After that we went to explore more of the town - we tried looking for a place to see some flamenco dancing, but the places we ran into needed us to buy dinner, so we decided against that. After, we kept on walking around a little bit more and we stumbled on some ceremony going on outside the cathedral that was complete with a marching band and statues of Mary and Jesus being carried in (this was after midnight with the matching band, and neither of us were able to figure out what it was) but after this it was bedtime so we headed in so we could get the next day started early.
We woke up on Sunday to yet another beautiful day, with highs forecasted to be in the 90s. We left the hostel around 10:30 with plans to visit the Alhambra (which is Arabic for the red one). It was an old fort essentially from the last Muslim stronghold in Spain and it dates back to the 8th century in parts, but it was really cool and is the thing to see in Granada, so we spent a few hours up there (by the way it was all up hill, yay for more walking!) before we headed back into town for lunch. Michael had been wanting to try paella and Grant just wanted anything, so we found a restaurant that suited our needs. Once lunch was finished we had work to do, so we headed back to the hostel and printed out our boarding passes for Amsterdam and made plans on how to get to Seville. Once that was complete we walked around the Cathedral, which was cool and dated back a long time switching between a mosque and a church a few times so the art and architecture was cool. But then we had some time to kill so we signed up for a free walking tour of "the caves" which actually are not caves we usually think of. The caves in Granada are actually makeshift homes that people live in temporarily or sometimes permanently. We started walking and our tour guide took us up a giant hill (I know right, side note: Granada is right next to the Sierra-Nevada's so it is far from flat) and the tour guide talked about the history of the caves, the people that live in them, how they used to keep the slaves who built the Alhambra up there, and that people keep progressively making them nicer, but right now it's all hippies that live in them. Then he showed us what they could look like once they are fixed up further down the hill. It was interesting and gave us some good background information on Granada (and gave us a few more miles of walking) but it went longer than we thought it would so we got back showered and were able to get to dinner by 10PM (totally normal in Spain). Then we walked back and went to bed since we had an early bus to catch to Seville.
Monday morning started at 5:45 so we could catch the bus to Seville, Kansas City's sister city. With no hiccups we made it to Seville around 11 and got all checked in to our new hostel, complete with a rooftop pool with a view of Plaza Encarnacion, which had a really unique building at the center, but our stuff got dropped off and we had a lot of stuff to see. First stop, the cathedral where we went up in the tower (which is replicated in Kansas City) and saw a great view of the city. Next stop was the Real Alcazar which was an old palace from the Islamic era in Seville and had cool gardens, with peacocks. Then we headed to the Plaza España for another set of cool architecture. At this point we were hot and tired so we gave the pool a quick test. It felt great for a couple of hours and then we made our sandwiches and we were deciding if we should go to bed at this point since we needed to be up at 4:30 to catch a plane to Amsterdam, but our roommates (from Wales and England) who we had just met convinced us to go out and see more of the city. So we made it back to the hostel around 1:00 AM and were close to the first ones in bed, and when we woke up everyone still wasn't back! Oh Spain.
Tuesday we flew into Amsterdam (which was really the city of Eindhoven, thanks Ryanair) and we took the bus to Amsterdam which should have been an hour but there was a major car crash so it actually lasted about two and a half hours.
Amsterdam, what can I say about Amsterdam...How about I have never seen so many bikes in my life! Seriously though, they had a parking lots for bikes! Once we got there we found a hostel and quickly went out to see the city. So we put our stuff in the room and headed off for the Heineken Experience (the Heineken factory), which was a really cool brewery. It was probably a cooler tour than the Guinness factory, the beer is just not as good (personal opinions). Then we headed off to see the Anne Frank house, which was interesting and not what either of us were expecting. Then we walked back to the hostel and got some kebabs on the way. We are walking everywhere again, have to get in our 10 miles a day (rough estimate). After dinner we walked around and observed the red light district, which was funny, weird, and something that is completely different. We also saw more of the city and walked around Dam Square (the city's main plaza) before heading to~11:30 where we were the... Last ones in bed.
The next morning we were up at 5:45 to catch the train into Germany and meet Fabian!
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