Climbing a mountain on your twenty first birthday: priceless

So this weekend was hectic with the past couple weeks of school just not letting me have a moment to think. Friday at 8:30 in the morning we headed off to the Alpujarras mountains in Spain. These mountains are in the Province of Granada and south of the city of Granada. I truly had no idea what was in store for me. We arrived at our pueblo (town) that was our starting point. We meant our guide who never broke a sweat, and fixed our backpacks to lighten our load. At approximately 10 am we started a vertical hike to the next pueblo in the mountain range. The scenery was beautiful, except I didn't get a chance a see it until we hit horizontal paths (I was too busy counting the seconds until my thys would stop burning). Once on flat land we could take in the aroma of the fresh cherry blossom trees and fresh air. If anything I had allergies that weekend because I had never smelled air that fresh in my life. After going up and down, and up and down some more we stopped and had lunch that consisted of us making little sandwhiches from local meats and cheeses. We stopped right by a great little waterfall and took everything in. After our meal we walked for about another hour and a half. It was so amazing it felt like we were in a Pocahontas movie or something. Around 5 o'clock we were done for the day just waiting for dinner.
I couldn't sleep completely that night because I knew that the next morning was my birthday and also because I knew I had such a day ahead of me. This day the first hour and a half was the most streneous becuase it was our climb to the mountain peak. Some of us girls found ourselves singing "Living on a prayer" by Bon Jovi because the song says that we are oooo we're half way there ooooo living on a prayer....this mind set was so necessary at some points. Once we got there everything faded because we could see the rest of the world below us.
We continued the day down a mountain that was part of the Sierra Nevadas instead of Alpujarras. That was my favorite sight I have ever seen in Spain. I think it was because it was more green and if I looked to my left I could almost touch the clouds. It was absolutely beautiful. For lunch we stopped at a spot where there was natural carbonated water because of so much iron in the water. It tasted carbonated, but not as strong. We followed a path after to see some great lookouts, a shepherd and his sheep, and a 400 year old tree. I honestly could not of asked for a better birthday! More pictures and an update to come.
After I went out to a Italian restaurant and out with my friends. It was definately a night to remember!