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Published: August 4th 2006
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La Sagrada Família
Antoni Gaudí's temple/church is the world's most visited construction site. Construction started in 1882 and has yet to be completed and many people think it never will. A spectacular icon of Barcelona. Hello Everyone!
After Morocco we took our night train to Madrid and planned continuing straight on to Barcelona, but the train was full so we were stuck in Madrid for the day and had to take a night train to Barcelona. The great thing with having a few extra hours in Madrid was that we were able to go to the Reina Sofia Museum with Picasso’s Guernica (YEAH!) bad thing was we were going to take two night trains in a row.
After waiting in the train station for two ridiculous hours to reserve the our ticket (long story, but was totally ridiculous), we were off to the Reina Sofia to see one of my favorite paintings. We have owned a print of Guernica for many years, but I wasn’t ready for what I saw…it was huge! Heather guessed-imated that it was about 30’ x 12’ - using the floor tiles as reference - and we just stood there and stared for a long time to take it all in. After checking out the rest of the museum we were off to Barcelona, home of the 1992 Olympics, and also known as the Cataluña region with their own Cataluña
Parc de la Ciutadella Fountain
It was in this beautiful park we were almost robbed language, but they also speak Spanish as well.
Unfortunately, our first experience of Barcelona wasn’t the best. We were couch surfing there with a guy named Carlos, but he wasn’t able to meet us until 8pm at night, so we locked up most of our luggage and headed to the park for some lunch. With us we had two things, my backpack filled with food, laptop, mp3 player, and other important items, and also my Murse (man-purse or a small man-bag) to hold our important items like passports, rail passes, etc. Well, we started in on lunch and I noticed these two guys, one guy on a bike, talking from the corner of my eye. One guy disappeared and the guy with the bike slowly came our way and stated talking Spanish gibberish pointing at his bike tire. Well, our Portuguese helps us to understand most Spanish, but I soon discovered his main goal was to divert our attention away from my backpack. Well I caught on fast and noticed his friend come from behind grab my backpack and run. Heather quickly caught on to what was happening and already had the murse strapped on, but I jumped up
You want some of this? I didn't think so
Even though we didn't lose anything, it sure dampens your mood for a while. and ran the guy down and was able to retrieve my backpack, thank god! I was ready to pound the living shit out of the guy then I remembered Heather was alone with the Murse and the guy with the bike. So I recovered my bag ran to her and she was ok. So I gave her the backpack, on watchers came over to watch her and I ran towards the guys, but they were on their bikes heading away. Police shortly after drove by and weren’t too interested since I didn’t loose anything, but it really damped our moods for the day even though 10 minutes later something kind of cool happened.
We decided to pack up our food after losing our appetites. The thieves didn’t get anything, but it’s frustrating that after being on the road for almost a year, and feeling like savvy travelers, we almost fell for their ploy. We decided to take a walk around town first in the old Gothic area. Our first stop was going to be a Gothic Basilica, but I saw someone that looked familiar to me. At first I wasn’t sure if it was who I thought because this
I'm the King of the World Leo!
Well, I don't think I'll pursue a career as a paparazzi photographer - Heather person was wearing a hat, sunglasses, and was a bit scruffy on the facial hair, but as soon as I recognized him I quietly said to Heather, “Look! It’s Leonardo da Vinci!” Well she was a bit confused at first, but then I corrected myself and said that I meant Leonardo di Caprio, and it was him. We didn’t jump all over him and introduce ourselves, because he is only human, but I did slap him and say, “No Leo, I’m the king of the world” then walked off (just kidding). He, two older ladies (maybe mom and grandma di Caprio), and his body guard walked along the same street as us for some time, but eventually he quit following us. I think he wanted our autograph or something. We thought this would lighten our moods some, but didn’t help too much, but we bought some Gelato and fresh strawberries from the local market and that seemed to do the trick.
We ended up viewing all the tourist sights our first day (La Sagrada Família was unique…pictures will explain more) and met up with Carlos and his girlfriend Valerie around 9pm to do some couch surfing. We were very
The inside of Església Santa Maria Del Mar
One meter higher and it would have been bye-bye fortunate once again because Carlos was a great host. He's originally from Lima, Peru and Valerie is from Quebec, Canada, but they both were quite Spanish to us! He just moved to a new flat 10 days ago and didn’t have much furniture, but he had no problem taking us in and made us feel 100% welcome. He let us do some laundry, he had a big swimming pool at his flat that we all hung out the second day, and then our last night there they took us around to see some of the other sights that we missed. Another great experience, thanks Carlos!
Our next stop along the Mediterranean was the French Riviera where all the stars and rich people hang out (we fit right in…ok, not really), but we were excited for some warm sandy beach front. We decided Nice, France was going to be where we stopped for a place to stay and then from there we would tour around the area. We found ourselves a very lovely cheap hotel and after dropping off our bags we headed to the water front to check out the famous French Riviera beaches, but were a little disappointed.
When you go to the beach there are usually two things you expect. One would be water, they had that, and the other would be sand, but it was no where to be found. Instead of sand we found rocks, smooth pebbles, and we were a bit surprised because the area is supposed to be famous for their coast, but looked a bit uncomfortable. It sure wasn’t any Cancun or Brazil beach, but we walked along and took in the views and decided the next day we would skip playing on the beach and tour some other cities in the area in search of sand.
After some good rest we packed our bags and decided to do a 4 hour self tour of the Riviera and then head towards Italy. Our first stop was Cannes, famous for their film festival and expensive shops, and we only had about 50 minutes to take in the views while toting our packs. We headed straight to the beach and found some sand, but only a small stretch was for people, the rest was filled with restaurants and ridiculous prices. We grabbed some fresh baked goods on the street took a seat
and enjoyed the views for about ten minutes then ran back to the station for our next train.
We next stopped off in Monte-Carlo, Monaco to view the famous Monte-Carlo Casino and all the very expensive cars. It was unreal all the cars that we saw at the casino. There were at least a hand full of Ferraris, a dozen Bentleys, too many Aston Martin, and other cars that I don't know the names of. Also we walked along the track of the Monte-Carlo Grand Prix, which is just a regular city road when not being used for races. After staring at all the uber wealth, we jumped our last train on our Mediterranean tour towards Italy.
The Mediterranean coast was very beautiful, even with pebble beaches, and we had a great time, minus the “distract, snatch, and run” thieve situation, but we had to move on, too much to see and so little time. Look forward to our next blog about Italy where we share with you our tales of traveling on Italian trains (not the best thus far), visiting the ruins of Pompei, as well as our exciting history lesson in Rome.
Love Ben and
Heather
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anonymous
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Wow Paparazzi and Crime fighters what dont you guys do? Looks like your having fun still!!!!