Spain in a nutshell

"For me it is like heaven". That is what Henar, our host, said when she emailed us about volunteering out here and she was so right! We can´t connect our computer to the internet, so only have short little bursts to check our mail, which means posting Spain stuff after we´re back home. This is just me saying hi and that we are all healthy happy and loving our last two weeks here on our Spanish mountain.

I can´t even begin to describe this place with justice, but I´ll try. First of all, the mountains (mist shrouded mountains I might add) are lined with miles and miles of stone walls and paths, weaving in and out of the trees all the way to the top. These were built by the Moors I guess until 1290 and still standing strong (some of the olive trees are over 1500 years old!). This place we are in was built somewhere before then as well, then used as a monastery for a few hundred years before being left to ruin until rescued and brought back to it´s former glory. I don´t really have time, but I have to say something about this place! First of all, come here if you can.

We arrived lost and blurry eyed (John wrote on that, but can´t post it til later. I´ll just say our taxi driver refused to go any further up the mountain road and dropped us off in the middle of who knows where) walking in the pitch black night, feeling a little creeped out by the twisted gnarled trunks of the ancient olive trees (very Sleepy Hollw in the moonlight). We could here sheeps bells clanging along beside us, but couldn´t see them and went along like this for a good ten minutes until we finally saw the lights of what we hoped was the monastery. As we got closer we heard laughter and music coming from inside and knocked on the arched door with the giant iron knocker. Voices from inside yelled familia! Ninos! The door was opened and we were ushered into this huge and amazing stone floored, adobe plastered entryway with arched doors and winding staircases all over the place. We followed our new hosts down to the kitchen that couldn´t be more cozy if you got Disney to sketch it out, with a huge sit in fireplace lined with pillows and benches where they brought us wine and food and babied the kids (and us). You have no idea how nice this was after our twelve hour day of traveling (broken mini van, train, metro, plane, mean and uncooperative taxi drivers and way too much walking)

This is the kind of place with hidden rooms (even a passageway between walls) that lead into other rooms that lead to staircases that wind to the top of the house where there´s a terrace overlooking the sea. It´s crazy. There are some original paintings on some of the walls (is it only me that cares about that???) and when you walk out into the mountains there are strange round stone huts that date back to the dark ages. I can hardly stand it!

We work very hard for five hours a day (weekends off), but they have been great about finding work that the kids enjoy. Lots of burning things in bonfires and picking olives and getting the gardens winterized. When we come in for lunch at two we´re starving and the table is loaded with delicious hot food and wine. After that we do whatever we want, so I think it´s a great set up.

Then there´s the people. It´s an amazing little community here, people staying as long as they want to help (Jorge from Argentina has been here for two years and built himself his own tiny little cottage) and others that, like us, stay for a couple of weeks. John´s found a philosophy buddy in Tom, a 45 year old German guy that´s been here for a couple of weeks longer than us and Maria and Eva- two super sweet and funny girls we sit around the fire with every night. It´s been a great way to meet people from all over, preparing meals together and working every morining. We feel like we´ve known them for ever!

There´s so much more I´d like to say, but it will have to wait. Hi to all of you and see you soon!

Angie