Elephant Adventure

by Laurel...

So, how crazy was the day before yesterday? Crazier than a monkey drinking hyper-caffinated coffee with extra sugar.

Sounds like a bad GEICO commercial. But no, this was no GEICO thing at all. It is a real thing in a real place in this very real world. 

Who's excited to hear it? You, there. Yes, you, the one reading my post. Say, what do you think could be crazier than a monkey drinking hyper-caffinated coffee…. need I say the rest? It is awfully long and boring to type…

You! Sorry, lost my train of thought. What do you think we did? Another game drive? Guess again. Here's a hint: It's the last thing that will come to your mind naturally.

No, we did NOT go into outer space riding a unicorn. Maybe not that outrageous. I think I should tell you now, before the suspense gets so thick your brain explodes. We……

RODE ELEPHANTS!!!!! Betcha never saw that coming…. hey, guess what? Remember the fact that I'm random? And do you want to play Yo Mama Smackdown? Yo mama...

Wait a minute… you really want to read the rest of this? I think it's because I'm the best writer EVAH… or not. But you really want to hear the rest over a good game of Yo Mama Smackdown? That's a smart choice, buddy boy (or girl), because I was taught by Master Redding Hillers how to play. And he taught me his best lines. But honestly?

Okay, I'll tell you the rest if you play with me at the end. Sort of my reward for killing my hands typing for y'all. 'Ere goes.

We ride to the place in a open-top jeep. I guess this is okay, that little voice inside me says, but I don't see elephants, lions, or cheetahs like the brochure says. I tell it to shut its face. We (finally) pull up to this lone thatch-roof shelter thing with cheetahs in an enclosure next to it, lying in the sun. Click, click. Pictures. After I step inside the lodge, someone rushes to me with blah paperwork. I try to alternate playing Subway Surfers and writing my information on the paper, but iPhone gets the best of me and I play a few more times before Arwyn's mom reminds me I need to finish. I scribble my name on the end in cursive and make sure it's totally unreadable. That ought to count as a signature. We wait outside in the blazing sun…. and wait and wait and wait. The same someone (whom I later found out was named Justice) tells us our elephants were ready. We hike to a very tall mounting block, where six elephants are waiting. Wait a minute, six elephants for the thirteen of us?

Justice tells us we'll have to double up, and of course I get stuck with my brother Bryce. We learn Safety stuff (nothing you should know, much too boring) and then meet the elephants. The only ones I can remember are Mouse, Tata, and Timba, all girls. We choose an elephant, and me and Bryce get Tata, who coincidentally happens to be twelve (in case you don't know, we're turning twelve in two days). We mount and begin our 45-minute ride. It was mostly uneventful, except for a tree that smacks us in the head. After the ride, we get feed and learn to feed the elephants properly. I'm the first to race up to Tata and say, "Mouth: open," she opens her mouth obediently and I stuff one of my handfuls of feed into her mouth. She swallows and I say, "Trunk: down," I hold out a handful of feed and she vacuums it up with her trunk and stuffs it into her mouth. I am thanked by getting a smear of dirt all over my clean white shirt. Then we get "Saluted", or having the elephants hold their trunk back and stamp their left foot. It was an experience no one will ever forget.

Now will you play Yo Mama Smackdown with me? Hmm? Gasp! Do you not know how how to play? Gasp again! Never mind. I will sit in a corner and think about how much the world needs Yo Mama Smackdown to heal its non-YoMamaSmackdownness. Goodbye.

Laurel's Jackal Story

Laurel got inspired by Simbavati to write a story about Jackals. Here it is:

Come," Harley beckoned her with his tail, "I want to show you something,"

Liana hauled herself to her feet.

   "This better be good," she growled playfully, "Because the sun is

about to rise and I should be sleeping,"

Harley blew air out of his nose, as if exasperated, and trotted out of

the den. Liana shook leaves out of her pelt and followed him. They

journeyed across a plain of nothing but grass, and then uphill, on

solid rock. When the rock gave way to forest, Liana finally caught up

with the other jackal.

   "Where are we going?" she asked him.

   "You'll see," was all he said.

Harley halted just above a sheer drop. It was a clearing in the woods,

and trees framed the pink sky.

   "Okay, is this," Liana waved her tail in a circle, "what you wanted

to show me?"

   "No," Harley answered, "But this is,"

The sky seemed to catch fire as a bright golden sliver of light made

its way into the sky. Liana yelped and jumped back. Harley chuckled at

her reaction.

   "We came all this way for a prank?" Liana sniffed, cleaning her

pelt with her tongue.

Harley's head drooped, "You don't like it?"

