Blame it on Air France

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Hola Finally!

Sorry for the incommunicado since I left. I'm sure the anticipation to know how things are going over here was just killing all of you. Well, it's been a good trip. I have lots to report, so here's the story...

11 & 12 JUNE - Monday & Tuesday • We left for Spain in three groups. Group 1 was small - two chaperones (me being one of them) and one student. Group 2 was a student who flew over by herself. Group 3 was the other 23 people, including our group leader. The three of us flew from the CLE to the ATL and then straight in to Barcelona. No real issues, other than a 1.5 hour wait on the runway in ATL because we couldn't go to our gate, and in Barcelona we joined up with the solo student and waited at the airport for 2 hours to meet our guide and Group 3. It'd been years since I last flew Delta. Nice flight. Weak choice of movies, but I was able to watch episodes of "30 Rock," "Las Vegas" and "How I Met Your Mother." All-in-all, no big deal... for the four of us.

Group 3 was supposed to fly CLE-Philadelphia-Paris-Barcelona. They sat on the runway in Philly for 3 hours before leaving, which caused them to miss their connection in Paris. They caught a later flight down, but the whole ordeal left many of the students full of bitterness towards the undeserving parisiens who definitely did NOT give any of them the snobby attitude they're so well-known for. :-) As a result of the fun, "Blame it on Air France," became one of the go-to quotes for the rest of the week whenever things weren't working our way. So, while the others were suffering during their layover at Charles DeGaulle Airport, the two students and I were exploring the Ramblas and making our way towards the night's dinner restaurant where we would hopefully meet up with everyone else if things went well. And they did.

The rest of the night we had a little free time to cruise the Ramblas and we all got back to the hotel around midnight.

13 JUNE - Wednesday • Our "hotel" doubles as a university dormitory during the rest of the year, and it was pretty new. The place had its bugs and things for the kids to complain about, but it was rather far away from action downtown and the food wasn't great. Nevertheless, it gave us a place to rest our heads.

Wednesday, we began our bus tour of the city by traveling to La Sagrada Familia, one of Barcelona's most identifiable images. This stone cathedral, begun in the late 1800s by Antonio Gaudí and as of yet unfinished, is as majestic, beautiful and amazing as the pictures you've seen. But I have to say it's smaller than I thought it would be. Make no mistake, it is enormous, but I thought it'd be bigger. I think I'm going to go back to it later in the week.

From there, we went up to Montjuïc, the Mediterranean-adjacent hilltop that hosted many of the events when the 1992 Summer Olympic Games were held in Barcelona. We checked out something called El Pueblo Español, which is a huge square that features buildings representative of Spain's 17 different provinces. Inside the buildings, you can buy examples of items created by artisans native to those places. Pretty neat. Sort of like a Spain-only Epcot Center, I guess, but waaaaaaaaaaaay smaller. We cruised around Montjuïc and saw all the Olympic venues and eventually stopped at a place where we could take some photos of the city down below. The bus tour led us back into town, past some famous buildings with crazy architecture, and left us off to go get lunch wherever we liked. I took five students and we went to La Boquería, a famous market that is off the Ramblas. I introduced them to a few different types of tapas: croquetas (little fried nuggets of chicken and a sort of paste/gravy/sauce), calamares (calamari, but no marinara sauce), empanaditas (little pockets of beef & veggies) and jamón serrano (Spain's famous smoked ham, cut straight off a leg hanging at the bar). They were brave girls and tried all of them. Some they liked, others not so much. I was proud of them for letting me introduce them to the cuisine. I wasn't going to give them anything that I wouldn't eat, so it was a fairly safe wager on their part. (The previous evening's dinner was a buffet with lots of stuff that isn't necessarily "Spanish.")

After lunch, we went up to Parc Güell, which is an enormous park that Gaudí landscaped and designed to make use of the land owned by his rich patron, Eusebi Güell. Words can't really do it justice, so you'll have to be patient and wait to see the photos I upload once I'm home. I can't make that happen here, for one reason or another. We spent a lot of time at the Parc. It's really big. From there, we got some shopping/free time in the center of town and then broke up for dinner again. We took the Metro to another restaurant and had paella, Spain's famous rice/seafood/chicken/veggies dish. Some of the kids got creeped out by the shrimp that looked like they still might be alive and others didn't like having to take the mussel out of the shell, but I think the consensus was that it was okay. I love it, so I was in heaven.

After dinner, my lunch bunch and I wanted to go ride the cable cars that go up to Montjuïc and we hustled to get to the station, but it closed minutes prior to our arrival. Bummer. So we walked all around the top of the hill, past the Olympic venues and museums, prior to taking the Metro back to our hotel. The next morning, we ate breakfast and left for Madrid.

I really enjoyed the little time we spent in Barcelona. I'm glad I'm going back this weekend. There are about 1,349 things I want to do there, so I'll have to choose and use my time wisely. I have a hotel near the Ramblas, so that'll be good. I'm hoping to get to see Joán Miró's museum up on Montjüíc. That's MUST-DO!!

Talk to you soon,
Love, Kev

NEXT UPDATE: Madrid & Toledo

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