Thursday 20 January 2011

mr. moonlight

I'm staying at a lovely mountain house in Valencian community. From the village nearby, I can see the city of Benidorm in a distance.
My job here is to clear the forest garden and some other outdoor work. The weather for last few days has been a bit cloudy and misty but otherwise, it's warm and nice. The warmest January ever for me. The house is in a very quiet and peaceful place.
My stay is till next Monday. Not quite sure where to go next but maybe Greece. The time of my travel is approaching the end. Another month and a half. I'm a slow traveler but I guess I'll have to speed up a tiny bit to see as much as I can.
So many places I want to go, but bish bash bosh, and I'll do my best.
picture: full moon

Sunday 9 January 2011

Granada

I moved to Madrid and stayed there for three days and moved to Granada, where I'm at now. I visited a couple of museums and saw many famous works in Madrid. It was raining most of the time but not too heavy. Very interesting city. They have a huge garden in the main station and so many turtles in it's pond. Some swimming and some sitting still like a stone.
Four hours and a bit train ride from Madrid to Granada. My departure was at five so I was looking outside of the train when the sun was setting. Beautiful sunset it was. I think I've heard a term "the sky is burning" before. I'm not sure I get the real meaning but it looked like it was. The sky around the sun was like the surface of oil. So many colours mixed, the colors I don't know the name of or maybe there is no name for those colours, the "colour of surface of oil" colour.
Granada is another unique place. I've never been to Morocco but it is said that Granada has it's culture. Many small shops pouring out onto a narrow streets selling souvenirs. So many kinds of smell too. On one street it is spicy and when I cross a street and then it changes to a smell of incense from the souvenir shops. Another turn into a narrower street where there's no shop and you'll encounter an odor of cat piss and dog droppings. Interesting isn't it. I enjoyed walking and smelling the streets but I also enjoyed visiting Alhambra. Tiny tiny decoration was everywhere in the palace. Neat.
I'm leaving Granada tomorrow and move to a town called Alicante. Then I'm going to work for two weeks in a mountain close to Alicante. HelpX is a very good thing, I would recommend to anyone who is interested to work for short term abroad, or in your own country, of course. Anyway, I'm going to stay in the quiet mountain area and wind up my spring for the last bit of my "odyssey".pictures: above, in Madrid. I don't know what it was but some kind of festival was going on on the sixth. below, inside the Alhambra. the father is pointing at a ceiling which looked like a night sky full of stars.

Sunday 2 January 2011

Happy New Year

So… first of all, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
I went to Mont Saint Micheal after Rennes. And after Mont Saint Micheal, I moved south bit by bit by train. First, I went to Nantes, where I spent my Christmas. And then to Bordeaux, Toulouse. By then the temperature was much warmer than Paris. I wanted to enter Spain but there was no train to Barcelona from Toulouse that day so I went to Narbonne, changing station for Spain. It's very south of France. 2010 was almost closed by then and the hostel was very quiet. I was surprised that it was open this time of the year. And then the next day, December 29th, I entered Spain. The train ride was interesting. Short after departing Narbonne, the train started to slow down. I looked out to check whether something was wrong. But everything was okay. The train was slowing down because it was riding a very thin land. Sea on one hand and lake on the other. Many kinds of birds flying. I saw a big bird flying and the silhouette looked like it was flamingo. Soon I knew I was right. Groups of flamingos were searching for food and more came flying to join them. I was surprised to see wild flamingos like that, from a train. I was even more surprised when I saw the railway on the google map. The land where the line was was so thin and I couldn't understand why they built it there. But I had fun looking out the window. Maybe it was a good decision after all.
I got off the train at Girona. A bit north from Barcelona. Stayed there for one night and then moved to Barcelona, where I spent my last day of 2010 and the first day of the 2011. The warmest winter I've ever spent. I walked around the city today. Went to Park Guell and Sagrada Familia. I also went by the beach on the new year's eve, where there were many fireworks.
I'm leaving Barcelona tomorrow. Thinking to move to Madrid.
2010 went by like a blink of an eye. Or maybe even faster. I hope that I'll be able to blink more than once by the end of 2011, the year of rabbit, the fast one.
Happy New Year
picture: above, mont saint micheal. below, sagrada familia