Europe 2008 - Day 11

Ola Everyone,

It is 7:30a.m. local time and we have finished our time in Barcelona and Spain altogether. We are soon to travel to France to the village called Vers, on the countryside east of Avignon in Provence.

Before Barcelona, Day 8 was spent at the coastal city of Valencia. Here we had very little time to take in the city, however we made the best of it visiting Spain´s largest aquarium, "L´oceanografic Valencia". The visit was well worth it as we witnessed Spain´s most diverse waterlife including beluga wales, penguins, six different types of shark (swim overhead of us in a tunnel aquarium), and ofcourse, dolfins. From there we spent the rest of our day visiting downtown or what the locals refer to as the old city. We climbed an old cathedral tower and spent time taking in the views of the city, and enjoyed tapas the way I depicted: paying for only what you eat or, how many "sticks" you have on your plate.

We arrived at the hostel in Barcelona around 1230. Once checking in and getting settled, we took a walk down to La Ramblas which is the main drag here. No cars drive along this street and it is packed with tourists, local venders, souvenier shops, and artists with shops surrounding. there we saw a statue of christopher colon, checked out the musem de lérotica, went to the local market, which is massive and unlike anything I have ever seen. we bought smoothies for 1 euro, and they were delicious! Mine was coconut mango and chris got mango passionfruit. We had an amazing lunch this day. Chris had fish soup and truffle mushroom ravioli and I had goat cheese salad with raisins and walnuts followed by provlone sausage tortellini with leek sauce. For dessert, we shared a typical catalunian dessert, which is pudding, meets creme caramel, meets, creme brulee. We sat outside, and the tables even had white table-cloths. After that we walked all the way up mount juic looking for the cable car station to take us all the way to the top of the mountain. As we arrived, it was closing and we were not able to persuade them into leeting us on. that night we stayed at the hostel and ate dinner (chorizo, cheese, bread, snackies) that we had bought at the market, after our big lunch. We went to bed at 9 that night I think.

Yesterday morning, after thinking we were doing a bike tour with the hostel, which was cancelled, we ran to a local bike shop in hopes of making their tour just in time. We arrived just as they were leaving. We both felt as though we were part of amazing race dashing through the crowds. the bike tour was great. We both had a fabulous time. We were able to see a lot of the city (especially great since this was our last day in Barcelona) and it lasted four hours. We rode to a cathedral, a palace, the sagrada familia, barceloneta (an area along the beach). Then we had lunch at the beach before heading back. I can´t exactly recall the names of everything we saw. We are kind of in a rush before running to the train station. When I get my book out for the next entry I will fill in the details. After that we browsed around the shops a bit and then walked back up the mountain. This time we made it on time! The cable car ride was fun and provided a really nice view of the city, beack and harbour. at the top we checked out a military base, enjoyed the view eating some fresh fruit, and then walked down. We got lots of exercise that day and our legs are pretty sore this morning. For dinner, we ate at a cuban restaurant which was fabulous. Big portions and fabulous tasting dishes. After that we took the metro home, attempted to do some laundry only to find out it cost 3 euro per cycle! and an extra .50 for soap! yikes!. We packed our bags and then headed to bed. Now we are going to France as chris mentioned!

We are not sure if we will have internet access there. So we may not be in touch for 4 days or so. We weren´t able to post any pictures this leg of the trip because the computer is in a cage. haha.

Hope to be in touch soon. France is something we have both really been lookign forward to - so hopefully everything turns out well. Goodbye Spanish, hello French.

Love you all,
Jenna and Chris

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