Barcelona...

About Barcelona...we left Salzburg, took a train to Munich, got to the Munich airport, took a flight to Barcelona, took a bus to the city, and then walked to our hostel. We basically unpacked, made our beds, and wanted to go eat because by this time it was around 7pm. Our hostel was really cool too. It had wristbands that opened the outside doors, our room door, and our personal lockers inside. Sweet! We were in a room with 3 other people, about 4 different ones through our stay.


Anyways, so we asked them someplace to eat and they said this place around the corner. It looked pretty cool and we wanted to get some tapas (kind of like Spanish appetizers). So we get beers out of the tap on our table (yuck compared to Austrian beer) and decide on what to order. (Reminder: Barcelona's language is not Spanish - it's Catalan which is like a mix between Spanish and French. I'm sure most of them can speak Spanish, but everything is usually written in Catalan - sometimes Spanish/English below.)


So Emily asks the waiter what "Sepia" is and he says, "Fish." Wanting to try something different, she gets it. I get chicken and Caitlin gets ribs. (We also got a a pork loin tapa which was great!!) This is what she gets:


Also known as jelly fish??? hahahhaha

We finish eating there and it's somewhat late so we just decide to walk around Las Ramblas (a street with street performers, souvenir shops, restaurants, hotels, etc.) We walk all the way to one end and see this really cool bridge.


Bridge at night



I wish I could have taken a better picture but it was really dark and hard to see through a camera. BUT there were HUNDREDS of fish swimming all in the water. They look small in water, but they were around 18 inches long or so.


We ventured back home, took showers and went to bed. The next morning we wanted to hit up the beach, so we walked a while to Barceloneta - it wasn't all that great. It was man-made for the Olympics in 1992 and it was actually really windy so we got cold after laying out for a hour or two.

Here is the Colon Statue at the end of Las Ramblas during the day


Barceloneta - and a man with his metal detector haha.


We walked around the city for a while and wanted to eat tapas again. Finally finding this place called Micky's we went in, ordered some tapas and water (since that was the cheapest beverage on the Menu - but still 3 euros for half of a bottle!!!). The meal was insignificant. 4 pieces of food for around 12 Euro (18 dollars....GRRR). AND our Russian salad had tuna all over it....we didn't touch it. Let's just say we then had to get a euro cheeseburger from McDoanlds because we didn't want to spend any more money trying some place else.


That night the hostel was having a pub crawl, so we signed up to go (15 euros). We also got our roommate to go with us. At the first bar it was free sangria from 9:30-10:30. We then went to 3 others after that and then a night club (which is actually in a mall). It was cooler going with a big group rather than just by ourselves - we probably wouldn't know where to go anyways.



Our roommate Casey (which is graduating from med-school this month), us 3, and the pub crawl leader....what a job...haha.

The next day (Wednesday) was going to be a sightseeing day. We took the metro to La Sagrada Familia. Long story short, Gaudi is a famous architect who started building this cathedral in 1882 and it's still being constructed today. It was absolutely breathtaking and detailed. There obviously aren't any pews or an altar, etc inside because there are huge pieces of cement and everything else that they are using to build it.


La Sagrada Familia from one side

Us on our audio tour


A view from the other side


One of the 4 doors



Inside. Gaudi took most of his inspiration from nature. See how it resembles tree trunks with branches at the top. The patterns at the top also look like light shining in through the trees.



There was so much detail and so many stories of Jesus, saints, and disciples all on the outside of the Sagrada Familia.


After that tour we wanted to see more of Gaudi's works, so went to Park Guell that had some more famous things!


Me in the park, its really high on top of the city - you take outside escalators part of the way to get there.



Simulating a wave...cool huh?




This kind of reminds me of a gingerbread house!


The famous Gaudi Lizard and me

Another one of his houses that we found walking back - the little patio things kind of look like skulls

Here's another!

We kind of shopped around and then went back towards Las Ramblas. We wanted to eat at that one restaurant that was in Caitlin's book and that was supposedly the best food ever. It was around 8, and it opened at 8:30 so we tried to hurry. We got there around 8:40 so they had just started letting people in. We made it close to the front but the inside was full. Why wait? We said we would sit outside. Nothing on the menu was over 10 Euro...great prices and a great atmosphere with candles, white table clothes, etc.

Here is part of the line waiting to get in - totally worth it

So we ordered 2 appetizers, bread, a main course (each), desert, and a liter of sangria - it only cost around 14 euro each. IT WAS GREAT!!! (Emily has the pictures or else I would show you). After a 3 hour dinner we went back to the hostel and that was it for the night.

Thursday we got up and wanted to go to a different beach so we asked the hostel staff and they recommended Sitges which was around an hour train ride away. After getting to the station, we find out the tickets are free...score! We basically wander down to the beach and it was MUCH better! It was kind of crowded, but then again compared to what Emily was saying about Cape Cod, this was nothing! haha.

The beach and people laying out...probably half of them topless

Me laying out

Caitlin and I on the beach

We laid out for around 4 hours - the only ones wearing sunscreen too...haha. Those Spanish! We walked around in the city, got sandwiches and ice cream, and then headed back home. It was a great day trip and I totally recommend it to people who go to Barcelona and want the beach life as well as the city life.

We showered and wanted to go back to the same resturant as before, but wanted to sit inside this time. We got there probably 40 minutes before it opened, waited and got a seat! We ordered all new things and they were just amazing if not better than before.

Us standing outside the restaurant

This was another 3 hour long meal which I love to just talk and take your time so it was wonderful! We had to go back and pack to leave in the morning. Basically we just woke up, had some breakfast and traveled from 10 in the morning until 8 when we arrived back here in Salzburg.

A rainbow on the way from Munich to Salzburg - I had never seen one so bright and you can't see it in this picture, but there was a second lighter one too next to it!

Once again, overall this trip was amazing!! Less people, less hectic, nothing got stolen, beautiful weather, just great!! I still do want to see more of Spain because I think it would be a totally different experience of the Spanish culture.