Luarca
Notice the clear blue sky!
The second little town Tracy and I visited was Luarca. Here I was able to see a traditional Spanish lighthouse, a tranquil church and a traditional Spanish cemetery (which are quite different from ours in the states…).
No one is buried individually here in Spain. All the people from one family are buried in the same grave. If it gets to a point where there are too many bones to put in one grave (too many people from one family have passed) they need to extract the oldest bones. Although, I’m not sure what happens to the extracted bones. Just another example of how close and sacred the family is in the Spanish culture.
A view of Luarca from the top
It’s quite common to see old men and women just sitting in front of a church, enjoying the day. Below are a few more pictures from the afternoon. It was such a beautiful day!
There were many of these crosses on the path to the church. Signifying Jesus’s walk to where He was crucified.
Some old Spanish men checking out the water
Cute little lighthouse
Cudillero
I recently went to Gijon to visit my favorite ex-Wisconsinite and have some dinner. We decided to seize the beautiful weather that was present that weekend and travel by car to a bunch of beautiful little town/cities in Asturias. The first we visited was Cudillero! This actually reminded me of a tiny Galway, Ireland. It is a little fish town built on a hill. It is rumored to have been settled by Vikings, but this is uncertain. It is part of the Northern Way route of the famous Way of St. James. In case you have not heard of this pilgrimage, I’ll give you a little description.
This woman is wearing the traditional dress of a Spanish farmer wife
The Way of St. James has existed for over one thousand years. It is one of the most important Christian pilgrimages. It is considered one of only three pilgrimages where indulgence (full or partial remission of temporal punishment due for sins which have already been forgiven) can be earned. (The other two are the Via Francigena to Rome and the pilgrimage to Jerusalem). Legend states that St. James remains were carried by boat from Jerusalem to northern Spain where he was buried. This place is now the city of Santiago de Compostela. Many people walk this pilgrimage, non-Christians and Christians alike. It is supposed to be a very humbling experience. I’m considering doing it after my teaching is done here.
Below are a few more pictures I took of the town. Enjoy 
tight squeeze!
An example of how tiny the roads are. This is supposed to be a two lane road with cars going both ways…
A beautiful church and two Spanish women on a Sunday stroll
This shows the steepness the hill. There are no streets between these houses, only walking paths! Everyone who lives here must park their car in a parking lot (located on the left of this next picture)…
See it on the left?
And then they must walk over this bridge into town…
Tracy and I couldn’t figure out how anyone moves in or out of this town with this system of transportation.
I love all the little boats
A beautiful view out of Cudillero and off to the next town
Rio Sella
The crew
Alright dad, you’re going to like this one! A few peeps from the program and I went kayaking down Rio Sella. It was located in a town called Arriondas. This town reminded me a lot of Wisconsin Dells in Wisconsin. It’s an adventure town! Down each little street was a different kayaking, canoeing, four-wheeling, hiking, biking, or ropes course company.
We chose Escuela Asturiana de Piragüismo www.piraquismo.com which turned out to be pretty great! The kayaking trip was about 18Km long and we got a wet suit, life jacket (PFD), and a bucket including lunch and a water for only 25 Euros. We only made it about 4 Km before we stopped for our lunch…
Lunch time!
Then we traveled another 4Km and ended our journey at the 8Km stop. Here’s a couple of pics from the trip
Beautiful
Not a big fan of the wetsuit look but the background is great
Celtic Knot
Carlos and his fantastic celtic knot. Can you see it?
Drawing a Celtic knot was a recent project in my arts and crafts class with Isabel! I personally did not know how to make one, but acted as if I did by explaining the directions in English to the students. They worked very hard and were able to make beautiful Celtic knots in the end. Here is the link to the class blog if you want to try out the project. It is a lot of fun!
http://blog.educastur.es/artsandcrafts/2009/10/05/celtics-knots/#more-154
This blog is great! The teacher, Isabel, is a blogging goddess. Please no comparisons…
I took a couple of pictures of other students with their knots.
Look at those pretty knots! Good job girls
Check out the pictures on the folders of these girls below. I took the picture more to show our common obsession with the twilight series, but their Celtic knots look pretty great too!
Luna Nueva!!!
Mi Escuela
The little sign on the front of the school.
