Alhambra Parte Dos, Que Guay!

So I left off entering the Alhambra, the first thing we did after we entered La Puerta de Justicia was go up to the Alcazaba and you can go to the watch tower from there.  It's basically a really big tower and from there you have one of the most gorgeous views in the world.  You can see the whole Albicin from the top of the tower.  The Albicin is a very old neighborhood and all the houses are a beautiful white with narrow streets.  I'm going to visit the Albicin later this semester.

Ruins of the Baths

View from the watch tower of the Alcazaba

  At the Alcazaba you can see the ruins where all the soldiers used to bunk and even ruins of some old baths.  The Aarabs of course are known for their baths and ingenious designs for cleanliness.  They were seriously ahead of their times with their sewage systems, toilets and baths.  So the first picture is of ruins of the baths, and of course there were seperate baths and you went from a nice hot bath all the way to a cool bath.  I'm going to get to go to a bath in Granada this semester, AIFS is paying for everyone to get a bath in one of the places they have there.


This picture is a view from the watch tower of the Alcazaba.  This is the ruins of where the soldiers barracks where.










After we walked around the Alcazaba we got to walk up the Watch Tower and see the incredible view from there.  Here's a few pictures of me on top of the watch tower and the views.  There are a ton so I can't put them all up, but there's more on Facebook, of course.

 So this is basically one of the views from the Watch Tower.  The Albicin is gorgeous and I can't wait to go see it.  It's the oldest part of Granada so I'm pyshed to see it.





 Here's me at the top of the tower!! It was an amazing view.  Sorry for the hair in my face, the sun was blinding but it was the best spot for pictures.  From the Watch tower we went to Nasrid Palaces, which is a ton of rooms and courtyards, chambers, a bunch of really gorgeous rooms.  Like I said earlier a lot of the rooms have lost their original color, but there is gorgeous blue, yellow, red and green tile everywhere.  The places where the tile are still bright look amazing.  After we saw all those really pretty rooms we went to a patio area where there are twelve lions surrounding a fountain spitting out water.  They were actually under restoration for 6 years and the day we got there I think was one of the first days they revealed them.  They are gorgeous pure white marble hand carved lions, and they just hooked them back up to the water system so they are working again.  We were advised to come back to see them working but I didn't have to!

Patio of the Lions

Tiles

 Here's the two pictures, the Patio of the Lions on the left and a picture of some of the tile in a room on the right.

After we went through the Patio of Lions we went up to Generalife and saw the gardens over there.  From there we had an amazing view of the Alhambra in it's entirety, or pretty much in it's entirety.  

So this is me walking towards Generalife, unfortunately it's not the greatest picture with me and the Alhambra, but hopefully I'll get another chance to go back and take better pictures.  At Generalife there are tons of gardens with all sorts of different flowers and trees.  Again because it's kind of cold here there are no flowers so it's really just big bushes that are shaped and look really pretty.  There's so many pictures I want to show you but I can't possible put them all up here.  After we went to the gardens we were left to ourselves to wander around as we wish and eat our "bocadillos"  or our bagged lunch.  So me and my friends went off and found a place to sit and eat.  We sat near Charles V Palace and the Alhambra museum and ate our lunch.  After that we went into the Palace and tried to go into the museum but it was closed due to siesta...sometimes while siesta is well appreciated, it's quiet annoying. 

 We finally left around 3ish and headed back down to the main city.  We certainly took our time shopping in the little stores and I got two scarves and some post cards that I need to send off soon.  Sorry to anyone waiting on one.  Then Sat night I went out to a sports bar with my roommate and friends and was able to watch some good o'fashioned American Football.  I got to watch the Saints Vs 49er's game and the first quarter of the Patriots vs. Broncos game, which was very fun.  Those games were on untill around 11 and 2 here, so I was out quite late but it was a good night.  Overall I was exhausted by the end of the weekend from walking so much and I slept and did a whole lot of nothing on Sunday, which is fine because nothing is open on Sunday anyways.  

A pavillion in the Alhambra

Me and some friends at Alcazaba

Me somewhere on the Alhambra, just a very pretty photo. 

To conclude my exciting weekend I went to mass on Sunday with two of my friends, which was quite an ordeal because mass times are quite confusing to figure out.  We went to the huge Cathedral that's in town, pictures later, and it's giagantic.  The Cathedral is so pretty and huge inside.  There's huge organ pipes on your left, tiers and tiers of paintings, ornate things hanging from the wall.  It is also apparently where one of the Queens was once buried.  It's a very cool place and I felt so fortunate to be able to attend mass there.  Oh yea, and apparently the mass we went to, the Bishop decided to do.  So it was pretty cool to see the Bishop, the people go pretty excited too, they ran up to shake his hand and wave goodbye to him at the end of mass.  Unfortunately for me there are no misseletes of anything of that nature to help me follow along, so really all I could say was "y con tu espiritu" which is the only thing I know from our changes in the U.S.  It was quite the experience, but a good one at that.

I'm starting to like things here, and now that my first week is over, I guess the adventure can begin...

Until next time...Love and miss you all