Yes, despite all appearances this blog is still active!

I apologize to anyone who's trying to follow this what I'm up to through this blog. With over fifty student in private tutoring classes and growing, working at the school, trying to become a freelance translator, and generally staying up on daily things like Bible reading I am one stretched thin hombre. 

I'll try to do a more consistent job of posting however, the captions are just going to have to get shorter :-)  

Proof that little things we do have greater influences that we realize! Man, I thought it would be kind of funny to draw a smily face on my thumb to give my thumb's up an extra boost and now all the students in every class I teach are drawing faces on fingers and hands! Haha, this influence is pretty fun though.

 A friend from church invited me to have a coffee with him down by the water front. It was a bit brisk but so awesome. I have met few people that can slip into a spiritual conversation as quickly as Hernán.

 Behind Hernán in the picture above there were these rock structures that were built out into the water. He told me that they were built by the phoenicians to trap fish when the tide came in and thus make it easier to fish. Gotta love the history here!

 Kind of an undescript shot but I found this little plaza when I was taking a shortcut home and I thought it was pretty neat.

 Ah, the principle crunching down some churros the doorman brought. Heavenly little goodies.

 So this sheet is how they start little ones writing in the school (like three year olds). They don't start with letters but rather these shapes to get them used to holding a pencil. Not sure what the logic is there but it intrigued me.  

It was the birthday of one of the teachers and she brought in these little goodies from a local bakery. Oh my goodness, these things were amazing! They varied but the ones that I liked the most were comprised of a chocolate shell with this blueberry meringue filling. Whew, delectable. 

 Kind of hard to see but here's a cut away of the goodie that I was happy to make. 

 I was working on a project that kept me up late so to take a break I went down by the lighthouse to do some praying and wave watching. An epic evening it was. 

 A shot of the lighthouse above where I was sitting. 

 So this fruit is called a cachi fruit. They are super good and you just eat it like an apple. 

 Ah, my fair lighthouse in the day. It's such an awesome structure. 

I was recovering from a bit of tendonitis so I had to walk instead of run. I took this shot on one my walks (feel like such an old person to be talking about my walks) and it's such an epic old hotel right on the water. 

 Another shot of the town while I was walking around.

 Hahaha, Miguel is one of the members of the congregation here and his car recently broke down so he's borrowing this one from a friend while he looks for another. He didn't realize it came with a dash kitty. 

 So this is a weird but very tasty combo: milk and juice. Trust me, it's actually pretty good!

 Test time!

 So after the test the fourth grade took I wrote 100% on my hand and flashed it to one of the boys in the front row. He promptly wrote something on his hand and flashed it to me in the picture below.

 Hahahaha, ah man, someone needs to set their sights a bit higher I'm thinking ;-)

 Another shot of the hotel from another walk. I think I like this structure just because it is RIGHT on the water. You just don't see structures where the waves lap the base very often. 

 Some sweet steps to the south of it. 

 More shots of walking around my town. I can actually appreciate why people walk now. The slower pace really does allow you to take in the scenery well and I actually enjoyed by little sabbatical from running (glad to be back though!). 

 So true (I love English).

 Guess who's in the box! That would be my bike. Finally arrived from the states. As soon as I get some wheels we'll be seeing some Spanish roads I'm a thinking :-)

 So Tuesday evenings I give a English lesson to the teachers. Three more came in after this shot was taken and the funniest thing was that they talked as much as my young students!!! Haha, I even looked over one time and caught one of them texting. Ah man, it was a blast though!

 Walking by the beach on the path. A gorgeous day as usual :-)

 Sanctuary in the morning! What a pretty little feller it is. 

 This is a hotel in front of the sanctuary that I thought was pretty elegant. 

 Wow is all I got to say. 

 These next two shots will give you an idea of the size of the building. 

 Some Chipiona houses.

 More of the sanctuary (I think that technically it's a cathedral but they all call it a sanctuary so pardon if I'm confusing anybody).

 I'm not sure what's up with the fence they erected but I'm guessing it has something to do with the winter wind blowing the sand around. 

That's one small step for man...

So I stepped off the path a ways to say hi to a bush and when I looked down there was this big ol' snake skin at my feet. Yeah, I'm not sure what kind of snakes live around here but given the warm climate he probably had some pokies, making me glad I didn't meet him!

 An epic shot, in an epic place, for an epic ending of this blog post ;-)