iHola!

So I woke up this morning, pulling into Spain with all of its palm trees and mountains :)  Not to mention the water here is gorgeous. My roommate wouldn't wake up because for the 10th day in a row we had to get up at 7 a.m. and of course we lost 6 hours along the way. When she finally did she was upset I didn't wake her up...but I did. haha We had breakfast at 8, because they said we had a mandatory meeting with a diplomat at an unknown time. Problem is they are always inconsistant when they process our pass ports and such. We didn't end up with the meeting until a little after 9. It was basically to tell us everything our speakers on the ship have. There are lots of pickpocketers, Spain is amazing, and stay out of ghetto. lol It makes sense there are pickpockets here, they have a 43% unemployment rate here, so unfortunatelly it makes sense. I can't wait to actually go into the city tonight, my friends are ranting and raving. I will post that up here as soon as I can. I actually spent my first hours in Spain driving through the countryside in a charter bus and then Snorkeling at Les Medes, a group of protected islands with caves, cliffs and a lot of sea urchins. It's located in a relatively upper class touristy area called L'Estartit It's quite close to France on the far end of Catalonia. We had a group of really awesome tour guides who gave us a small talk on why they preserve these islands. The water was really blue, and there are a lot more sail boats around this area than what I'm familiar with in the states. We took a small motor boat and the waves were huge and really rough, but the side of the Mountain we went to had really calm waters. They insisted I use a wet suit, and I ended up getting too warm with my water polo swim suit on. I even had to request a 1/2 length one. It was nice though because after about an hour of snorkelling a group of Californians and I (we all know they like cold water) jumped into the water to cool off. One girl from Texas started freaking out about how cold it was and went back on the boat. The rest of us jumped in and swam around with a couple of the guides. There were about 30 of us split up between 4 guides. The fish weren't as impressive as those you would see in the Carribean, but that was probably due to the side of the island we were forced on due to conditions. But I got to see rockier formations and caves than I've seen before. The cave was amazing, with light coming in from a little nook we swam through. Our guide had a flashlight to show us the orange, purple and red coral growing on the inside :)  Also there was a lot of red coral, which is rare. That's part of what they're protecting the island. I got to hold a sea urchin. I love them. They suck onto your hand and wiggle there spines. haha  Also, it was really refreshing to swim around and walk around instead of being on the ship. Granted, I do love the ship. I just loved seeing the country side and the people. There were huge sunflowers, corn fields (I can't escape from them), olives and grapes. Not to mention these giant trees with big bright orange flowers. It did remind me a little of PA in some places. I think a lot of things will always remind me of home. Some people are really welcoming, and others just look cranky...but I will get time to meet more people soon. I actually need to get this salt water off of me and get ready for dinner. They don't eat dinner until 10 here, and they don't go out at "night" until like 1 a.m. I will try and update again soon!

Love to all,

Gwen