12/30/04

We got up and checked out of our little hotel/hostel and caught a bus back to Madrid. We checked at our hostel and they still don´t have any room. So we dumped our bags there and we are going to hang out today maby visit some shops or somthing. ...
...We stayed at Los Amigos hostel in Madridd last night because our regular hostel Barbieri was booked up. At 3 am a group of about 9 italian guys came into our hostel room to go to bed after partying. They turned on the all the lights and made tons of noise. It was pretty rude. So both of us were up for more then an hour after that. We could hear people partying in the streets until 6:30-7am. Spaniards truly love to celebrate life! Neither one of us slept well at all. We got up at 6:30 am to go meet our friend rick at the Madrid airport. We found him with no problem and then navigated ourselves to Barbieri hostel again. We dropped off all our luggage to sto5re there for the day. They we walked around to show rick some good Madrid sites and have breakfast. Rick has a digital camera(alright!) and is letting me(angie) take photos for him(and copies for us!). I am psyched!! Rick wasnt feeling well and was tired from jet lag so he took off to Toledo to check into our hotel there and rest. We made dinner at the b. hostel and watched kill bill vol.1 with Christophe(from germany, he is going to find a spanish girl here and marry her.) We tried to rest a bit, however there were many people milling about the living room. We wernt able to get a room for the night, so we had no privacy to retreat to. It was ok though. We met several people including Ariane from Paris and Raphel from Germany(but studies in holland) At 11 pm the small party of people from the hostel all gathered our wine and grates and made our way towards the Playa del sol to ring in the New year. This guy, o-, that works at the hostel had a big party at his huge beautiful apartment 1 block from the Playa del sol. The apartment had 2 big balconies so we had a perfect view of the street and the playa del sol and the big clock. When the clock striked 12 we ate 12 grapes for each chime for good luck. The only thing is that we didnt know that the grapes had seeds in them so it was cruch-a-rific. The party was tons of fun. Disco ball, lazer lights, and fog and techno made for a legendary new years party. And the whole night cost us 4€!(4 bottles of wine and a locker) Both of us drank WAY to much. Raphael was kind enough to help guide(i.e. carry) caleb home in his excessively relaxed state. We snuck into the hostel and tried to sleep in the living room. Caleb passed out fairly quickly. I on the other hand didnt catch much sleep. We got in after 4am so we almost made it all night.