Carnaval Day Two

February 28th,

I woke up around 7:00am, smashed between everyone else who had come back later that night and tried to fit in the same bed.  I got up and laid my sleeping bag out on the floor and fell back to sleep.

We all woke up around 11:00am and talked about the night before.  We lounged around in the hotel room before deciding to get "breakfast" as 1:00pm.  At the café next door we ordered "café con leche" and "pan con tomate" in true Spanish fashion.  Everyone was feeling tired, so we went back to the hotel room to nap.

The weather was clearing up and that afternoon we went to the beach.  Blake and I picked up a pizza while the girls went to find drinks.  It was about as a relaxing afternoon as we could have had as we leaned against the slanted sea wall, enjoying the warmer weather while eating our lunch.  Tonight would be the most crowded night as groups of day tripping, Erasmus and American students from the other Spanish cities would be taking "party buses" to Cádiz for a total of 16 hours.  As we laid on the beach, costumed people walked by.  We stayed on the beach until sunset, which was quite stunning with the last drop of sun and sliver of moon spread across the horizon and sea.  Alexis and Debby went back to the hotel to get the costumes and we put on our togas and crowns right there on the beach.  

As the last night of Carnaval began, the beach was the beginning of the party.  I ran into some of the girls that I had met from Morocco Exchange on the beach.  Pushing our way through the streets, we first went to a great restaurant that Blake had remembered from summer.  The Greek Gods sat down at the table and ordered.  Eating my meal in my golden wreath crown was quite a scene!

Whereas yesterday was crowded, but manageable, today was so packed that in the plaza de la Cathedral it was impossible to move.  The Cathedral was an incredible, ridiculous sight and probably the epitome of the idea of there being a difference between "Saturday night and Sunday morning." Thousands of people in a variety of costumes were dancing, running wildly and consuming large quantities of alcohol on the steps of the Cathedral.  Only in Spain.  In the plaza we ran into a huge group of Spaniards dressed as Smurfs who we hung out with and spoke to in Spanish.

We spent a long time at the Cathedral and Alexis and Rachel decided to head back.  I followed Blake, Debby and Sarah as we kept going from plaza to plaza.  Once again, our group was separated and I decided to head back to the Cathedral before heading to the hotel.  I ran into Kendra and Maggie from our program who were dressed as "punk rockers" in vibrant, neon wigs.  We headed back to the cathedral together before I said goodbye and walked back toward the beach.  Down on the beach I ran into all of the Moroccan Exchange girls.  Their bus would pick them up in a few hours and they were there in costume with hundreds of other people in the same situation.  We hung out for a while, before tired and a little cold (my undershirt and toga weren't that warm) I headed back to the hotel where I immediately fell asleep.