Sunday 1 December 2013

Day by day

The final report of the first meeting was in charge of Poland this time.


Day 1 

Today’s day was very tiring, but nice for us as well. Everything started at 3 o’clock in the morning in front of our school. We were so sleepy, because we had slept only for 4 hours !
But what can be done for beautiful Spain! After 2 hours in a bus we arrived at Balice Airport. We had  a lot of time so we went for a cup of tea. After a check- in we got on a bus which took us to the plane. During the flight we had a sweet bun with raisins which to be honest wasn’t very nice After  one hour and a half we landed in Berlin to change a plane to Madrid. We got there around midday. Unfortunately this time we had to wait more than 3 hours so we went to a restaurant for some snacks. Just before the next check-in we met  the Italians and the teachers and students from Finland.  The last flight took us to Asturias Airport and from there we got to our hotel. When we finished with unpacking we decided to go for a stroll in Luarca. The same idea had an Italian group so the rest of the evening we spent together.


Day 2

The day started for us at 7.45. Even quickly we tidied ourselves up and we went for  breakfast in the hotel. After drinking some tea and eating muffins we went to the Padre  Galo school for the first meeting. When we just entered the building the junior pupils started coming to  school. They were so sweet.

At first, of course we said hello to all the participants in the project from Spain, Italy, Hungary, Finland and Turkey and we gave each other small gifts. Our first task was getting to know the school in international groups. We were involved in different Asturian sports. Than we went to the museum of gigantic squids, where we spent over an hour on admiring different bigger and smaller animals living in the sea. After returning to school we went to families, at which we spent over the hour and we had lunch. The next event of the day was a walk  around Luarca and admiring the fine view on the highest places of the town.  Another meeting with families was longer. We talked,  had dinner and watched  TV,  three hours passed quickly and we had to go back. It was very nice.


Day 3

The day began similarly to the previous one at 9 at Padre Galo school. All the delegations presented their countries  and what they learned about  the others from the project. The students of Padre Galo arrived in beautiful Asturian folk clothes, The atmosphere was nice and the resentations interesting. After that there were Art&Music workshops. During an Art workshop everyone made an Asturian hat. The other workshop took place in the open air.
We walked on stilts and squeezed apples to get juice. We ate warm chestnuts and drunk cider- popular Spanish drink. We stayed at the families longer today till 20.30. While staying we all met in the park. In the evening we all met in Villa Blanca restaurant where we had a farewell dinner and tried delicious Spanish snacks. At the end we watched  a magic show. We enjoyed ourselves very much but because of late hour we had to go back to the hotel. This day was great.


Day 4

We began our day with breakfast, as usual. A few minutes after nine we went by bus for a trip to Oviedo, which is 90 km  from Luarca. I took us more than one hour to get there. Unfortunately, the weather didn’t make us happy. It was raining all the time. On the outskirts of the city we saw the pre-Romanesque temple of San Miguel de Lillo, built in the 9th century and situated on the Naranco hillside. There are a few such temples there. Then we went to the city center and we got acquainted with some interesting places of this city- the capital of Asturias. We could also see a military march of the company representatives and the orchestra near the Cathedral of San Salvador on the regional occasion (Acto de Jura Civil de Bandera), similar to our Christmas Flags festival. We have also learned that Fernando Alonso- the famous Formula 1 driver comes from Oviedo. The rain, sometimes torrential, was very annoying so we spent some time in the courtyard of the university where the boards with Nobel Prize winners in physics aroused our interest. Many of them were dedicated to Marie Curie- Sklodowska. After eating the meal and playing the finger game in MacDonald’s we went back. Luckily, it wasn’t raining in Luarca. We planned to visit the families straight after the trip but we were so soaked and cold that we had to go to the hotel and change our clothes. It was our last dinner with these families. So it happened that we all ate pizza. At 9 pm we were escorted to the school. We said goodbye to the Spanish students and their parents and we exchanged our phone numbers. This day was full of excitement. Out stay in Spain is almost finished but we hope to keep in touch with the peers we have met here.

Photos

Day 5

The last breakfast at the D’alabeira hotel was traditionally held at 8 o’clock. This time we ate it alone because Hungarian teachers and students we stayed at the hotel with had already departed early in the morning. The weather was quite good in the morning so we were looking forward to our trip to Madrid, where we planned to finish our stay in Spain. The headteacher of Padre Galo School – Mrs. Carmen and the main coordinator of the project- Mrs Ana said goodbye to us personally. In the special bus, we were going to the Asturias Airport together with the Italian people who were flying the same plane to Madrid . Through the window it was still possible to watch the Atlantic Ocean, actually its part called the Bay of Biscay, for a couple of minutes. The flight to Madrid passed rather quickly. We said goodbye to the Italians at the airport and we headed for the exit. The bus took us to the city center but it was clear that we were unlucky about the weather. It started raining. Fortunately, the hotel was not so far away and we didn’t get wet so much. The hostel we stayed  in, however, was about 100 meters away from Puerta del Sol (the Gate of the Sun) – one of the most important squares in Madrid. On the square there is a statue of a bear climbing the 20 tones weighing strawberry tree – the symbol of Madrid. We took a picture under this tree, as almost all the tourists who come to this beautiful city. There is also a point from which a distance to all the destinations in Spain is measured. It is called “zero kilometer”. In Museo del Prado in Madrid we visited several rooms where we saw the images of Francesco Goya, Rubens and other painters. We so also some sculptures there. Then we went to the Reina Sofia Museum particularly to see Pablo Picasso’s paiting “Guernica”, which made a great impression on us. We returned to Puerta del Sol by underground and after a short walk around the square we went to the hotel.

Day 6

Wishful thinking that it would be nice in the morning  or at least it would not be raining  unfortunately didn't come true.


Morning Madrid greeted us with coldness and rain but we decided to do some sightseeing anyway. Therefore we and our teachers went to Plaza Mayor - one of the main squares of Madrid. In the past, there were placed all important state ceremonies like coronations of kings, bullfightings (corrida) and even the cutting of convicts' heads. Before we reached that place we had  some hot chocolate with churros (traditional Spanish baking rod-shaped dough). And then glance at the Royal Palace and the Almudena Cathedral and we had to go back  because the time of check-in at the airport was getting closer. We took the subway to get to the airport. Such a journey was much shorter than by bus.  For safety reasons after check-in you had to go through the gate, leaving jackets, sweatshirts, watches, phones, keys, coins, jewelry, belts and even shoes in special containers which pass through the device detecting the presence the unwanted items. Flight proceeded calmly and we could sleep . Next we changed planes in Berlin and about 7 p.m. we landed in Krakow Balice. The bus was already waiting for us  so we were in Gorlice before 9 p.m.

And it was the end of our excellent trip to Spain.

Photos

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