   "No, no. It's beautiful," Liana apologized.

Harley lifted his head so his resin-colored eyes met Liana's, "Just

like you,"

Liana grew warm under her pelt, as if the sun had made her icy heart

suddenly melt.

   "LianaŠ. I love you!" he burst out, and then looked ashamed.

   "Oh, Harley," Liana said softly, "I-I don't know what to say right

now,"

They shared a tense laugh before falling into silence.

The two jackals watched the sun climb higher in the sky without

speaking a word. Harley edged closer to Liana. She held herself erect

until they were so close their pelts touched, and then Liana leaned her

head against Harley and looked up at him. She loved the feel of his

fur, the way his jaw curved, how the fur on his head spiked upwards. It

seemed as if in that moment, not only their tails but their hearts were

twined together, and nothing could ever pull them apart.

Laurel's Travel Summary... so far

Hi, I'm an alien. 

No, I'm actually not, I just need to familiarize you with my complete and utter randomness.

So pardon my randomness when I tell you about the last two weeks.

It had been two, three weeks after school let out (and I miss you Burke's girls like crazy, especially the ones who I will not mention but you guys know who I'm talking about). New York was hot and muggy, something I was dreading about the east coast. Ugh. I'd have preferred the drizzling rain of San Francisco any day.

So anyway, I was being awesome and minding my own business, when it hits me like a lightning bolt: I'm here. I did it. We're in NYC, baby! I always like to sit in the hotel and play on my phone when we first arrive at a city, but dad likes his little 'I'm-going-to-walk-somewhere-and-get-lost-and-then-walk-in-the-direction-that-I-think-the-hotel's-in' thing. Somehow, we convinced him to stay and look up restaurants on Zagat while we unpacked and played games.

So then we went to some Italian place, and I honestly don't know what I got, 'cause, remember, this is like two weeks ago. But I do remember my dessert was a Nutella Panna Cotta. Nom nom. And then we did something else, which I also forget what it was, and then went to bed. Good night.

Next day, (July 4th) we went to Times Square. Craziness, my friend. All the electronic billboards were flashing stupid videos for skin cream that smelled like pineapple and M and M world. So we walked around a little in the thick, 90 degree air, before needing air conditioning and a potty break.

So we ducked into M and M world, a giant M and M store selling a ton of useless M and M junk. There was M and M printers and M and M statuettes with the ugly red thing dressed like the statue of liberty. He didn't look very happy. After actually finding the loo, we tried to find Rockefeller center, a hidden gem in the noisy, polluted, littered-on city. As you can tell, New York was not my favorite place.

After walking in circles for half an hour (Thank you, dad, your map reading skills are extraordinary), we finally found the Lego store, which signaled the fact we were in Rockefeller center. Bryce whooped something that made people stare at him like he was stupid (which he is) and raced towards the revolving doors, making sure he went around a few more times than necessary. I, being a normal person, walked around the door once and stepped into the building stacked floor to ceiling with plastic lego containers. There were many lego sculptures scattered about, and a dragon looped through the walls. Us kids rushed to the model of Rockfeller center, and in the middle were two star wars characters dancing. Yes, as Bryce said, it was Leia and Darth Vader. What the heck? Weren't they, like, enemies? Since when did the DID (damsel in distress) dance with her least-liked person?

After the LEGO incident, we tried to find the Pokemon store and accidentally walked into a bank twice. Soon we found out that Nintendo World was actually on a side street, in Rockefeller center. My bad.

So we went into the Pokemon Center, my favorite place EVER. There were poke dolls and pokemon games and pokemon everything on the bottom floor of Nintendo world. While Bryce went off to do whatever he did, I took out every cute poke doll (most of them, except the Trubbish. It's no coincidence that it's called the Trash Bag pokemon) and poked each of them of the nose.

"I love you, and you, and you, and you, and you!"

Then I air-kissed them. After all, who would want a poke doll with my spit on it?

Hey, don't laugh. They were really cute.

After I  put the poke dolls back, I talked with the attendant about White version. I had beat White the day before. Apparently he had been into pokemon when the first game came out (Yellow) and had played every game ever since. We dragged Bryce away from his beloved Woobat (he's obsessed with those things. One time, I covered up Woobat by turning the page of the game guide and Bryce went nuts and punched me) to climb the stairs to the top floor, Wii. No surprise, he went straight to the racing games. After five minutes, we dragged him out again to get lunch, He cast a loving look at his "Little Wooby" before heading out.

We found a small cafe somewhere and had empanadas. Then we went to central park and had ice cream, and then back to the hotel where we swam until dinner.

And don't ask me what the dinner was. I can't remember.

