Oktoberfest!!!

Wow! I don't even know how to begin writing about my trip to Munich, Germany for Oktoberfest.  It is a 2 to 3 week festival that has been running since 1810, and the festival draws millions and millions of people every year.  The majority of Oktoberfest-goers are from Bavaria, but there are definitely a good amount from other countries.  There was an especially solid showing from Vanderbilt; all of the study abroad Europe kids met at the festival and we had the time of our lives! Before we even left Barcelona, the friends I was traveling with and I decided to kick things off right with a round of beers at the bus station.  We continued to prep ourselves for beerfest by having some road beers, or sky beers, on the flight...

We thought we were pretty cool having our beers en route to the festival, but we had no idea the kind of beer we would soon be encountering the next day.


After taking a bus, a plane, and another bus to get to Munich and then wandering around to our hostel, we tried to go out on the town in search of something to do, but only ended up grabbing a few slices of pizza and befriending drunken, lederhosen-wearing people who were roaming around after a long day of Oktoberfest.  We hit the hay not too long after so we could be ready to go early in the morning and beat the long lines.  Cole made us wake up super early, we ate breakfast at the hostel to fuel up before the adventure, and we were on our way... I have to admit I was already feeling pretty high off of adrenaline and excitement to see what the festival would be like.  Taylor, Cole, Lauren and I set off around 7:00 AM to line up at the Hofbrau tent and the amount of people already there was astounding.  After we entered the park, before even getting to the tent where the other Vandy people would be, we saw so many huge rides and thousands of food and game carts...Disney World but funnier, costume-y, and with tons of beer!

 Kennywood's big swings except 600 times bigger

Charles, it's the real Hofbrau House! And soon I can go to the Pittsburgh one with you!

(inside the tent, view from one of our tables)

Vanderbilt friends

Shown: size off bierstein relative to my body

Once we were finally inside and situated at a few tables with Vanderbilt people, we awaited the beer waitresses' entrance.  The crowds went wild once they started coming out with huge rounds of huge steins of beer.  I was warned that this beer was higher in alcohol content, and that one mug had about 3 regular sized beers in it, so I was pretty sure I would have to pace myself.  I was so excited to see some of my great friends, who are studying in other countries, that I have been missing and everyone started to reminisce and drink their beers.  Before long, you could say we were feeling pretty happy as probably 75,000 people (only in our tent, but there were many more on site) were chanting, singing different songs, and meeting each other.  Whenever one brave soul in the HB tent decided to try to chug an entire stein, the whole tent stood up and watched to see if he/she could do it...if the person couldn't then everyone booed, if the person could...the crowd went wild! I couldn't have chugged one of those monsters if my life depended on it, but Tess and I got some pretty good shots of us pretending we were hard core...

Prost!

I drank beer, believe it!

Some of my friends, like Evan here, bought hilarious German hats...

View from top level of tent. So many people.

 Lederhosens on Alex and Lauren's adventure to the toilet!

 Biggest soft pretzels you'll ever see, Dad you would've loved them...and bratwurst (ew)

 This is how every German person dresses, it was so entertaining. I almost bought a dress.

They sell cookie cake necklaces that people wear, who knows why?

More Bavarian-clad natives

That guy had one too many...

These are the ridiculous kind of people we saw walking around.

After a long and enjoyable day, we needed to nap before we went out to get dinner with one of our best friends studying in Italy, so Taylor, Lauren and I headed back to the hostel.  Seeing everyone in the streets trying to stay awake and continuing to party on was very impressive, but the nap we finally got was much needed.

The day, in all, was one that I will never forget for the rest of my life.  I wish I could repeat it, but I'm not sure I'd be able to handle it all! I highly recommend going to Oktoberfest to ANYONE, it's a must.

This final picture shows how long and crazy German street names are, the language is crazy! I think I'll stick to Spanish...

Josepspitalstreet? Out to dinner after the festivities.

Palma de Mallorca

This past weekend, a few of my friends and I flew to the beautiful island of Mallorca to spend time on the beach and in the town.  After not sleeping on Friday night to get to the airport very early Saturday morning, we relaxed on the beautiful beach near our hostel and waited for our rooms to be ready.  We found some golden arches that I wanted to show my mom (but the food is way different from American McDonald's and the coffee is espresso.  They have McPollo instead of McChicken)

 After we checked in, we took the Palma bus to the main plaza and toured the shops and cafes.  I got to walk around an amazing cathedral that Gaudí helped to create and where many important Mallorcan kings are buried.  The cathedral looked like a castle and had a moat around it, here are a few pictures to show how big it was.

Lauren, Taylor, and I split from the other girls because we were starving and spotted an "italian" restaurant that smelled delicious.  I order a margherita pizza "con rucola" and we all finished 3 huge homemade plates of pizza.

