Kaaw-deeth

the beach at 8am when I first arrived

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The title is how they pronounce this little peninsula type thing off the southern coast of Spain. I took the long (8hour) bus ride down there Thursday night (because it was a holiday, all trains were booked!). I slept for the most part, but woke up every 2 hours or so...I got into Cadiz at about 730 and it was still dark out! they dropped us off at just a little bus stop and everything was closed...and i had no map so i just started walking. probably not the safest thing, but I survived and cadiz is safe from what I hear. Anyway, I saw a sign for the beach, followed in that direction and luckily found our hotel! They let me check in at 8am and I took a nice long nap until Max got there around 11am. We went out to eat (I was starving) and had sandwhiches, chips, ice cream and beer right on the beach. We spent the day walking along the beach and further into town, through the various alleyways and plazas. We made sandwiches for dinner (my senora packed me food) and ate them on the beach as we watched the sunset. It was gorgeous...but the millions of mosquitos sort of ruined it. Saturday, after a fantastic buffet breakfast, we headed back to the beach, in our suits this time! Considering Cadiz is on the Atlantic Ocean, the water was not swimable...but we lazily spent the day on the sand. We did walk into the main part of town and saw the old and really pretty cathedral.  We took the long way back and stopped at an ice cream place/bar (I had lemon sorbet with champagne! yumm) and a fruit market.  We spotted a Mexican restaurant (which we had both been craving since they're hard to find here) and decided to skip the usual sandwich dinner and splurge. They didn't open until 9pm for dinner so we wasted some time at a pirate-themed bar watching the spanish futbol (soccer) game until dinner. We had nachos and burritos (very different from real mexican food, but hit the spot nonetheless). Sunday we got up early to eat the buffet breakfast before checking out and heading our separate ways. I took the 9am bus back to Madrid which was filled with a crying child, two old men sneezing and coughing, and the guy across the aisle picking his nose. I tried to zone out and listen to my ipod the whole time, but it was difficult. Anyway, I had a fabulous weekend and it was incredibly relaxing (not like I have much to stress about since this all feels like one big vacation!) :)