our trip to alpujarras

Last weekend my group and I headed to the Sierra Nevadas for a weekend away at a set of villages called Las Alpujarras. I was not anticipating a great adventure because the weekend was rumored to be all about hiking. This is not a favorite pastime of mine, to the chagrin of my mom. So we headed out on the bus at 8:30 am, early as usual. I received an email prior about how the roads are curvy and might cause some people to feel car sick. Me, being a sufferer of this, mistakenly didn't heed the warning. So when we got to the site, I rushed out of the bus in the middle of my director's hotel registration speech to throw up. Then I felt much better! We started hiking right away. The air was fresh but the scenery was not impressing me much. We had 4 hours ahead of us, but the time passed quickly because I was trying to speak a lot of Spanish with my directors and learn new words about the environment. We got about 3 hours into it and the scenery was quite charming. We walked along a little stream and through small farmlands where people live in the remote countryside. We eventually stopped to eat sandwiches that our families had made for us while enjoying the sun. I can't really describe the terrain because I don't know the specific biome or landscape's name. However, it wasn't much like anything I've seen before. There were natural lawns with trees and chaparral. The views from this part were awesome. What was cool about this hike was we came upon a natural spring with agua con gas (carbonated water). It is natural and safe to drink and we all filled our bottles. It was delish! We also saw an ancient tree that has been alive for almost a thousand years (I don't know how they approximate this stuff...) We finally got back to a little town where you could see posters and banners that had taken over the city advertising the Spanish election. All the towns in Alpujarras are made up of white wash houses and small businesses. They were all scarcely populated and tranquil. Finally we returned and I crashed asleep after a glorious shower. (The reason I take such pleasure in the showers at hotels is because mine back in Granada is the worst.) That night, I ate at the hotel's free buffet and then studied a little Spanish with friends.

The next morning it was another early day and we headed out for another 4 hour hike. This is so strange for me! Usually I DON'T like extensive hikes. My muscles were so sore and I had a little sunburn on the back of my neck. We took off and it was immediately more interesting and beautiful than the prior hike. Right on the road out of the hotel we noticed a phenomenon that clouds form in the mountain. They sit amidst mountains and look like cotton floating. It was so pretty. We did the tourist thing and took a million pictures and poked around another village in the Alpujarras. We kept walking and saw more meadows and a waterfall. We climbed, we descended. The terrain was quite rugged. We got to a plateau where we took a giant group picture. I think there are about 50 kids in our group. We walked through a man's backyard and he had a dog and a chicken. He also had a solar panel on the roof of his stone house. We got to another plateau where we saw a shepherd. He has 700 sheep! We saw part of the flock below us. He also had two donkeys and 10 dogs which delighted the entire group. Everyone took a long break to play and take pictures with the animals. This lifted everyone's spirits after many hours of walking. We finally descended for the last time and reached the end of our hike in another village. We had a lunch in the town and then took off back to Granada. The way back a girl in my group (who happens to be from ASU) gave me a Dramamine. Yes! I was much better. The rest of my Sunday was spent relaxing and a little studying. Back to school.

I think the reason I enjoyed this weekend so much is because I got to practice Spanish, was removed from a city setting and got to know people as I passed the hours walking. I liked the hikes a lot and was happy to see the country of Andalucia.