Plane flight to Africa next day was so boring, you'd fall asleep if I even told you what we did, which was nothing. I did nothing. My phone ran out of battery. My DS was already dead. And my kindle was on half. This was all after ten hours, so I slept the last four hours. Are you asleep yet?

WAKE UP!!!!!!!! You can't bail on me! Oh no, you have to hear the whole thing. After we disembarked, we went through customs (also terribly boring). I used the last of my Kindle battery to play Subway Surfers. Then we got to the baggage claim, and there was none of our baggage! So we made Dad stay while we got settled in our rented apartment.

When he came home without any bags, everyone was disappointed, but we managed my sharing the toothbrush the airline gave to us and sleeping in our clothes. Meh.

Two days later, when the bags came, the first thing I did was change. Then we explored the city on a red bus with my new friend Arwyn, who would be the only girl roughly my age when we went on Safari. We went to world of birds, where we saw the most ADORABLE owls. OMG they were soooooooooo cute!!!!! : D

We found a kids channel on the bus to listen to, and it was hysterical. See, it was a seagull talking to you, with a lot of "Brrrrrrrr! It's fur-eeeee-zing!" and "Yeeeeeee-uck!" sort of things. Every time we heard the seagull, who was named Salty, say something stupid, we would start laughing so hard we would cry.

I think Dad has been keeping you posted on Cape Town, which is good for me, because my memory needs something to make it bigger. Like just yesterday, I forgot to do my homework! : (

So anyway, I'll skip that part because I forgot most of what went on in Cape Town.

When we arrived at Simbavati (it's Simbavati, no matter how many times Bryce will say it's Simbavita. I'm right in front of a big sign that says Welcome to Simbavati) these okay orange juice things were waiting for us, along with a British woman named Hailey who worked there. And if I say an orange drink is okay, it's super good. I just say it's okay because I don't like oranges.

So Hailey told us the basic rules: If you go outside at night, you need a guide because the wildlife literally goes through the camp. Last night we were ambushed by a family of warthogs. We had dinner, a yummy chicken dish with rice and for dessert, lemon cream pie. Delicious.

Bryce woke everyone up at 4 with cries of "Mommy! I just got sick!!!!!!". Of course. He never eats chicken, but last night he had six pieces. I tried to go to sleep, but Bryce kept on waking me up to use the restroom. Someone knocked on our door at 5:30, a guide to wake us up for the safari. Bryce wasn't feeling well enough, so Dad stayed with him and they promptly fell back asleep.

So I crawled out of bed, unwilling to leave the electric blanket, and got dressed in:

A cami

My underwear

A long, warm shirt

Heavy pants

A winter jacket

Jeans

Gloves

A scarf

And a hat.

And while we were safariing in open-top vehicles, I was cold. It was 32 degrees, and the wind blowing in your face made it drop even lower. At one point, we chased a pack of wild dogs, and everyone in back was looking green as we ran over rocks and trees and bumps. And to make it worse, we didn't actually see the dogs. They had passed over the western border where the Simbavati jeeps couldn't go.

That day, we saw a herd of elephants, a pride of lions, hyenas, and a whole lot of impala. According to the tracker, impala were basically the pigeons of the savannah. 

The jeep is pretty much like this: A seat built on the passenger side of the hood for the tracker, who looked at footprints and broken branches and stuff to find animals and direcst the driver to it. The driver was on the driver side for the UK and the passenger side for the US. There are nine seats in back for people like us.

That night, we saw a leopard eating its kill, a kudu. Mason, another kid on the safari, caught a video of it eating the antelope. He's going to post it on YouTube.

Next day was warmer, but still cold. We saw an adorable rhino, hippos, and the lions again.

That night, Arwyn's jeep broke down in the middle of the safari and we had to go rescue them. They were out on the road, and their axle was kinked. We brought some parts to them and headed back to Happy hour. I had a Grapetizer (fizzy grape juice. And my best friend Jackie, who will be reading this, knows the best way to drink it), and Bryce had an Appletizer. Good stuff. Dinner was chicken again, and Bryce stayed away this time.

Dessert was chocolate fondant with ice cream. Marshmallows to roast. We pyromaniacs had fun pouring the fondant into the fire (Only Bo did that, I ate mine before he could get to it) and then trying to replicate the Spanish Inquisition with marshmallows. We speared them on a skewer, and then stuck the skewer, marshmallow at the pointy part, into the fire. The goal was to get it to stand up perfectly straight and watch the marshmallow drip down into the fire. No one accomplished this until we realized there was a much faster way to destroy marshmallows; stick them in the 'incinerator'. It was a hollow log in the fire, and intensely hot. What we did was stick a marshmallow on a spoon, and then stick the spoon (with the marshmallow) into the incinerator. Then we tipped the spoon over, the marshmallow fell down and burnt to a crisp instantly. Fun.

