Well everyone, it seems I have finally gotten behind on my blog. It happens to the best of us. Now I am procrastinating because it seems impossible to blog the sheer amount of vacations I have had…. my last two days in Greece (check), two weeks worth of spring break, and the island of Ibiza. My life is so hard right now.
I will soon add to that list the week my parents are here (I am currently in the airport waiting to board a plane to Madrid to meet them). Here is the effort to get some of these trips blogged! Lets skip straight to Ibiza…it is the freshest!
I have been lucky enough to travel to many island paradises in my life, all of them a part of the Hawaiian Islands. Ibiza is my first island out of the states and what made it so very different from any of my other trips in Europe is that it actually felt like a vacation. I had almost forgotten what one felt like. I wasn’t running around like an insane tourist trying to climb the Duomo, explore the Louvre, and catch a bus, train, or plane. No wonder they call what I have been doing a trip or adventure, while it is just as fabulous as a vacation, it certainly has many different qualities. For one thing, on trips you arrive home more exhausted then when you leftJ
My vacation to Ibiza differed, in that, I arrived back to Spain rested and relaxed. Islands, it seems, no matter if they are in the United States or somewhere else in the world have that affect on people. Everything slows down, and all that seems to matter is the way the sun and sand feels, how the crash of the waves sounds, and the smell and taste of the salty air.
We landed in Ibiza at about 7:30p.m. on Friday and the sun was still shining. The sun doesn’t go down until much later at night and I love that the daytime stretches into nighttime. Gretchen and I hopped on a bus from the airport into Ibiza town, and from that bus we went directly onto another from the Ibiza town to Sant Josep (a pueblo farther inland) where we would be staying. This is not where your typical tourist stays most are in hotels in Sant Antonio or Ibiza town itself. At the risk of my grandparents, parents, and basically any adult who reads my blog freaking out, I am going to be honest and say we couchsurfed. That is why we were staying out where locals lived in Sant Josep. I thought about leaving it out of my blogging but a true blogger wouldn’t, and I want to look back on these blogs and remember exactly how I felt and exactly how it was.
We got dropped off at the ¼ mile marker in Sant Josep and were picked up by our host Valery. We were lucky that his brother was there for the weekend, working at the medieval festival, and had brought his truck. Valery was able to pick us up and bring us to the guesthouse where we would be staying. As it turned out, Valery was a caretaker for a family who had a vacation home in Ibiza, and he let us have the run of the guesthouse for the four nights we were staying on the island. I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect place to stay. While it was a little out of the way (harder to get to with transportation), Gretchen and I were able to see the greenery and beauty of the island, there was a peacefulness and lack of disturbance that was greatly appreciated. Here are a few photos. I have only ever seen vacation homes like this in the movies, and it was an unexpected surprise to see it in real life.
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| Guesthouse *please note: the black cat in midair...I planned that! |
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| Comfy beds! |
When we arrived we thought it best to head straight for Valery’s house and imagined there would be a store afterwards we could walk to for food. It turns out that his house was not near any stores and so he ended up making us dinner that night. Valery is a vegetarian so dinner happened to be lentejas with vegetables and bread. That night we asked him a good place to go to the beach the next day, he recommended Les Salinas.
His brother headed into town at 8:30a.m. to set up his ice cream stand at the medieval festival so we caught a ride into town with him. We then took a bus to Les Salinas, when we arrived it was around 9:00a.m., and we had the entire beach to ourselves. The sun was perfect and the water felt great. It has been a long time since I went swimming at the beach, for one reason or another. It seems you get older and just reading in the sun sounds more appealing. A few years go by, and then you forget how nice it is to be in the water. Granted this wasn’t like Huntington Beach, where you can’t see a few inches below you, this water was crystal clear, and you could see everything! Even though the water was freezing when I first got in, once I was used to it, I didn’t want to stop swimming and paddling around. I loved it.
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| Crystal clear waters and perfectly empty, Les Salines! |
Once the beach started filling up I began to notice a few things. All of a sudden there were more topless women than women that had on tops. I also noticed that some men were wearing Speedos and not just any kind of Speedos, thong Speedos. I kid you not, I saw a 50 year-old man strutting around in a thong Speedo. He also seemed to strike poses at random times which could be a little awkward. At first, I was just stunned, when I was in Nice, France for euro trip we saw one or two women topless, but you should have seen this beach. Everywhere you looked there was a women sunbathing, or swimming completely bare. They would walk around or chase their children around, and it was no big thing…completely natural. Well…I began to get a little curious…it was weird to be the minority (not topless) and I just can’t help but try all things native. Eventually I just whipped off my top and started sunbathing. Naturally, the first 15 minutes I tried it I was slightly uncomfortable. That day I put my top back on and was happy to say that I tried it, and it might not be for me. After we spent the day at the beach we headed back to our guesthouse and Gretchen made spaghetti for dinner.
