It's all wheels from here...

Oh no!

Our last blog and we barely have enough money...we had to make a decision: a decent meal or blog post. You should be so lucky that we went this route. Now we're hungry. Feel good about that, blog readers.

Now that we've wasted two minutes, let us say goodbye to Europe. We are leaving in 16 hours and just as the sun has left Madrid, we, too, will be leaving this fine city. It's raining.

The last few days have been interesting. We spent 3 days in Sevilla, enjoying the beautiful parks and exploring the city. We also had a great time melting in 90 degree weather. Thanks, Sevilla. It was a gorgeous city with a mix of old and new. The city felt young, lush, and vibrant. Sevilla also had one of the most picturesque cathedrals ever. We were planning on spending another night couchsurfing, but once we found out the bus to Madrid would take 9 hours, we made a spontaneous decision to hop a night bus. However, nothing went according to plan - theme of this trip. The bus actually would only take 6 hours and would leave from 11pm and arrive at 5am. What? Alex caught swine flu (not really)/a stomach bug and spent the last day suffering through her upset stomach. We sought out a pharmacy, looking for the good American solution of Pepto-Bismal. Yeah right, Spain. Instead, the pharmacy had nothing to offer us. Nothing for upset stomachs. What kind of pharmacy doesn't have medicine for that? Oh yeah, we're in Spain. Without any medicine and still feeling ill, we embarked on our trip. Although Alex almost puked on the bus and on an elderly couple, she managed to make it to the rest stop bathroom to take care of business in the trash can.

Feeling better but with bus sleep (and we all know how great that is), we arrived in Madrid at 5am. We originally planned on getting to the hostel to drop off our luggage and finding who knows what to do at 5am. But when we found the hostel, it wasn't open until we woke up the jefe of the hostel and forced him to let us enter (after an hour of sitting outside, looking like homeless people, and buzzing the doorbell). He informed us that we wouldn't be able to check-in until 1pm but we were able to leave our bags. Faced with 5 hours to kill and fighting sleep deprivation, we went with the familiar: STARBUCKS! We bought some coffee, found some comfy-ish chairs, and settled in for a morning of rest. We slept there for 5 hours. Literally, slept in chairs in the entrance to Starbucks, our sleeping faces greeting all who entered. Why we didn't get kicked out will forever remain a mystery. The barista laughed and waved knowingly when we finally stumbled out. He probably could tell that we were miserable.

After our full day of laying around, doing nothing, we spent the next day seeking out La Plaza de Torros. We were bound and determined to not leave Spain without having seen a bull fight. The bull fight was....just that...a bull fight. There were 6 participating bulls who bravely fought los matadores. As we learned, each bull fight is divided into 3 rounds. In the first round, the "lancing round", the bull would enter the ring and be challenged by 5-6 men with capes who would pretty much just distract the bull until the blindfolded horses came out. Yeah, there are blindfolded horses in a bull fight. The horsemen, called "lancers", would take their gigantic spear and stab the bull in the shoulder muscles. Cue bloodloss. The bulls would get pissed and ram the horses, but don't worry, the horses wore mattress-like padding. In the next round, other men would enter the ring with barbed spears to throw in the bull's shoulders. At this point, the bull is mad. Way mad. Then, the matador enters. Fittingly called the "third of death", the matador kind of toyed with the bull by drawing it closer with the red cape, nearly getting gored himself. The matador gets a big sword and shoves it into its back. At this point, the bull is in rough shape and eventually just falls. The best/worst part (depending on your animal-rights passions), a chariot of horses comes out to drag the bull carcass around the ring to the delight of some people. We saw this happen 4 times before deciding we had enough bull-death for one day.

That's about all the excitement we've had in the last few days. We went to the Prado, but like other art musuems, it wasn't that exciting. You may remember our blog about the Picasso museum and how we had no clue what we were looking at. Well, it was like that but with more crucifiction paintings and odd renditions of Christ. By the way, the lady at the Picasso musuem in Barcelona was wrong: Guernica isn't at the Prado. It's down the road, elsewhere. We never did see Guernica. We bet it was lovely though...

So now here we are. Sick of walking everywhere and excited for vehicles with wheels. It's the small things that we have come to appreciate...free refills, endless amounts of ketchup and ranch, Cap´n Crunch, dollar bills, and English. But we're not Europe-haters. There are plenty of things that we have grown to love...cafe con leche, gelato, cobblestone streets, cheap beer and wine, tapas, amazingly old and gorgeous architecture & cathedrals (America has nothing on Catholic Europe), meeting other travelers and swapping tales of grand adventures, the freedom to do whatever we want aka no jobs, Euro fashion, football - VIVA BARÇA! - seeing world-famous sites, and Italian men. We recognize how lucky and blessed we were to be able to take this kind of trip and have this experience to remember forever. One day, we'll be able to show our kids and grandkids photos of this trip and they can see how cool and young we once were.

We also want to say THANK YOU for reading our blog posts, sending us messages of support, and showing interest in our crazy little adventure. You guys have been great! (Happy Mothers Day!)

We did it! Eurofest 2009 officially concludes here. Pics coming soon!

We send our love and we'll be seeing you very soon.
- Alex + Kirsty = time to beg for food

Editor´s Note: Kirsty will be leaving for Honduras in August. You can follow her travels at http://www.hondurasyear.blogspot.com/. Alex will be in TC - come visit her at the Cherry Stop!