Galicia, Spain

We traveled down the coast a bit from Austurias (where I live) to Galicia to visit the Playa de Las Catedrales. Pretty amazing site as these rocks form arches 30 feet or so overhead that can be walked underneath. That is until high tide, a point at which the arches are completely submerged under water. It's an incredible experience; to go from walking on the beach with these towering arches overhead, to seeing the tide slowly begin to engulf them to the point where they are no longer visible.

If you know me, then you know how much I love SBUX. Well, finding a starbucks in a major city such as Madrid is not terribly difficult. However, when one travels outside one of the semi-westernized cities, this task becomes impossible. It's not that they're aren't cafes on every other corner, it's just that they serve coffee in kids meal-esque tazas (well, that goes for most food raciones too). Fine, but they have generally tried to serve it to me "americano" style, which is just a diluted version of a normal Spanish cup of coffee with water added.

me- "Coffee plain, no milk or sugar please"
waiter- "i think you mean you want water added instead"
me- "hmm, no, i think no milk, no sugar, and no water"
waiter- "really, i think you want it american style watered down"
me- "i think i want two cafes now...plain, no water, no milk, and no sugar, gra-thee-as" (the z's are pronounced "thee")

It's been a blast so far, though, and the people are great.