¡Listo!

I know I'm a little behind.  But I have an excuse!  My parents have been here for the past couple of days and I'm loving that they are here!  Of course, we're taking every opportunity to spend time together.  As such, blog posts would be hard to write.  So excuse me for this post about Meagan's and my beach trip last Saturday to a nice little town called Matalascañas.  (That literally means "Kill the sugarcanes."  We think.)

Getting there: we went to the farther bus station from where we both live to get tickets, and they ended up being pretty cheap!  I don't know how coach companies do it in the U.S., but in Spain at least, they usually leave you with a vuelta abierta, which means that you can choose to come back at whatever time you want, provided there are buses running then.  That option is also cheaper, so we went with that.  The bus ride wasn't too long, maybe about an hour and a half each way.  The drive wasn't the prettiest either, but we did get to drive through Spain's main national park, of which they are very proud.  It's called Doñana National Park, and from the looks of it, it seems pretty cool!  We only saw a very small portion, and it probably wasn't the best portion to see (mainly because it was the roadside part of the park, which is never as pretty as the more secluded areas).  But it was still cool!  Evidently, Doñana is where they grow most, if not all, of their strawberries.

To go back a little bit, before setting off the night before, I asked Marisol's (my señora's) friend Antonio for advice on where to go and what beach to visit.  45 minutes later, I had learned that the two best parts of the beach are (1) by la piedra, which is the ruin of an older lighthouse that crumbled to the ground after the beach eroded back to where it is today.  Advantage: cool landmark!  Disadvantage: lots of people and short beach.  The other part he described to me was (2) near a part of the town called El pueblo andaluz, in which I discovered that Marisol used to have a piso (apartment)!  (I later told her I knew that and she kind of blushed.  I don't really know the story behind this, but I think she shared it with her brother.  I don't know why that fell apart, though.)  Advantage of this beach: very long beach and not as many people.  Disadvantage: no guarantee that the bus would go there to drop us off or pick us up.  (Obviously, that was a pretty big disadvantage.)

When we got to Matalascañas, we figured it would be easier to just go to the short beach, even though there were a lot of people.  That didn't stop us from having a great day!  We really wished that the ocean had been warmer, though.  We only got to put our feet in before running back to the sunny sand to warm them up again.  (It was really cold.)  Other (cool?) experiences: got to see la piedra, which translates directly to "the stone," but didn't get to touch it (because the ocean was so cold); had our first/second nudist experience when a woman decided to remove her top; saw my first open chiringuito, which is a dive-ish beach bar; and found out that Spain has public bathrooms on the beach that only cost 20 cents, but I'll be damned if there were any open ones.  I guess it was the off-season.

Here are some pictures for your enjoyment!

Overall, the trip was fantastic!  I foresee many beach trips in the future, maybe when the water gets warmer.