Someone dropped a teabag in the fire, and Arwyn's dad and I had fun watching it burn and making dumb jokes about it. I won the round with a witty British "How would you like your tea? Crisped to a cinder? Burnt beyond recognition? Or maybe incinerated to ashes?"

This morning, we also got woken up at 5:30. On safari we saw giraffes, a warthog, hippos, and baboons.

Lunch is in two hours. Wonder what it'll be? Smells like brownies. Mmmmm…..

Clink, clank: The prison

By Laurel

A few days ago we went to Clink prison (see Cruel Brits), which was supremely cool. Erm.... not in Mom's opinion, but it was really well presented. You paid, walked through a self-opening door (I swear it was automatic, but it made you think like there was ghosts), and entered Clink prison, now a museum. It took you through a timeline, because when you entered, there was an exhibit on what would happen when you first came to the Clink. Clink Prison got its name from the clinking sound the echoing hammer would make on your chains. Oooooooooooooooo..........

I learned about dreadful tortures... one was being "squashed". You were put underneath a board, and then the prison keepers would put weights on the board until you suffocated. To help, your friends would jump on the board to make you die quicker. That would save you hours of torture. You might have been "Left in a hole", which has a very accurate name. The keepers would shove you under a trapdoor and forget about you. The worst part was that the River Thames would flood the room at high tide. After a few days, the flesh would be so soggy it would just fall from the bones.

We eventually finished, and came to this souvenir shop at the end. You got to take your photo in a cell, and read about famous prisoners. Mom's finishing exclaimation: "I think that will give me nightmares!"

Eiffel Tower Stats

A few days ago we went to the Eiffel Tower. Max amount of tourists you could ever see were there. Here's a few cool facts:

-The oldest female elephant (85 years old) was taken up to the first floor
-The building uses 60 tons of paint every 7 years.
-The whole thing weighs 10,100 tons
-The Eiffel Tower was put together using rivets. The builders used 2,500,000 rivets. One third of them were hammered in on the spot, the rest in the forge.
-The citizens HATED the Eiffel Tower at first and wanted to tear it down. Little did they know that in the future it would become the symbol of France and become known worldwide!
-The third floor has a really cool view!

Ciao!

Laurel

P.S See you in about a week! Maybe more, but probably a week!

Gaudi Craze

So, Bryce and I have been addicted to Minecraft for the past few weeks. After we visited Sagrada Familia, Dad is saying that we had to do an "architectural" drawing of something Gaudi style. And I'm like, "Why can't we make it on Minecraft?" Dad beams at the suggestion and says something about it being educational to draw something and then build it for real. I draw a picture of a bell tower with slanty chapels representing a feather, or a pine tree, or some abstract cactus. My orange Pip-squeak traces the slants and shades them in a beautiful sunset color. Bryce draws a building with foaming curls on the top. Waves. We both stay up late coloring our architecture.

Bryce's "Wave building" sketch

My bell tower sketch

In the morning, we are allowed to play Minecraft to work on our buildings. Bryce finishes in about an hour, but mine takes longer, roughly three days to create a landmark in my world. Bryce now has a bell tower, too, as well as three buildings piled together to create a pile of Jenga blocks stacked together.

The finished bell tower

Completed Wave building (also called the Welcome Building)

Interior of the Wave Building

(I might as well have titled this Minecraft craze, but oh, well.)

Dolphins and Lemurs: Oh boy!

by Laurel

So, today was a kid day. Yahoo! We decided to go to Aqualandia and Mundo Mar, but Aqualandia (waterpark) was closed so it was just a Mundo Mar day (FIY, Mundo Mar is Ocean World in Spanish). We were signed up for a dolphin "experience". You apparently learn a few commands and make the dolphins do what you asked. So we got to Mundo Mar, and it's like "OMG. We got ourselves into this awesomeness?". There was a large flamingo enclosure near the entrance (which reminded me of the SF Zoo) and the flamingos were all fluffed up and happy. Typical, they had five plates of seeds in the enclosure! Most of the local birds were snacking on the plates, but when a flamingo came, they all flew away. So we walked along and checked out cool outdoor and indoor enclosures. The one that fascinated me was the meerkats.  They had a short topless enclosure that was outside. The meerkats were standing on thick logs higher than the enclosure! I was surprised one didn't jump out onto my shorts.

