and Josh got woken up by the Cops screaming over the loud speaker in Spanish. Haha! We got back from croissants and they were drying the tent. They told us about how this truck and cop car came flying up the trail and the cops started screaming at them theses city workers were pulling matrices our of this cave above and behind us. While cops sat there and watched josh and Aaron pack everything up. Then they all just took off and we came back about 15 minutes later. So that was definitely interesting! I’m glad the cops didn’t take them in!

Nov 5
Today was an amazing day. We slept in this new spot about a quarter mile from where we were originally staying and it is such a better spot, no lights, people, or anything. We woke up at sun rise, I didn’t get the best sleep but I am doing alright.
We got up and waited for Aaron, he was an hour late because his watch was on London time. We rented bikes, well I actually borrowed a bicing.com bike that wasn’t being used. It was great! Free bike ride around the city. But we biked everywhere. We went to this place called Gaul park. It was designed by Gaudi and was just full of amazing architectural structures, designs, tons of colorful mosaics, rock sculptures everything, this guy was so far ahead of his time. It was so good to get to see some of his work. It was like a Dali painting in physical form. I really was blown away by all of the mosaics that he has done. He designed a couple of pieces in a park that looked like quarterpipes, but were completely mosaic. So after Gaul park we cruised through the streets of Barcelona. I cant believe how many landmark structures there are in this place. So we raged through the city streets on our bikes and found this like 700 foot tall cathedral that Gaudi designed named La Segrada Familia. This structure blew me away! Huge spires raising from the ground, intricate abstract figures, alter pieces, just crazy crazy stuff look it up, after that we headed back got board shorts on and headed to the water. It was so clod so I didn’t go in. I was too happy being warm. That was the day we are back sleeping were we did the night before.

Nov 6
We got up at 7 today and got everything packed and walked across town to the train station. We are leaving one of the coolest if not the most amazing city I have ever I have ever been in. When it comes to recapping on my experience I would have to say that I have been as surprised or…taken back at what the city demonstrated, it was really unusuall for me because when we decided to go to Barcelona it was on a whim. Different people told us different stuff about how we needed to see it and we went on that and really didn’t have any critical agenda toward the place. So we just cruised in stoked and ready to take anything in. Clay brought up, when we got off the plane, that when his siters friend came here to visit she ended up staying for years.
So when I think innovated, influential, modern, abstract artists, just from the small knowledge of famous artists that I have I think first of Picasso and then I think Salvador Dali. They happen to be the only big abstract artists that I know anything about. I don’t know howling I have spent with Chris, by myself or with whoever just looking at and being blown away by Dali’s paintings. His stuff can get kinda dark but in a sense he is really talented and has had opened slot of doors in terms of abstract art.
So to arrive here and see the influence he has had on this city and this city on him and his stuff, is kinda surreal. Then there is this architect by the name of Gaudi. I don’t even know what realm this guy existed in MOSIACS! Everywhere. All of the structures he made seemed to have some sort of mosaic tied into them, He just got soo creative with designing the structures he made! He built so much. He never left a wall flat or undecorated. He built statues coming out of slanted rock walls…just crazy stuff that you only dream of. Anyways the whole city just blew me away seeing all of that stuff consistently.
I just had a conversation a couple of minutes ago, while writing this, with a girl at a bus stop, who happened to be from Montana. She has a master’s degree in ESL. She has taught in South America, France, Japan, and knows Frence, Spanish, English, and Japanese. She is now got her sights on Arabic. Just taking everything in. that is what I want my life to be about for a while.

Nov 7
We are in Nice, France. We have spent the last two days traveling. We got on a bus from Barcelona, Spain to Marseille, France. Marseille ended up being this huge city that we weren’t too stoked on, so we spent the night in the train/bus station because it was dark and rainy outside. France is much more rainy than we expected, so we are spending more money staying hotels, to get out of the rain. Yeah we weren’t too stoked on Marseille so we decided to go up the coast to a small town called Antibes. We took a 20 euro ride there the next day. It was a real cool little Medittrean town so we set up camp and started to look around, when out of no were came a massive rain storm. The storm killed us. It was so heavy that we had to go back and take down the tent, and we were all wet, all of our stuff was wet, so we decided to go to the next city, Nice. We ran to the train station and got a 5 euro train ride to Nice. In Nice we got a hotel, two rooms. We dried all of our stuff off and made some pasta! It is good to have a hotel for a night. So today we got another room cause it was supposed to rain again. We dropped our stuff off and cruised through Nice. Nice is a cool old town. It has an amazing little port. It is split by this hill, and so we walked along the boardwalk and took pictures of the water. When we got to the top of the hill we could see the entire city and on the other side of the hill the rest of what was Old Town Nice. The city kinda has this unreal, dreamy, somewhat romantic Frenchy feel to it ☺. I enjoyed what I saw of it today, so when Clay and I got back we discussed finances and the future dynamics of the trip. Where we want to go and how we are going to do it for cheap, so we decided to cut out Venice. Venice is going to be an extra like $150 diversion. So that was a real bummer but I guess that is what will be the best for us. So that was intense to talk about. Venice is a landmark for sure. I wanted to see it big time but we are picking up Pisa because it is right next to Florence.

2 Comments:

Blogger Grinder Family said...

Wow,
Sounds like you guys are having the adventure you guys were looking for. It's crazy that you have been gone for like two weeks!! Well have fun and don't get too wet.

~Emily Grinder

Sat Nov 08, 09:12:00 AM 2008  
Blogger El Klepacabra said...

YEEEESSSSSSSSS dude i just read your blogs to the family and their all super stoked for ya bra's....dude man im soo jelous but your journals just are freakin great bra, i had pictures in my head like i was there!!! i kinda am there just in this weird spiritual sense....listen to hear me in the wind and remember to wear your Moon screen, i hear the
MV rays are amplified during rain. But remember live in yesterdays tomorow to the fullest. im stoked for ya bro....super stoked

Sat Nov 08, 08:01:00 PM 2008  

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