Last days in Gandia

So we have been here in Gandia for the past two weeks taking spanish classes. We just finished taking our finals, which were really easy, at least for me they were. Tomorrow we find out if we passed and then we have a going away party tomorrow night.
As of right now neither of us have a place to stay when we go to Valencia, but that is OK because we will figure it out. We might end up in some hostels for a while until we find a place, but that's OK too. That's all I got right now, I will post again when we arrive in Valencia.

God Bless,
John

Un poco viejo

Hey all,

So this post should say Saturday Jan. 16th, but this is the first day we were able to find some decent internet.

This morning we woke up at 8:30! The earliest we've woken up all week. Although I must admit, I didn't wake up from the alarm...John did. Paloma brought us to the bus station at 11, and we left at 12. We made it here (in Gandia) by 6. Our place is nice, right along the beach. The sunset was amazing! I'll try to upload some pictures later, although the internet here seems to not like pictures. We found our hotel very easily. The guy at the front desk apparetly was in our same shoes four years ago and just never left! John and I might be here for a while... Its ok, we'll let you guys come visit. Anyway, we just got back from a grocery store, bought a bunch of pizzas for an oven that we thought we had. O well, cutting it in half and shimmying it into the microwave one at a time will have to do.

Enjoy,
Kyle

Classes Begin

So we have finally made it to Gandia where we are taking out Spanish classes. They are really easy. Out apartment is nice, but it is very small. There is only one big problem with it, the internet. That is why it has taken us so long to put a post up. we finally got access to the internet here at the university so we can actually do stuff on the web. The internet at the apartments I would say is as slow as the internet when it first came out in the states. Well besides that, the weather has been beautiful here. We got here late in the afternoon on Sat. Meet our roommate, Joey (he's from Texas, but goes to college in Maryland), and then went to the grocery story to buy some food, which consisted of pizza, bread, orange juice, milk, and of course some really cheap wine. We get back to the apartment and find out we don't have an oven, so we ate some soggy pizza and we don't have a wine opener. That was successful!
Later some of the other guys Joey meet came over. There is surprisingly quite a few people form Wisconsin here. That night we saw the most amazing sunset (attached). The next morning, Sunday Kyle and I got up and found a church we were only 10 minutes late for mass and he was already on the homily. If his homily wasn't so long mass probably would have been only 30 min. long. We came back to the apart. and took a siesta after mass. Later that day a whole bunch of guys went down to the beach to have some beers and some cheap champagne, and then meet some other people down there. Afterwards we came back to the apartment and sat around and talked.
Monday was the first day of classes. Kyle is in the upper intermediate, and I am in the lower intermediate, which is really really easy, which I don't mind. Last night Kyle and I sat around and relaxed, which was a nice change of pace. I went for a walk on the pier and watched some fisherman. Lately it has kinda been cloudy. Hopefully it will get sunnier in the next couple of days.
Oh yeah, almost forgot, we think we may have found an apartment, so sometime this week we are going to go to Valencia to check it out. That's all I got.

God Bless,
John

From Green Bay to Madrid-> Italian Style

John is one step ahead of me, so I'm going to attempt to catch up on some of the things he might have missed. Here goes... First of all I want to point out that while many of you were going to your first classes on Janruary 11th, we were on a plane to Spain. It's ok, we to sit in an airport for four hours. We finally got onboard for what was my first international flight. Tell you what, if you ever get a chance to fly international, I recommend Alitialia (italy's airlines). It was happy 21st birthday Kyle when they came around with a healthy Italian portion or their red wine. The food was great on the airline (as well as the PB&J's my mom packed). We made it to Rome with a little over an hour to get to our connecting flight. After more security, passport control, and what seemed like a three mile run, we made it on time!

The Palace and the Cathedral

Today we slept in till noon, which means that I got like 15 hours of sleep. I really did not need that much, but I really don't mind. We took the bus to downtown Madrid and saw the Royal Palace and the Cathedral in Madrid. The palace was closed for tours but we could walk around the Cathedral. It was really amazing.
After the Cathedral, we walked down some of the older streets in the area. It was really cool. It was just like what you would imagine walking down the old streets in Venice or in old European City. I put on as many pictures as possible, but not all will upload so they will be on my face book. You can look at them there.

God Bless,
John

First Day In Spain

So, we leave Chicago at about 4:15 and arrive in Rome 9 hours later at 8:15(local time) in the morning. We have to literally run to catch our connection flight. We made it, but guess what, our bags didn't. Good thing we have a change of clothes in our carry-ons. Then Pedro, Paloma's dad picked us up from the airport in Madrid. We went back to the house, had lunch with Pedro and Fernando and then went for a long walk. It's 8:00 and we are about to sit down for supper. That concludes our traveling and first day in Spain. By the way, I am so jealous of the poster that Kyle has above his bed. It's of Leonardo DiCaprio, but it's all good because I got the Spice Girls above mine.

God Bless
John

Welcome

Just decided to make this blog so then I wouldn't have to continue to send you all e-mails every week because that would be a lot of e-mails. Don't worry I'll try to still send them, but I can't promise everything. If you are interested, Kyle and I will try to update this blog at least once a week and include some pictures hopefully.
I first adventure begins tomorrow, Friday, when we travel to Chicago to pick up our visa's and then Mon. we fly out of Chicago. Exciting I know, but that is all I got for an update.

God Bless,
John