Single digits, baby!

Oh man!

9 days? Is it really true? How can I only have 9 days left in a city that I've lived in for nearly 4 months? It is so strange for me to think about all that I've done and seen since I arrived on January 11th. And as sad as I will be to leave this beautiful city, I am SO SO SO excited to see my family and friends back in the states...I'll write more about my feelings of leaving as I get closer to May 13th.

As promised, here are my pictures from Portugal and my dance recital, PLUS an added bonus: Granada! I spent a day down in Southern Spain (really only 12 hours) with my friend Lauren who is studying abroad there now.

This is one of the main streets in Lisbon. Note that all of the streets are like this one: they are paved with coble stones and have mostly pedestrian traffic on them.
On our second day in Lisbon, we decided to tour St. John's castle. While there we encountered a peacock. I was a little terrified but managed to get a few pictures before he went away.
The city of Lisbon!
These were all the girls that were on my trip...Me, Mary, Laura, Lisa, and Ally.
The beach that we layed on for several hours on Friday. It was beautiful.
So like I said, I came back from Lisbon and had a CRAZY week at school, with a million tests, papers, and projects due. In the middle of my crazy week I had my dance recital from my Latin Rythms and Dance class...here are a few pictures that I took before we performed. You can see our BEAUTIFUL (note sarcasm...) costumes here.

These were the "chicas solas" in the cha cha...meaning they didnt have partners.
My group, chicas con parejas! We closed the section of the Cha-cha by dancing with our male partners. From L to R, Monica, Ali, Amanda, me, Theresa, Maria.

After last week was over, I knew I wanted to get down to Granada to visit and see Southern Spain. My friend Lauren was studying there this semester and my friend and co-leader Allison studied there last semester. To be honest...I feel like I need a re-do trip to Granada. I arrived at 12:30pm and we made our way up to the Alhambra, only to find out that they were sold out of tickets for the day. So we sat down and had lunch, then walked around the town (Granada has a lot of Moroccan flair) and then found a bar to watch the Real Madrid vs. Barcelona game (Barcelona danced circles around Real, it was SO frustrating. ugh. The final score was like 6-2 Barca). Then we went and got dinner, found a cafe and sat there for awhile, ad then we took a taxi back to the bus station so I could get back to Madrid. I jsut felt like the city was so small, and I didn't really experience the true feeling of Granada. So it's on my list of places to go next time I come back to Europe :)

Anyways I did take a few pictures while I was there.

While we couldn't get into the Alhambra, we did walk around the grounds for awhile, and they were really pretty.
The city of Granada.
The view of the Alhambra from the bottom of the mountain.

So yes...I have 9 days left, 4 finals to take, 2 suitcases to pack, and one very long flight back to the US until May 13th. My travels are officially over, and I need to use these last few days in Spain to concentrate on school (ugh) and enjoy the gift that I've been given this semester.

See you all in 9 days!