There and Back

My day today was fantastic. There isn't a better word to describe it.

It started off last night, when Courtney and I rallied the girls to go to the Baltic Sea at midnight. We took a guy with us that we met on the couch at the hostel, bought our tickets with directions and help from only two Polish locals (and also learned the word for "sea"), and found ourselves at the pier in Sopot.
I don't know what it is, but during the last hour of the train ride yesterday afternoon, the presence of the ocean was tangible. I've missed it so much, living in Alabama, and my excitement was evident to everyone I was around... and kept growing until last night when I found myself standing in front of the crashing waves of the Baltic. The four girls rolled up our pant legs and pulled up our skirts and ran straight into the Sea. At midnight. And the sand was incredibly soft and the water was warmer than the surrounding air..... and we frollicked.
Just like the children we are.

So today, we woke up late after our adventure, ate some bread and (in Courtney and Kristin's case) pizza for breakfast, and headed out. One of our roommates at the hostel told us about an island in the Baltic named Hel (pronounced "Hell") that was supposed to be awesome, and you have to take a ferry to get there, so we jumped at the chance and bought tickets to go.
I have not had a more relaxing day since I've arrived in Europe. We bought big beach towels at an outdoor market by the sea, staked out a little section of beach to call our own, and laid in the sun all day long. It's incredible, because back home I get overheated and sweaty after thirty minutes, but here the sun is warm and friendly, and doesn't burn even with hours of exposure. We people watched, laughed at kids building joint project sand castles, and soaked up the rays to help our bodies make Vitamin D - the only vitamin we've gotten in abundance since we've been in this malnurished country!
Sundresses and seawater aside, our day ended at a fabulous little cafe that saw four tiny girls eat two ENTIRE loaves of bread with butter, and we filled our water bottles with sand to bring to all of our loved ones back home. Courtney even ate TWO ice cream cones somewhere along the day's journey. AND we took the stereotypical jumping-in-the-air-with-the-sun-at-our-backs picture, which turned out adorable.

The ferry ride home lasted an hour, and saw the four American girls sitting on the deck of a ship called the Opal, watching the sun set over a foreign landscape that somehow endeared itself to us. It was astounded to realize that that same sun was shining a 1 p.m. sun to our parents and friends, and that looking at it was also looking towards the direction of home. It's something the four of us shared... and no one else will ever actually know what it was like or how we felt. It's sad to think that tonight was probably the last night of my life that I will see the sun set over the Baltic Sea.

So now I'm camped in the common room of our hostel... the three other girls and two friends we've made here are debating politics as we pass a giant water bottle and a tub of nutella around. Everyone is in pajamas and we're in for the evening. It's our tribute to the amazing time we had in Gdansk...... I'm sad that we have to leave so soon.