I suggested that we walk around more, so we did, and then we came to this lemur house where kids were going in the cage and the staff were taking pictures. We waited in a line (with lemurs trying to swing onto our shoulders) and finally our turn came. Bryce quotes: "I didn't even need seed, and this lemur came swinging onto my shoulder like a parrot". One came to me too, but after the staff took a picture. The lemur (which I mentally named Joe) grabbed my hand and looked at me all weird. Joe's hands were cold and clammy. I don't know why it felt cool.
 
So we walked around more, checking out other cool animals, and we came to the scheduled place where we would meet the dolphins. This really annoying song was playing on the speakers- "Mundo Mar, where animals are rock stars!"- which made me a little upset. For such an awesome park, they should have a better theme song. I learned that it was the starting song for the dolphin show, so we took seats and watched really amazing trainers do stuff with dolphins.

They were really good, and Bryce kept on commenting "I wanna do this when I grow up!".

After another hour, it was time for our dolphin "experience". We had to change into bathing suits, but I was really shy, so I had to wait for all the other women to evacuate the one-room changing room. Then we got on wetsuits and met the trainers. We were training with two dolphins: Camino and Frera. We had the dolphins jump over us, and each "group" of two learned different hand signals. Dad learned that waggling your fingers meant "Sing". That didn't sound pretty. Me and Bryce learned that turning around in a circle with one hand up meant "Turn". Camino (my training dolphin) kept on turning even when I put the attention signal up. Frera stopped when Bryce did. After more photos, we climbed out and changed again. It was really fun!

Out and About

So, the past few days have been mostly in our rental Mercedes B-class something-or-other. Bryce is thrilled. We have gotten back from Morocco and are back in Spain, braving the awesome waves to body-surf!

Okay, let me explain. The plan is to take two weeks traveling around beach towns, with about a night in each. We have stayed in three awesome hotels and have just settled down in Orgiva, a small town with crazy heat. We will stay in a rental home for five days and then head back on out for more awesome beachyness! Yay!

By Laurel

Outdoor Kitties

Madani showed us that Moroccan cats are let outside during the day, and let in for the night. Some hotels have cats living there because apparently they catch mice. Hotels like that. We took a few pics on street kitties:

                                    Kittens playing on a motorbike. Look how tired mama is.

                                                       One of the little cuties.

                                       Kitten living at our hotel in the Atlas Mountains.

                                               Mama coming to check on the kits.

                                                        Just plain cute.......

                                                        

                                                          By Laurel

Last Day of Seville- What Will We Do Next?

By Laurel

So, it is our last day of Seville (Sob.......). We plan to go to Parque Maria Luisa and feed the pigeons (see Pigeons in Parque Maria Luisa, by Bryce), and then head over to Feria (also see that article), and go to Duo for dinner. Duo is the place with the awesomest chocolate souffle´ that is just on the corner. So that will be our day, but WHERE IN THE WORLD ARE THE DETTERINGS GOING NEXT??????? Morocco. Africa. Yipes. We are staying there for a week. MOROCCO. It is going to be record-breaking hot. Another Yipes. Triple yipes. Seville was a challenge with the heat, so what are we going to wear in 70 degrees? Shorts? We have rented an awesome hotel in the middle of town! See you later! In Morocco!

Flamenco show in Barrio Alameda

We went to a flamenco show last night. It was at a savvy little restaurant in El Barrio Alameda. A kind waitress greeted us as soon as we were sure we were at the right place. She led us through a door with a small step that tripped you if you didn't look down. We were led to a table right next to the stage where the dancers would perform. I slid in first, followed by mom. We sat in the creaky woven straw seats for the next thirty minutes, bored out of our skulls if it wasn't for a soft, yummy, bread bun that the waitress gave us. I was going to ask mom if this really was the right place when an older woman in a light yellow dress stepped onto the stage. Three guitar playerS followed her. Two other men took their places in betweens guitar players. They sat down as a group onto the same style chairs that we were sitting on. The woman started singing in a loud, clear voice that echoed off of the walls. The two men without instruments joined her. The trio sang opera for a little while, and then a wave of applause. I didn't really understand what the singers were singing, so I clapped politely anyway. Then one of the men singers went offstage, and a woman in a dress so long that it dragged on the ground came out. She bowed for some time, and then started dancing. The audience was whistling and hooting almost the whole time. Near the end she whisked the long end of her yellow polka-dotted dress into her hand and tapped her feet against the stage. Shavings of stage flew off of the stage and landed on the white tablecloth. The lady bowed and gestured to the guitar players. Lots of applause. Then, as quick as she had come, she was gone. The show had some really amazing men dancers. One of the men's feet was going so fast, sweat was flying off his hair every time he turned. It was a great cultural experience, and Bryce drew a picture ( or was forced to) of a flamenco dancer. Here it is: ----------picture coming soon------------ I noticed that the dancers either used castanets or their fingers to create sharp snapping sounds in time to the music. We weren't allowed to take video or pictures, so we can't show you how good they were. Sad....... By Laurel

