Week Eight: Santander!

Hello! So I forgot to blog last week so I'm going to pretend that I wrote this last week...
Alright, so this week we had midterms. As always they were such a drag but I made it to the end, (only to realize I had three the following week).
We actually got to meet up with some of the API Barcelona kids from Stonehill who spent a weekend in Madrid. I can't tell you how nice it was to see those familiar faces! As we had to get up early the next day Lisa and I met the Stonehillers at a common spot in Sol and we all caught up, shared stories and reminisced about Stonehill!

STONEHILL! Sheriden, Lisa, Tori, Me and Jovan

So after a week of studying and teaching, the fun began!
We went to Santander, in the north of Spain for the weekend! Basically it was a blast. I saw some of the most breathtaking sights I'd ever seen! Santander is a beach town/city where the Royal Family used to go because they had a beach estate there. So Saturday when we got there a few of us wandered around down to the beach. Of course we took pictures and laughed and enjoyed ourselves very much. After that we met back at our hotel, which was very nice I might add, then met up with the group and took a tour led by our awesome director, Quique! We went over to the Royal Family's estate first. Then after taking in the astonishing building we walked down a hill as the state was on top of a huge hill overlooking the sea, where we saw the replica ships that Christopher Columbus used to sail and find India which turned out to be America. Then after the ships we got to see a bunch of sea mammals which are kept in somewhat of an outdoor aquarium. Relectunatly we had to leave the animals and we ventured over to the down town area which was quite the walk.  There we saw a fracking protest and had dinner. The food wasn't anything special but we got ice cream after which hit the spot. So by this time it was around 9 and we headed back to the hotel.  As always Lisa and I called it an early night and did some studying in our hotel room while all the other kids went out.

Lisa and I

The estate!

Me!

The Harbor!

The next day we had an amazing breakfast provided by the hotel then we were off to the caves at Altamira! So these caves were some of the oldest and best persevered caves on the Iberian peninsula. We did not get to see the actual caves but we got to see the replica which was incredible! The detail and precision of the painting were unreal. After the caves were done we headed into a little town called Santillana. It was the quaintest little tourist town. After we finished up our lunch, which was AWFUL, we headed back to good old Madrid.

View from the cave! 

Santiallana!

So that was my fantastic eighth week!
xoxo,
Michelle