No Hablo Español

- Zach -

So, this whole "not being able to speak Spanish" thing definitely has its moments. Without Rachel being able to translate for the two of us here in Spain, I would be in trouble. For example, if I had to navigate my way through the Aeropuerto de Barcelona while flying with a Spanish airline (which I attempted). Nothing serious went wrong, but it was a good thing I got the airport early just to be safe. On three separate occasions I thought I was in the right place to hand over my boarding pass only to be directed in somewhere else. If I had known where I was going, it would have taken me twenty minutes. 75 minutes later I finally got to the right zone where my gate was going to be and I made it to the Aeropuerto de Madrid safe and sound Tuesday at 23:00, but that isn't the end of my journey to meet up with Rachel yet. 

While I was in Barcelona, Rachel messaged me and told me that her and her friend Sasha were going to "pick yo ass up" at the terminal in Madrid via the metro rather than me trying to navigate my way throught the Madrid metro by myself in the middle of the night. This was all communicated via Facebook chat Monday night in which I was in Barcelona with some friends from Galway. We had a study week at our college in Galway, so naturally we went to Barcelona instead. The plan that night was to go to "Nasty Monday" at Apolo night club, so were enjoying a couple thirteen or fourteen ice-cold cervezas. Well, I told her I was landing in Terminal 1 because that's what my boarding pass indicated, but that meant Terminal 1 in the Aeropuerto de Barcelona... -_- After staring at the metro platform waiting to see Rachel and Sasha, they finally got off of a train that pulled up as I was getting up to go and ask a security guard for help. I should note here that I had a total of eight euro all in change in my pocket, a phone with 8% battery, no wi-fi for my nearly dead phone, and a credit card that wasn't approved for use in Spain yet (hence the no wi-fi situation), so it was safe to say I was screwed. But hey, if that's an indication of how this journey is going to go, that's fine by me because it all worked out and makes for a pretty good story.

Here's to more stories,

Happy Turkey Day everyone from Toledo, Spain, 

Zach

And here we go!

- Rachel -

After three wonderful months in Alicante full of learning, adventures, and new friends, I’m now on a bus to Madrid to start the next chapter of a new adventure. A month in Europe with my boyfriend Zach! While I got to spend my semester in Spain, he was way over in Galway, Ireland! Not quite as far as Minnesota, (thankfully) we were able to see each other three times in three months, this being the fourth so NOT BAD! Now that classes are over for me, and almost over for Zach, we will be blogging about our experiences abroad up until we head home to Minnesota on January 3^rd. We are so excited to be able to have this opportunity not only to be in Europe, but to be able to travel together throughout Europe! Its gonna be a good ride folks, so get ready to share our adventures with us!

Rachel