Isla Magica- Birthplace of Fun

We went to Isla Magica yesterday, or Ithla Magica as most Spaniards would pronounce it. Did I mention Spain talks with a lisp? So yes, we went there, expecting a few kiddie rides, maybe some roller coasters (None of our family likes roller coasters. Dunno why.). So we got there, and it's like "Woohoo! Isla Magica, here we are!" Bryce was excited about a log flume he had looked up online that had drops up to 15 meters. I'll do the math for you. That's pretty far! The first and closest ride to the exit was Los Buccaneros, or The Buccaneers. I clambered into a small barrel-shaped boat and Bryce and Dad followed. I banged my elbow on a blue cannon-like barrel thing. We had seen other people pulling back a lever on the side of the blue thing and water came out of it, so I pulled the lever back and banged my elbow again. Ouch. But water came squirting out of the cannon and nearly dousing the attendant, so I knew I was on the right track. The attendant pushed the boat with her foot, and we were off on a narrow track, trying to shoot other suckers on the ride and small targets. We didn't know what was going to happen when we shot the targets, so when I shot the first one, a small hose shot a fine mist out on the bottom of the track. I liked it because it felt really cool and Seville is really hot, but Bryce and Dad went like "Ackthp!" so I didn't shoot any more targets. It was really fun shooting other suckers because the track was circular, so when they went like "Whew, we're out of the trouble zone," they got soaked from the other side of the track.

When it stopped, Bryce said what he had been saying this whole morning. "I want to go on Anaconda for a warm-up!". Anaconda is the log flume with 15-meter drops. We hiked around until we found Anaconda. The line seemed to stretch for miles, but luckily, the boats came fast and we were in one very soon. The log heaved itself onto a conveyer belt that took us uphill to the first drop. That one was only eight meters, but it seemed really long because this was the first log flume I'd ever done. There was one in Hershey Park, but I chickened out there.  So anyway, we took a sharp yanking turn from the drop and stared up at an even longer conveyer belt. Our log gently bumped against the conveyer belt and got sucked up onto the uphill. I was basically leaning back the whole time because I got really scared from the first one, and this second one was nine meters. The log got set down into the water again, and pushed forward on the straight. Another sharp turn, and looming in front of me was that nine-meter drop.  The boat faithfully pushed on, and when we were nearing the drop, all I could hear besides blood pounding in my head was Bryce screaming, "This is gonna be AWESOME!!!!!!!". Time seemed to slow down. I could hear slo-mo wind pounding my hair, and Bryce slo-mo screaming, "Yahoo!!". Then time sped up and we splashed back onto the track. Maybe our boat was excited  for the next drop, the fifteen-meter one, because it seemed to pick up speed the closer we got to the final conveyer belt. We got placed on the really tall belt, and slowly crawled up the hill. When we finally reached the top, I got really excited for the drop. I hoped time would kind of slow down a little bit, but not like freeze again. No such luck. The drop basically whooshed by. We made a huge tidal wave as we landed back in the track. I noticed that Dad's knuckles were turning white from gripping the safety bar. We reached the loading/exiting station, and reluctantly departed from our boat.  I bet everybody in the park could hear Bryce screaming, "That was AWESOME!!!!! No, BETTER THAN AWESOME!!!!! AND EVEN BETTER THAN THAT!!!!!!!"

Iguazu was kind of like a sister ride to Anaconda. The description from online: "Take an exhilarating drop of sixteen meters while riding rapids of up to 50 k/h". That's about thirty miles an hour. A lot of speed. We gingerly stepped into a boat with about twelve other people. Dad's trademark motto for amusement parks: "What have you knuckleheads gotten me into now?". He used it as we were slowly climbing up via conveyer belt. There was another sharp turn, and we got into the rapids. I warned Bryce that if he stuck his head out of the boat, it would get taken off by the splash we'd make.  We cruised around another corner and dropped. We flew off of the track when we neared the end of the drop. A huge splash marked our nearing the end of the ride. A fine mist showered over all sixteen people in the boat. We disembarked from the boat and let other people get on the ride of their lives. Me and Bryce ran across a stone bridge to the "Splash Zone". I had seen a few kids playing over here when we went down and get soaked by our amazing splash. We got there just in time to see a boat racing down the drop. I closed my mouth and watched a wall of white come racing towards the Zone. The water poured down like a tsunami. I was swept back a few feet and saw Bryce amazingly stand his ground. We did that a few more times, and Dad managed to take a video without getting the camera wet:



Cool, right?????!!!!