I.E.S. Posada de Llanera (Instituto de Educación Secundaria) is my lovely little school. It is in the village Posada of the town Llanera. Although it is a tiny little town, I managed to get lost the first day and had to stop in a cafe to ask for directions. A nice man whose son apparently attends the school drove me three blocks to the school (just an example of how nice people are here!). I teach English and help with the bilingual classes of technology, arts and crafts, and history/geography. All of the teachers are incredibly nice and patient with my Spanish.
In my first art class, the students were instructed to draw a picture of me. I have included some of my favorites:
My absolute favorite
The students range from ages 13-17 and are for the most part are a lot of fun. Some are quite loud, but who wasn’t at age 13?
Some girls in my technology class wanted a pic with me so of course I had to take one too. Hopefully more fun stories to come!
smiling is not cool
Jesus!
On Monday (a holiday here in Oviedo) I joined two ladies to hike up to Jesus. It was a lot of work and my legs are very very sore today so I hope He appreciates it 
On the edge of Oviedo there is a mountain called Naranco and up the mountain are two very very old churches and a statue of the one and only Jesus Christ.
church #1: Iglesia de Santa María del Naranco: a Roman Catholic Asturian pre-Romanesque church. It was completed in 848 AD (woa…that’s old). You can imagine my European history loving self was pretty excited.
Iglesia de Santa María del Naranco
Chilling on la iglesia
church #2: San Miguel de Lillo: Also finished in 848. Ramiro I and his wife wanted the two churches to coincide.
San Miguel de Lillo
Finally, the main reason to climb this insane mountain was to see the huge Jesus statue. Here’s a picture of what it looks like from the beginning of our journey, down in the city:
Can you see the statue waaaaay at the top?
An example of the paths we had to take. The picture doesn’t quite capture the steepness of the hill
had to stretch before attempting this one
He’s getting closer…
closer
And we made it!
There was a lot of mist at the top
The trip took a total of 4 or 5 hours including a stop for cervesa y pincho tortilla on the way down to reward ourselves. All in all a very well spent holiday.
It’s official!
I am not a total wanker! A Spanish man stopped me in the street today while I was on my way to the bus stop to head to work and asked “¿Qué camino a la estación de tren?” meaning he assumed I understood Spanish and knew the city. It made my day
Sunday Market
Yesterday I went to the market that is open each Sunday. The streets were filled with gaudy jewelry, scarves, books, shoes, flowers, and lingerie. I’m looking forward to buying little trinkets from the market one day…but I’m not so sure I want to get my underwear there, even if it is only 2 Euro! The coolest part of the market was the bagpipers! The Asturian region has many Celtic influences. They were settled by the Celtic people, so the general population is more fair skinned than the rest of Spain. I fit right in I took some pictures of the bagpipers in their traditional Asturian dress. I couldn’t figure out if I was in Spain or Ireland…
marching towards the square
The Celtic Knot!
playing in the square
Chocolate Caliente con Churros
I had my first traditional Spanish breakfast this morning with my leaser, Victor, and my roommate, Francisco: Hot Chocolate and Churros. You literally get a mug of hot chocolate, not like in the states with milk, but hot chocolate syrup. You also get a few curved sticks of fried sweetness (like a funnel cake, but singular strips and much bigger) and finally a glass of cold water to wash down the ridiculously rich taste. This is normally eaten around 11:00am and is called ‘desayuno’ or breakfast. The rest of the day is filled with comida (lunch) around 3pm, merienda (snack) around 6 pm and cena (dinner) around 10 pm. I’m going to have to be careful with this breakfast, I don’t want to end up una GORDITA!
Traditional Spanish Breakfast...yummmmmm
Sidra
ONLY in Asturias is there homemade cider (sidra). It is poured from above the glass to create carbonation and you must drink %95 of the cider and then pour the last tiny bit out exactly where you drank from to ‘clean’ your glass and then pass it on to the next person. Usually there is only one glass for all to share. A very fun and social tradition of my favorite Spanish region (the only one I know of, but still…). I have included a picture of Tracy pouring my first sidra and the lovely people I shared my glass with.
She's a pro!
Dace (pronounced datse)
Dace's husband, Simon!
Tracy! The best hostess ever