Unfortunately, I did not take my camera with me on Saturday night so I could not document the delicious halibut dish I ate or the 35 year old Spaniard who kept hitting on my 4'10'' friend Evan.  After dinner, though, we happened upon happy hour at a bar down one of the cute, cobblestone side streets and were surprised to hear a lot of patrons speaking English.  We soon discovered that the Americans, Australians, and one South African, hanging out there were part of a sailing team that was in Mallorca for a pre-Worlds competition.  Their middle-aged/billionaire/tribal-dress-wearing owner, Doug, was buying drinks for everyone and we soon found out that he is a Vanderbilt alumni.  Their manager, a young 20 something named Jen, told us we should meet them on Sunday at the Real Club Nautico Palma to swim while the boys had sailing practice and continue on to their private mansion sailing regatta party. 

We made sure to do a background check on these people before we set off for our Sunday adventures, and the fun began once we arrived at the yacht club.  We swam and hung out with sailors from all over the world, some young and some old, and they were all very excited to be meeting young college girls.  After the yacht club, Doug, Jen, my friends, and I stopped at a sports bar on our walk back to their rented private villa and Doug footed the bill for food and drinks.  Once we arrived to the amazing house overlooking the docks and water, we showered and began helping with party preparations.  There were TWO private chefs in the kitchen, it smelled fantastic, and it tasted even better later on once everyone arrived and dinner began.  I don't even eat red meat, but the little hamburgers that the Italian chef, Lorenzo, grilled melted in my mouth.  There was seafood linguine, ribs, fresh white fish (very similar to sea bass), a Mediterranean couscous salad, plenty of vino, and more.  The 40 or so sailor boys, and few women, were definitely enjoying our being there and probably our dance moves once the private DJ, Manolo, started dropping beats out on the patio.

 (My friends with the DJ pre-party)

 (Dougie and some of our new sailor friends at the party)

(Sarah pre-party/awesome old Mallorcan party house)

I wish I had more photos of the fiesta, but I was too busy meeting interesting people, eating, dancing, and practicing my español.  Needless to say, our Mallorcan weekend was one I will definitely never forget.  Our two days were filled with random adventures that probably only happen once in a lifetime...I am so glad we went.

This weekend, if all goes to plan and we can take our final early, we're off to Munich, Germany to celebrate Oktoberfest!!

Love and miss everyone!

Una Excursión

Today we had a group excursion through my study abroad company to two places: a cavas, or sparkling wine, plantation called Cavas Freixenet (pr: Fresh-shay-net) and to a beautiful beach town called Sitges.  The group and I were pretty tired from the night before, but we all made it to the coach bus from the metro just in time to depart at 10:00AM, an hour that many young people do not often see here in Barcelona.  Our first stop was at Cavas Freixenet and it was wonderful, I added some pictures of the outside of the vineyard and some pictures from our indoor/outdoor mini-train tour and cavas tasting! We traveled down many different layers of steps and found ourselves in deep, underground cave rooms where barrels and bottles of different types of cavas are stored by Freixenet, which actually is a very famous cavas company whose product is represented in advertisements by many famous actors and singers (even Liza Minnelli and Penelope Cruz).  There were more bottles on our train tour up the rotunda ramps on our way out of the caves up to the production area and outside of the vineyard.

After the tour and tasting, we loaded back onto the bus and headed 20 or so minutes away to lovely Sitges where a group of other students and I immediately got some lunch, bought beach towels, and hit the water. I added a few pictures of the water, but didn't want to ruin my camera by using it down closer to the water.  Not to mention, I didn't want any of the nude people's pictures on my camera.

Hope all is well in the States, I miss everyone!

 These final photos are at the Marina where there are plenty of cute restaurants. This picture is of Lauren and Evan last night when we went down to eat at one of the many restaurants along the sea at the Marina.  Apparently they bring you "chupitos", or shots, and shot glasses at the end of the meal for free?!?

La Boquería

Hola a todos! Today I went to one of the coolest places in the city of Barcelona called la Boquería.  It is a huge outdoor, but covered, fresh foods market.  La Boquería is situated on La Rambla, one of the main streets that cuts through a part of the city and is somewhat of a tourist trap.  The market though, is a place for both visitors and locals to walk through the various "paradas", or little food stations, and taste and buy different foods.  There are many different kinds of stands where vendors sell their food: fruit, vegetable, sugary candy, chocolates, dried fruit, beef, ham, chicken, fish, bread, cheese, nuts, and even more than I can remember.  Each food group is sold at many stands though, so the place is huge and there are tons of people everywhere!

My friend and I got falafel pitas because we were starved and it was one of the first things we saw (I probably should have looked around a little bit longer first) and before we left to take the metro back to our apartments I got a strawberry-coconut smoothie, or here "fresa y coco".  All of the fruterías in the market have icy spreads of pre-made smoothies to buy in little plastic cups, and there were more than 40 fruit flavor combinations that I saw today.

All in all, I had a great time at la Boquería, and even though I didn't fill out my packet for class as well as I could have, I still believe I learned a lot.  Hopefully we go back soon so I can cook delicious, fresh foods here at my apartment!  Hope all is well en los Estados Unidos.

Quick Bus Tour

Here are some pictures that I took today on my group's bus tour.  Some are of the Olympic Stadium, some of La Sagrada Familia, and one with an Asian statue man.