Toni Talk: Stranded in la Manga

Another week has come to an end and I have had yet another great adventure.

You know how last week I said I started classes well, apparently that was just a continuation of the language and culture classes. This week was the start of my real classes. I am taking a history class, geography class, music class, art history class, literature class and politics class. They sound more intense than they are...at least so far anyway. All of the classes went very well but yesterday, Friday, is when the true fun stuff happened. Friday morning literally everyone in my class except for me and one other person went to travel, so there were only two of us in class. He subject was art history and mind you, it was the very first time having the class (what an impression to leave on the teacher). When the teacher arrives she gives us the option to leave and reschedule our four hour long class for another day, or have the lecture as planned, so we decided to do the lecture. It was very interesting! I didn't even realize we had been in the class for an hour ans forty five minutes until she told us to go on 20min break and meet her at the tram station. After break, we met at the tram and then walked to the museum of roman architecture. It was very informational and what's more interesting is that because there was only the two of us there, we got a personal guided tour by our professor! She is extremely knowledgable on the subjunctive and I can tell she really loves what she teaches. It is going to be such a fantastic class.

I realize that the above story has nothing to do with the title but lucky for you, I was just getting to that. Today me and my friend Margo decided that we wanted to go to the beach so, at 1:30 we walk to the bus station buy our ticket to la manga and head out at 2:00. It was so beautiful! On one side we had El Mar Menor and on the other we had the Mediterranean Sea! It was 70 degrees but windy so we didn't get in the water to spare us from freezing later on. The water is crystal clear, you can see to the very bottom; the scenery in general is just gorgeous! After we laid on the beach of the Mediterranean for about an hour and a half , her reading and me "sketching" and "writing," we grabbed our stuff and went to the restraunt across the street. We were pleasantly surprised to see that paella was on the menu! We shared the paella de pescado y mariscos. Needless to say, it was delicious! I am glad we got it to share because it was huge! I asked the waiter if he had ever seen anyone eat an entire plate by themselves, and he laughed and proceeded to tell me that they are originally for one person. If you all had seen the amount of paella that was on the serving dish, your jaw would have hit the ground! It was so much food! After we ate the waiter gave us free chupitos, sin alcohol for me, and brought us our bill. Once we paid, we walked on the beach of El Mar Menor for about thirty minutes thinking that we were going to catch the 7:00 bus back to Murcia. Wow were we wrong. After sitting at the stop for about twenty minutes, a boy about our age, asked which bus we were waiting for and he informed us that the bus did not come until 8 which means about 8:30 Spanish time. So we waited at the stop. When we got on, we had to get off in Cartagena because the bus that goes to Murcia is different than the one we were on. When we go inside to get our ticket, we see that the last bust to Murcia was at 8:45 and it was already 9:30 when we got there. We thought would just get another ticket for later, but it turns out the next bus to Murcia isn't until tomorrow at 9:30 am which is the same time as our hike that we are going on. So...we look at tickets to places that would potentially stop in Murcia on the way, and we find a ticket to Madrid but, it was 40euros! So we call the bus ticket company well try to anyway to see if the bus would for sure stop in Murcia before we bought our potentially useless ticket. Margo was on the phone with them when her phone shut off. We then proceeded to call back on my phone but mid call my phone died. What luck right? About an hour goes by of us contemplating our options which were 1. Stay in a hotel for the night and catch the next bus, 2. Buy the ticket to Madrid or albcete in hopes that they stop in Murcia, or 3. Pay for a taxi. We decided to take the taxi because at the end of the day, it was the quickest and cheapest/easiest thing to split cost wise between the two of us. We ended up spending 30euros each on the taxi, 18euros each on food, and 10euros total on bus fare. What should have been a 30euro day trip, ended up being an almost 60euro trip but were the memories worth it...absolutely, because they were priceless!

All in all it was a pretty adventurous day with a pretty adventure filled day tomorrow as well!

Thanks for reading I hope you all enjoyed it! There are pictures below!

P.S. I realize now after relaying the story we didn't really get stranded, but would you have read it if it was less dramatic...didn't think so ;)

Have a great weekend!

Hasta luego!