Stay tuned for the next episode of Seville: Laurel Style

Reina Sofia

Once again, we got a really late start.  But it's not really phasing us so much, since all the daytime businesses are open until 8 PM.  Today, we moseyed out around 3 PM to the Reina Sofia, one of the other must-see museums in Madrid.

In the Glass Elevator at the Reina Sophia

The Reina Sofia's claim-to-fame is a great collection of Picassos, including the famous Guernica painting. Guernica was painted in the time leading up to World War II, during the Spanish Civil War.  it depicts the bombing of the city of Guernica by the Nationalistas - the eventual winners of the war and the party of Franco. It's a huge mural in black and white, and it was banned from Spain while Franco was in power. It's also powerful, and in spite of the cubist style, it really showcases the horrors of war.  It may be the most important art piece in all of Spain.

World War II is a constant theme in the Reina Sofia.  Especially cool were some of the war propaganda posters on display.  I suggested to the kids that they make their own propaganda posters, and here's what they came up with:

Bryce thinks he needs more time playing on the iPad

Laurel just wants something to protest. Note the bloody knife.

The museum had some famous Dali paintings as well. including the one called the Great Master Baiter.  Fortunately, the kids didn't ask too many questions.

A Day with Dana

As my Dad might have said, we have a new artsy-tour guide named Dana. We have been with her once before and we were really excited yesterday for another visit to some unexpected place. My mom directed her to Museo Reina Sofia. We got lost a little, but with the help of the metro, we got there. Dana was instructed to give us a little art lesson, so we headed over to a wide metal bench and opened never-used-before sketchbooks. Dana taught us about shading, trees, value scales, tints and shades, and reviewed color wheels, primary colors, secondary colors, and  tertiary colors. We set out toward the Chagall exhibit. I sketched anything interesting in my sketchbook, but my sketching skills need work, so old men looked like angry owls. Bryce kept on freaking out about nudes.
"Psst, Laurel, look over there. It's a naked person!"
"Ewww..... He's naked!"
"Look, two naked people in the same room! Gross!"
"They actually think this painting is good? There's naked people in it!"

The only thing Bryce was inspired by was a pigeon.

So, when we finished touring and sketching, we headed out to a cervezeria to get a snack. After a chilled potato tortilla sandwich, we took the metro from Atocha station to the Tribunal station, which is a block away from our house. Did I mention that it started pouring as soon as we set off from the cervezeria? We accidentally tried the wrong door in our haste to get inside. When we found the right door, I shrugged off my soaking jacket and sat on a swivel stool near the counter. We were supposed to draw something that inspired us. I was inspired by one painting about a wall that no one could see over. I drew a bird's eye view of a wall. On the other side was nothing. I drew two men carrying a ladder to the wall. Bryce, unsurprisingly, drew cars. You know the pigeon he was inspired by? He drew it on the roof of a car. Typical. Not really creative, sadly. Just something already invented and used in everyday life. We had a great day with Dana, but sadly, that was our last.

Stay tuned for another Laurel post

The Seven Deadly Sins

We were at Toledo on Tuesday, and as my dad might have said, we did have a very great time practicing maiming somebody at the house with the dagger and pistol. When we were there, Mom convinced us to go to a church, insisting "It will be fun!". We are not religious, so Bryce and I were moping around while we were being dragged to different chapels sporting Jesus on a cross with painted blood dripping out of his chest. Two out of the, say, hundred chapels were interesting. One was filled with all the church's gold, and one was in the form of a sword. The other had a mural describing the Seven Deadly Sins. I can't really remember all of them, but let's see...... one is lust, another hatred, another greediness..... I think one might be snoring....... joking. I can only remember those three. I mentioned the snoring to dad, as he sounds like trucks when he's asleep. Then we got into this big family conversation on our personal Seven Deadly Sins. Here's mine.

1. Snoring
2. Singing Justin Beiber songs
3. Not traveling at least twice out of the country
4. Not being a fanatic about iPad when you're a kid (this only counts for people who are up to 16. Others didn't have iPad when they were young. Sad....)
5. Greediness (ex: eating all the little candies that the waitress gives you with your check)
6. Having bad sleeping habits (snoring, grinding teeth, etc.)
7. Being naked in public (like Bay to Breakers and some biking events like Critical Mass)

I'm sure the rest of you can think of a list too..........

Ciao!

Laurel

Art Blogging - Toledo Weaponry

Laurel drew this cool sword after our visit to Toledo.

