Granada or Bust

El fin de semana pasado, fui a Granada.  Ohhh, but si sólo era tan fácil.  My flight, round trip for 28 dollars, I knew was leaving from Madrid on Thursday night at 10 pm.  That is, I thought I knew it...until I printed my ticket off around 6:15 pm and realized the flight was supposed to leave at 9 pm instead.  ¡Joder!  I ran up to my room and threw the rest of my stuff in my bookbag as quickly as possible and made it out of the Fund my 6:24pm.  I ran all the way to Zocodover, jumped in a taxi, y exigí, "Estación de autobuses, por favor.  Tengo mucha prisa."  about four minutes (and 5 euros) later, I ran from the taxi to the bus platform and jumped on the first one I saw that said "Madrid".  It was full, so the driver told me to go to the next one.  I ran to the next bus as it was pulling away from the platform.  The driver let me on, but said I had to go into the station to buy the ticket even though I was there with cash in hand (when I caught the 6 am bus before Barcelona, I just bought my ticket on the bus).  So, as I ran into the bus station, the bus pulled away.  This meant I had to wait for the 7 o'clock...There went a half an hour.  By this point, me puse un poco nervioso; sabía que me tardaría casi dos horas en llegar al aeropuerto desde la estacion de autobuses un Toledo.  But, I had to wait.

When the bus pulled into the station in Plaza Elíptica en Madrid a las 7:55, bajé lo antes posible.  Corré hasta el metro where all I could do, again, was wait for the next train.  It just so happens that the commute from the bus station to the airport is just about as far as it could be; I had to go half way around a circular, switch to a different line, and ride it until nearly the end.  This could easily take an hour.  But every chance I got, I ran.  I ran during the transfer to save any time possible.  I ran from the metro to the airport. I ran in the airport terminal to the security check where I found out I had to go to the airline counter to get my papers stamped because I'm a foreigner.  ¡Jooooder¡  There goes a minute or two.  De nuevo, corré.  The woman quickly stamped my papers and I ran back to security, put my bag on the scanner, and walked through.  However, I had to go back to take my laptop out and put it through again.  There go a few more seconds.  After passing security, corré hasta que me di cuenta de que no sabía dónde estuvo la puerta.  "Quick, find a salidas screen...Back the other way."  Corré hasta la puerta.  Just then, as I was running to the gate, I saw the airline worker close the glass sliding door just before the gate.  I knocked on the door, but she just shrugged her shoulders and mouthed that there was nothing she could do.  She quickly finished straightening the desk and left the gate.  And that was that.  9:02 and I was out of luck.

The woman at the general airline desk was nice enough to offer me a flight for 100 euros the next day.  However, I determined that my best bet was to make my way to the bus station to try to get the 11:30 pm all-nighter.  After backtracking the metro, buying my ticket, walking across the street to Burger King and getting a Whopper Jr. and a sundae, I only had a few minutes to spare before 11:30.  The first half of the bus ride, I watched a movie on my laptop until it died, then read a book for class.  At around 2 am, the bus pulled into a rest stop for a mandatory half hour stop.  After we got back on the road, I was able to sleep most of the way until we pulled in around 4:30.  From there, I had only a tour book I took out of the library, directions to my hostel from the closest bus stop (not the bus station...they recommended a taxi for this, but I only had about 4 euros in change after what I had previously gone through), so I started walking.  I wasn't sure how long it would take, because the street I was on was extended past the range of the map.  But, I stuck through it, following road signs to the city center, and knowing I was getting closer  because there were more people out on the streets (mostly drunk college kids stumbling home from bars).  About 45 minutes later, and without ever taking a wrong turn, I made it.  I was checked in and in my room by 5:30 am.

The next day, Friday, I got up at noon and went online to find a hostel to stay in Saturday night.  This was a holiday weekend, so when I tried to book the hostel before I left, there were literally NO vacancies.  But I quickly was able to book one just a couple blocks from where I already was.  After this, I went on a short walk through the neighborhood, then headed to meet Alex at the train station.  She stepped out of the station just as I was walking up, and after leaving her stuff at the hostel, we were on a search for food.  We ended up at this little pizza place with the best pizza I've had in 4 months.  Things were looking up after the night I just had.  We agreed we would bring Pepe back for dinner the next day.  Pepe got in about an hour later.  After getting settled, we walked up to the Albayzín, the gypsy neighborhood of Granada.  We got to the top of a hill with a free museum on it just in time to see the sunset on the Alhambra.  Later, we went on a tapas tour with Toni, a Spaniard who spoke near perfect English, and we made our dinner out of tapas.  We turned in for an early night by about 1am because we had to be at the Alhambra by 8 am to get tickets (they actually do sell out).

On Saturday morning, we all got moving pretty quickly and we made it to the Alhambra a little early.  We got in at about 8:30 with our entrance to the Nastrid Palace at 9.  This is a special part of the visit that you can only enter during the time your ticket says.  It is easily the most decorative and most musulmán part of the whole place.  Really, its hard to tell much about it and the pictures don't really do it justice either...Simply put, its very impressive.  The whole visit lasted about 4 hours and by that time, we were ready for siesta.  After changing to our new hostel, which actually was quite a bit nicer for a little bit less, we took naps for a couple hours.  Later we went back out to the pizza place again, as promised.  It was still just as good as before.  This night was also very tame, as I had to take the airport bus at 6:25 am the next day for my 7:33 am flight (I was not about to miss this flight too!!).  We walked around a little more, tried to find a couple tapas bars, explored the outside of the Cathedral, and stopped in a bar for a couple drinks.  We were back in the hostel by 1:30. 

Somehow, I missed my first alarm.  When I turned the second one off, I thought it was the first, so I was sure I could go back to sleep and wait for the next one.  However, I didn't wake up until I heard people walking through our room to get to their beds (this was not a private room, but we had lockers).  I looked at my phone and saw that it was 6:15 am!!  Luckily, I packed everything the night before except the clothes I was going to wear, so I was able to get up, throw my stuff together, get dressed, and walk out the door by 6:19.  I wasn't too far from the bus stop, but I didn't want to risk it, so I ran to the bus stop.  There were a few people waiting there when I got there at 6:23.  A minute later, the bus pulled in.  This was probably the biggest relief I have experienced since coming here.  From there, I got to the airport with no problems.  The hour long flight was definately better than the 5 hour bus ride, and it was really cool to see the fog settled into the valleys of the Sierra Nevada and even better to see Toledo, marked by the Alcazar and the Catedral, on our descent to Madrid.  The trip wasn't over when I got to Madrid, though.  As usual, I had a couple hours ahead of me before I coulld be home.  It wasn't until about 11:30 that I walked into the Fund.

That basically ended the fun.  On Sunday, I had only two papers and two finals on Monday to look forward to.  One more final each day through Thursday, and here I am, finally done with the academic parrt of the program.  Now, I've got to go live it up for my last two and a half days in Toledo.

¡Hasta pronto!