Picos de Europe

This weekend...
I think it was a break through. Everything I seemed to be striving for felt victorious this weekend. I'll explain.

I went to Picos de Europe in Covadonga. This small city is so important to Spain because this is where the Reconquest started. Amazing huh? Well, that was just a side story for some reference I suppose. Anyways, we took two hikes...one on Saturday and the other on Sunday. The two hikes were drastically different...

After we got done with the first hike the people I was with got separated from the rest of the group. We had no idea where they went. The location of where we were is also very secluded so there isn't a store just a few restaurants that close quite earlier. My friends and I were so hungry, mainly because we thought there was going to be a store there where we could buy us some food. There wasn't. We started looking for a place to eat but there was nothing. We called someone in the other group and they gave us vague directions...To put our emotions in more into perspective. We walked around dirty, hungry, and tired in the talk for an hour. All are not good combinations. Most of us, or all of us...were quite frustrated and angry towards some people in the other group for not waiting for us or calling us to tell us where they were. When we finally got to the restaurant that was open...the guy who worked there said it was closed.
I started to feel so angry and almost tormented. My past response to this would be cussing or getting so enraged...I tried to cuss. The words felt so unbearably foreign to my tongue. Like I tasted soap in my mouth. Then I knew that all this work I have been doing myself was paying off. God gave me this weird reward. A distaste for the common way society says I should react.

Saturday night I was so excited to sleep. I was going to sleep in a big bed with E.B. The night seemed so incredibly needed. The night came to sleep and E.B was sick. She coughed the whole night...not fun for sleeping, for the both of us. I found myself rubbing her back in my half a sleep state. We slept through my alarm. As soon as I woke...I knew there was breakfast for me downstairs in the hotel we stayed in. My friends this hotel was gorgeous and one of a kind.

The view from outside

Quickly I put on some clothes and came down to a fantastic breakfast. All I could think was..."THANK YOU GOD...for providing endless cups of coffee." We took a cab to our central and starting point of our hike. The hike took in totally 6 to 7hrs. 

There was this point in the hike that I thought I had enough and was so ready to give up. In my past behavior I would of put on some type of attitude showing I was hurting and had enough. I would of basically acted as a brat. I felt it coming on and quickly I just shouted to Anne that I needed some encouragement. She shouted back in a prayer to God. How perfect was that! I was so completely thankful for that moment. By the time we reached our destination, God defiantly showed His power and His might. He even gave me the encouragement to reach the top and actually see over the top. At the top the winds were well over strong. If I didn't keep a good stance at come points I would of fallen down the hill...because of the wind. At first I was so scared. I'm scared of heights....and no one knows this but I am about to tell the world I guess...I'm more terrified of strong winds. I remember when I was in elementary and the Santa Ana winds would come, I would be so scared that they would knock down a tree or something. I told my mom this when I was little and she told me, "me too." (secrets are just exploding out on here, haha) So I was terrified, SO scared. I almost didn't even go look. Though I felt a pull on my heart to see it and an embrace that I cannot explain but just say God. I put my backpack somewhere safe and went. I saw God's glory reign high. I felt and heard His breath of the wind all around me. I saw the colors of Fall and the mighty rocks that held up the mountain. Nothing was so terrifying and beautiful. I really couldn't stand the mixture. Because it made me so overwhelmed. It was like God had revealed Himself in an entirely different way. 

May I remind you that if you looked down...it was straight down.

This weekend was exhausting and I am still tired from it. It was more needed than I knew. To think that God will still be as amazing as that experience or even better, is more than words can say. I'm blessed.