The next morning we woke up and the weather was overcast, we decided it would be a great day to go to the medieval festival. I had more fun at the festival than I thought I would. First of all, the stands were set up at the top of a castle overlooking Ibiza town, and the views were wonderful. They had stands selling all sorts of knick-knacks…jewelry, soap, bread, ice cream, magnets, and ceramics. It was fun to stroll through the stands, and see all the artisan work. While we were walking up I happened to catch this scene between a grandma and her two grandsons. They all had balloon swords and were having a duel. It was adorable! When they went to leave she looked over her shoulder at the two young boys, and with her British accent shouted, “Forward knights,” and the two boys scurried after her. It made me smile because I thought, “my grandkids and I are going to do stuff like that.” Here is a picture of them racing up the hill and their grandma trailing behind…
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| Grandma with her two grandkids...digging the blue sword she is wielding! |
We found Valery’s brother while we were at the festival and he set us up with two free ice creams as we continued on our way. We bought some bread for dinner and I also found some presents for family members while I was at the festival. All in all it was a successful day. Along with the bread, we had leftover grapes from lunch, and then we went to the store and bought olives and cheese to have a thrown together “tapas dinner” with Valery. I thought it looked so yummy, in the end, I had to take a picture.
The next day we went to Les Salinas beach again in the morning, and this time I was a little bit more comfortable with the topless thing. It is weird because I know I would never feel comfortable doing it in the U.S. but I think that is what is so great about traveling. What is something that is not normal in the United States might be completely natural here in Spain. They are so much more comfortable with nudity. Flipping through magazines here, it is a common occurrence to see nudity. They are not nearly so censored as we are. It makes me think of how it used to be before Adam and Eve took that forbidden bite out of the apple. They were just running around naked and it was quite natural….well here they just run around topless and it starts to feel natural. Nobody gawks they just continue along with their own business. Here’s a risqué tip coming at ya…
Tip# 9: When in a new place do as the locals do…If you are in Morocco, by all means follow the cultural standards, and cover yourself. However, if you are in Ibiza…let loose and embrace your inner 60’s hippie…go topless! You may feel uncomfortable, or you may love the freedom, but if you don’t try you’ll never know! Here is a picture of me topless...hahahaha NOT!
Since Gretchen and I are both white patties we could not stay at the beach all day. At 1:00p.m. we went into town and decided the best way to get out of the sun would be to see a movie. We went to go see Thor in Spanish. I actually just started seeing movies in Spanish and have found that it is really helpful for my language learning. Every time I go to see a movie I hear a new way to say something or I feel good about how far my listening skills have come. Now I have seen Fast and the Furious 5, Thor, and Agua Para Elefantes (Water for Elephants). They were all good and I got the gist of what was happening, if not all, of what was happening (points for meJ).
The next day we paid for Valery to rent a car and he drove us around the island showing us fantastic places. I was so thankful to have someone who had lived in Ibiza for a long time because he showed us some beautiful views. I know if we hadn’t have met Valery we never would have been able to see some of these places and our experience in Ibiza would have been quite different.
First, we went to Es Vedra, it is a rock/island 3 kilometers out to sea, and 400 meters high. Some say it forms part of a magical “triangle of silence” within the Balearic Islands, similar to the Bermudas. We were the only three people on the cliff viewpoint, and it was quite magical. It was a stunning view and I am very glad that we were able to see it.
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| Es Vedra |
After Es Vedra, we headed to a little cove where we got our first taste of some strenuous exercise. I couldn’t even tell you what this place was called but we went down past rocks, bushes, trees, and finally sand to get to the bottom. The last 150 ft was pure sand and we raced to the bottom, it was a lot of fun. The water looked so inviting I was all ready to jump in, and had made my way past the treacherous rocks when I spotted a school of jellyfish. I was never so mad to see a jellyfish in my entire life. Usually I love spotting marine animals. I wasn’t stupid enough to jump in there with them so there was no swimming for me. Here is a picture of the cove.
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| the water was unbelievable...except the jellyfish happened to think the same thing! |
After the cove hike that took about an hour and a half, we headed back to take showers, because we were disgusting. We had lunch, then kept going on our road trip around the island. We saw many more great viewpoints but another one of my favorites was the Partinatx’ Lighthouse.
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| indescribable |
Valery dropped us off at the airport just in time to catch our flight. It was so nice to have really taken advantage of a day and caught a flight. I find so often that we have lost entire days to traveling when flying unless our flight is really early in the morning. In this case it all worked out and we had a full day of fun, and caught the flight.
Now…the trip didn’t quite end with us flying back to Alicante and taking the bus back to Murcia. Why? Well, because the buses stop running at around 10:00p.m. and our flight didn’t come in until 10:45p.m. The options were to take a 90 Euro cab ride to Murcia, or to find accommodation in Alicante, then come back to the airport in the morning to take the bus. Neither of these options seemed appealing at 10:45p.m so I have finally joined the club of airport hotel members. That’s right I slept in the airport! I feel like it was one of those necessary milestones to being a poor world traveler. If you haven’t been a hobo in an airport it is a must. In Alicante it was not that bad. I think I got four hours of sleep and the rest of the time I was listening to my i-pod or reading. I was even able to make all my classes the next day.
Next time I do it I am going to plan a lot better. If you are interested, my friend just posted an interesting website on facebook that has great airport sleeping tips,
http://www.sleepinginairports.net/tips. Since Kristen is flying in late when she comes to Spain I may be joining her to sleep in the airport (I am such an amazing friend, aren’t I?) and I may have to try some of these tips! Let me know what you think.