Fashion Alert- Totally Sweet Restaurant!

by Laurel

It was Easter Sunday yesterday, and we were just exploring Plaza Mayor (Major Plaza) the day before. We came across a cute little restaurant buried like your taxes under business papers in a corner. We looked once at the Easter Menu. Twice. Three times. Possibly even more. Mom couldn't believe her eyes. There was a mouth-watering selection of shellfish bisque, torrijas (really good french-toasty things), fruit salad, and more delicious selections of meat and veggies. We booked a table for four and while Mom and Dad were staring at the tapas in a display case, Bryce and I ventured downstairs to the seating part. We were amazed at what we saw. Tall brick cavern-like arches adorned the walls and ceiling. A small mahogany bar sat at the front of an L-shaped room. Bottles of every color imaginable were carefully placed next to others on a wooden shelf. Three empty swivel stools stood at the foot of the bar, waiting for someone to ease themselves onto the black leather cushions. About twenty tables in a small room had white tablecloths draped over their wooden surfaces. I backed up the stairs with Bryce at my heels, and we bounded over to our parents.
"Well," Mom asked, her eyes glinting, "How was downstairs?"
I squeak out an "Amazing!" and Bryce agrees with me by saying "Awesome!"

                                            The Next Day

We get all dressed up, waiting in our fancy clothes for the rest of the family. I nearly trip over the heels of my jeans as I race down the stairs, following an almost-as-eager-but-faster-than-me Bryce. We walk the way to Plaza Mayor. Every step seems to be a lifetime. We reach the plaza at about nine, a little early for Spaniards to have dinner (Most have it at about ten). We check into the restaurant and after a little confusion, a waiter leads us downstairs. A waiter is at the bar then, looking crisp and clean in a sharp white tuxedo. We sit down at a table with a tan tablecloth. Tonight, all the tablecloths are tan. The waiter takes a long time (I think they do that purposely!) to come back to our table and take the order. It takes about another thirty minutes for him to come back with food. Yummm...... bisque for Mom, soup for me and Bryce. When we finish, the waiter takes our plates and comes back with a second course. Mom is the only one with a plate in front of her, because me, Bryce, and Dad didn't order a second dish. When Mom's plate is cleared, the waiter comes back with a huge pan of paella- Dad's meal. We had to take some home because it was so big. When Dad finished his servings of paella, again the waiter took the pan away and came back with dessert- yummy torrijas- and Dad's wrapped-up paella. We finished the torrijas in eight bites- literally. Bryce was fencing off with his fork the family member who came to eat. Everybody at least had some torrija. All in all, it was really good, and I want to go there again!

Street Entertainers

When the rain subsides here in Madrid, the street entertainers come out in force, especially at the Puerta del Sol, the center of town right where we are staying.  Human statues are popular (Bryce said "These guys probably don't have ADHD"), and street musicians too.

Here's some of the sights:

 Washer Woman - who had a little sign about Women suffering in history

Laurel writes about this next one:  I saw a guy dressed as a table. His head was poking out of the top and his hands were heads, so it looked like a table with three heads on top. One girl came up to the coin jar to put a euro in. She dropped the glinting coin and all the sudden, table-man jumped at her! She was screaming, but I think she stayed to watch the next victim. We left table-man so we could  go home and Bryce connected him to Bush-man at pier 39.

The three headed Table Guy  - who pretends to attack anyone who comes close

These guys were amazing. Not sure what you call this but they were really good.

Art Blogging - The Armory from Palacio Real

Bryce and Laurel drew these pictures after our afternoon at the Royal Palace and Armory - inspired by the coat of arms for people and horses.

 Bryce's drawing

Laurel's Drawing

The Really Royal Palace

We visited the Palacio Real (Royal Palace) today. I know it was a long line, but Dad waited while Bryce and I played. It started to hail a few times, and I tried to convince Dad that it would be half past midnight when we would get to the ticket booth. Eventually, (at about 3 PM) we got our tickets and toured the palace. We walked (and walked and walked and walked) through the royal plaza and rooms. My favorite part was the armory, where we saw all these cool swords and daggers. Me and Bryce played the what's-your-favorite-weapon/saddle/armor/-in-this-case game. Mom liked to tell us "This armor was made in the early 1800s and was used in the battle of Madrid...". I just kind of tuned her out. When we got out of the armory, we stepped into this room with awesome chandeliers. The rest was red curtains and silk and gold paint and all that. Not as cool as the armory.

One thing that almost (but not quite) beat the armory in coolness was the potato bean soup I had at the cafe. Today was also the first flan of Spain! It had raisins on the bottom, which was kind of gross, but it was really good!


By Laurel