Happy Halloween!!
My parents chose to visit me this week because I had Wednesday, November 1st off for Día de los Santos (Day of the Saints), which is a national holiday in Spain. I showed them around Motril as well as two neighboring towns, Salobreña and Torrenueva Costa, and they got to meet my roommates. Motril is quite a change from Málaga, but I think they enjoyed the less touristy, slower-paced life we have over here!
To celebrate the spooky October 31st holiday this week, I presented a picture-filled powerpoint to my classes to explain the typical US Halloween traditions. I was expecting more excitement and engagement since we were diverting from their usual scheduled programming, science, but it turns out Halloween is pretty similar here. However, jack-o-lanterns and haunted corn mazes got oohs, ahs, and lots of questions. I also added in a picture of me dressed as a bat from when I was seven and that blew the kids minds (and mine when I realized it was 15 years ago...)!
After work on Monday I met my parents at their AirBnb so we could have lunch together before our afternoon adventure. The restaurant we chose was one of the nicer ones available in Motril and we got some very interesting dishes (my translation skills were a little rusty this day). We had to hustle to the bus station to catch our ride to Salobreña, but what is traveling without the occasional time crunch.
I wanted to show them the Castillo de Salobreña so we hiked up the hill to enjoy the beautiful ocean and mountain views. Apparently, third time really is a charm because for whatever reason we did not have to pay the usual entrance fee. We tried to walk down a different way to the coast, but the path was blocked off due to damage from a rockslide...
Once we safely made it back to sea level, we had a quick coffee/tea break before heading to the beach to watch the sunset. My dad took a million backlit photos of me, my mom, and the sunset, but I decided to include a selfie of the three of us instead <3.
We had a quick dinner and took a bus (shoutout to the nice driver who allowed us on his bus since ours was late) back to Motril. On the way to my apartment we grabbed my groceries for the week and some snacks for our adventures. My parents got the mini apartment tour and got to meet my roommates before they started fixing/trying to fix random things of ours. Now the chandelier in the living room actually produces a decent amount of light, but our balcony door proved too tricky for my dad.
Tuesday was pretty much a complete wash-out for me. After a short school day I started to feel really sick and decided to rest instead of biking with my parents. The weather was also very gloomy for southern Spain and made our Halloween less festive than we had hoped.
On Wednesday I walked over to my parents AirBnb to join them for breakfast. I got to meet the lovely owner, Cristina, who reassured my mom (via me because she doesn't speak English) that she will be my second mom if I need anything at all. There was a great spread of fruit, yogurt, and toast so we fueled up for our day of hiking.
We met up with Skye at the bus station on the way to take my parents on our previous Torrenueva Costa hiking route. Five miles, several photos, and a stern talking to about trespassing later, we sat down at an Argentinian restaurant for lunch. One of the owners thought Skye was a person he recognized from town which made for a very confusing conversation where we explained that we are actually not even Spanish. He did ask if we were sisters, and as we could not pass up that opportunity, Skye is now an honorary Detwiler.
After sharing some laughs about that interaction, we went to leave and he stopped us saying we had to have some chupititos (shots) before heading out. He brought out a chilled mint liquor and four frosted glasses for us to enjoy our digestif. I am not a fan of ending a meal this way, but everyone else seemed to like it!
Instead of taking the bus home, we decided to walk back to Motril along the coast and it ended being a lot more pleasant than I was expecting. We topped off our activity filled day with an ice cream and then we parted ways with Skye. I led my parents to some other spots in the city and we paid a visit to my school.
Before saying our goodbyes (until Christmas), we had dinner at a local spot with one of my roommates Lauren. We had to rush out of there to get them to their bus, but they made it! I am so happy that my parents were able to make it out here while the weather is still good. We had so many fun adventures in Málaga and Motril, and I know that they will be back soon to pay España another visit :)
On my way back to my apartment, I caught up with Lauren who was contemplating if she should ask the people at the table next to us about petting their dog. She got up the courage and their little girl recognized me from school. We ended up talking to this family, coincidentally our neighbors, for almost two hours! Now, we have an invite to Christmas dinner and a six month old Golden to visit whenever we want. The generosity of the Spanish people everyone.
Thursday night, after a Zumba session and a Halloween themed language exchange call to Ada, a bunch of us auxes in Motril got together for tapas. We checked out a new spot and it was really wonderful! We also got to welcome a new arriver, Brice, and get him familiar with all of us.
The highlight of Friday was Sophie and me (mostly Sophie, I just mixed the dry ingredients) making pumpkin cinnamon rolls! They took quite a while, with two different rising periods involved, but they came out delicious. The perfect fall themed dessert to enjoy during our Spanish TV show El Internado.
Skye, Renne, and I spent our Saturday afternoon in Granada with Clare and Katie who we previously met up with in Málaga. The five of us started off our time in Granada with a tour of the cathedral. Somehow after studying in the city for six months and visiting once this year, it was my first time inside the cathedral.
From there we took a tour of some of the touristy shops surrounding the cathedral and all bought some postcards. We wanted to check out some vintage shops so I led us over to Mosaic where Skye and Renne previously had success. Although all of struck out this time around, it was still fun to see all there was to offer.
There was a vegan tapas tour happening all over Spain this weekend and Granada was one of the participating cities which was one of the reasons I wanted to take a day trip there. The group decided it was time for some lunch so we tried to check out some of the listed restaurants, but they were all packed. We opted for some more classic tapas places and that is how we spent the rest of our time...hopping from restaurant to restaurant.
Three second year auxes from Granada, Mara, Lydia, and Julia, met up with us and we continued our culinary excursion. It was a really great group and we had so much fun laughing and swapping stories :)
We finished the night off with a drink at Hannigans, an Irish pub where I've embarrassed myself more than once singing karaoke. There was no karaoke last night but overall a very successful day trip to Granada.
I have spent a lot of today planning some excursions further afield for the upcoming weeks (no spoilers but we're going to be discovering a new continent!). Skye and I were too late for the gym, it closes at 14:00 on Sundays, but at least we know the schedule now.
I am looking forward to meeting the new, permanent teacher for my 5th grade classes tomorrow and teaching my students about the environment! Getting the chance to put my BS in Environmental Science to good use.
There is an actual inside to the Granada catedral????