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Lena and I continued to have a fun week after returning from Normandy. I had class Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday but that gave Lena time to drink herself silly on espresso's at café's and explore some of Paris on her own. During the week we went to some of my favorite spots in Paris and explored some new ground together too. On Tuesday night, Lena, Dani and I walked to the Eiffel Tower from our apartment building playing, "you see the Eiffel Tower, you drink!" Turns out the Eiffel Tower is a long ways away, but we eventually made it just in time to see it sparkle and light up! Lena and I tried to make it a late Paris night and go out dancing, but turns out we are both homebodies and settled for a nutella banana crepe and headed home instead 😊
Wednesday we had our breakfast in the Tuilleries gardens by the Louvre then went to Café Verlet, a place that grinds coffee beans from around the world. Being the coffee lady she is I was excited to take Lena here, but we both accidentally sugar spoiled our shots, but the atmosphere was still nice 😊 We walked
around the center of Paris, found some fun passages and new streets and ate a tasty pickle, salami baguette in front of the Pompidou center. Later in the day we walked to Rue Mouffetard, a cute Parisian market street. We stopped at a restaurant in the sun, split a tasty chicken crepe as a meal and a lemon/sugar crepe for dessert. While we were eating, a woman was singing at the next door café, an older woman with a strong beautiful voice. It was the perfect Paris afternoon.
Thursday was six hours of class then off to Barcelona!
(Dear readers: seeing as this blog is coming 2 months after the fact, I have used bits and pieces of dear friend Anne's blog. She is now managing editor at our newspaper and should be more than willing to have her writing samples available to the general public. I'm really just doing it to help her career.)
Barcelona was such a beautiful city. We flew in late Thursday night and headed to the apartment we had rented for the weekend. With the five of us, Dani, Lena, Anne, Erin and I it was cheaper, more fun, and our own space
to cook and play in. Thursday was a night of wine and reunions. Which came after an impromptu baguette fight started by Dani, Lena and I on our way to pick up Anne and Erin. We managed to find a bunch of stale baguettes on the street on our way to pick us up. I’d say the greeting we got pretty much sums up the whole amazing weekend.
Friday morning we woke up and cooked a feast of a breakfast/brunch that we ate on our terrace (eggs, bread, avocados, tomatoes, cheese, fruit, and tea). This would become a daily routine of tastiness. Wandered through the old town neighborhood to Barceloneta (the neighborhood around the ocean), listened to some cool street performers, saw some amazing sand castles, and then headed to Las Ramblas. Lots of window-shopping and people watching etc. At the end of La Rambla (main street) we enjoyed more people/pigeon watching in Plaza de Cataluña, including some amazing children vs. pigeon throw downs.
There is one especially huge market just off of Las Ramblas. Fresh fruit smoothies and fruit for 1 euro helped us wander through the mazes of meats, cheeses, fresh fish, and spices. We decided to have
a tapas themed dinner at our apartment, so we all did our shopping to prepare for our feast. We had brie and honey appetizers, tomato and mozzarella, and a big homemade bowl of sangria! This was followed by fresh pear ravioli, lemon chicken and more sangria. We were all perfectly content to stay in that night, and us all being the homebodies we are, it took some convincing by everyone to decide that since we were in Barcelona, we needed to go see some of the nightlife. Off to the 2 euro shot bar we went. Our featured shots were the Harry Potter, in which the bartender sugared oranges and then lit the bar on fire to brulé the sugar and put the orange in our shot. The second one "Boy Scout" involved similar flames and toasting marshmellows at the end of sticks as a before shot ritual 😊
Saturday we woke up to go get our minds blown by Gaudi. Even though the Sagrada Familia was started over 100 years ago, the construction is still ongoing. It was beautiful to read about his work and study of naturalism. The inside of the church is meant to look like a
tree canopy and different pillars or structures reflect shapes in nature. It was incredible. Afterwards, we went and found the Gaudi Apartments as well.
Sunday morning: Big brunch on our terrace and then off to Park Güelle (Gaudi’s park). We decided to walk instead of metro because it was a beautiful day. We got a “little” lost, and after climbing to the top of the hill three times, we finally achieved victory and found the park, wandered around eating ice cream and looking at all the candy land type structures and Gaudi-ness everywhere. Sunday (the first of the month) is museum free day, so we capitalized by hitting up the Picasso museum, which was a timeline through his works starting at age 8. It was the perfect way to see his progression and the change in his artistic style. He had mastered everything the academy could teach him by the age of 14, so he just started doing his own style.
Then went out for a huge paella dinner that included the spontaneous buying of beer on the way and a great life talk in the middle of a grassy nook in the middle of a random street. Delicious meal
and sangria and then a fair amount of ridiculous the rest of the night on the way home and back in the apartment.
Barcelona was probably one of my favorite trips of my time here so far. Being surrounded by friends who I love, soaking up the culture of Barcelona, and discovering Gaudi and learning more about Picasso made the trip really special.
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