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Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona April 29th 2016

Today we headed to the Barcelona cathedral, it was beautiful. There were many small chapels surrounding the large sanctuary. There was the sarcophagus of its patron Saint Euelia, she was a 13-year-old girl who was tortured and crucified on an X shaped cross for her beliefs. After this we went to the Picasso museum. It was interesting, but if we come back to Barcelona again it will be something I don't have to go back and see again. We then went to Mercado de La boqueeria, a market with tons of fresh fruits, vegetables, meets, and seafood. We tried several different things from different vendors for lunch. Next, walked down to Placa Espanya. Here we caught a train that took us to Montserrat. This is a monastery built into the side of a mountain near the ... read more
La Boqueria
La Boqueria
Montaerrat Monastery

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona April 28th 2016

We started off the day with warm fresh homemade churros. They were delicious! We then walked over to La Segrada Familia which is a large church that has been under construction since 1882. There have been several architects, but the most famous and who was responsible for the ultimate design is Antoni Gaudi. He spent about 40 years working on the church. The church was magnificent, unlike anything we have ever seen. The church itself is like a sculpture. We had tickets to go up into the nativity tower, but it had been raining off and on and they had closed access to the towers. They anticipate the church will be finished by 2026. We then headed over to Parc Guell, this was a park designed by Antoni Gaudi back in the early 1900s. It ... read more
La Sagrada Familafrom Guel Park
Pathway in Guel Park
Structure on top of Casa Mila

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona March 30th 2016

Part two of my Easter holiday trip was spent in Barcelona. Our flight got in very late on Friday night, so we passed out as soon as we got to our hostel. The hostel was on the top floor of an apartment building. It was in a flat that had five bedrooms, a tiny kitchen, and two bathrooms. It seemed ok at first, but by Sunday both bathrooms were out of toilet paper and the person who ran the hostel never came by to check on us. I will definitely not being staying there again if I ever go back to Barcelona. Saturday was our day to relax. We slept in, and didn't start our day until early afternoon. There was a nice plaza within walking distance of our hostel, Plaça de Catalunya. It had two ... read more

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona March 20th 2016

Signs of spring are emerging around Copenhagen! Perhaps most important among them, the sun! The days have grown longer, making waking up for work seem very manageable. So far, only the snowdrops and crocus have been brave enough to bloom, but tulips and daffodils are considering it. During the dark days of February, I decided to take a jaunt down to Barcelona in the hopes of some vitamin D, but even more appealing, to experience the works of Gaudi firsthand. My AirBnB’s only virtue was its location by Plaza Catalnya, so I spent little time there, but instead spent my time exploring. My first night, I quickly settled in, hung up my wool coat to give it some rest, and then set off for some tapas and a wander through the Gothic Quarter. The narrow streets ... read more
Casa Mila, or La Padrera
Sagrada Familia
Sagrada Familia

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona October 19th 2015

Today started off with us arriving at Plaza Catalunya, just in time for our day trip to Codorniu Cava Winery and Montserrat. We had little time to spare, so we bought a quick breakfast at a local café. While we were scarfing down our breakfast, we were approached by an older women asking for money. I felt insecure to go through my wallet looking for money. When she asked for my croissant, I decided to give it to her. I do not like seeing people go hungry. We quickly got on the bus and then it was off to Codorniu Winery. Codorniu, specializes in creating Cava, a sparkling wine mainly produced in the Catalan region of Spain. When we reached the winery, we were presented with a 3D video of the history of the winery. Very ... read more
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Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona October 18th 2015

Our first stop, this morning was Park Guell. Park Guell, located in the Gracia district of Barcelona, is a fair distance from the city center. We booked our tickets to the monument region of the park online to avoid the queue and save a dollar. We had to take the metro to the Vallcarca station and then follow the signs to the park. After walking uphill and taking a set of escalators, we finally reached the park in about an hour after we left the hostal. We just made our tickets window in the nick of time. At 8:30 in the morning, the park was fairly calm. It was nice to walk around the park in peace and quiet, without the large tourist crowds. As it is located on a hill, the park provided wonderful views ... read more
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Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona October 17th 2015

I am one of those people that likes to plan things well in advance. Therefore, when I heard that it could take over 2 hours to enter the Sagrada Familia, I decided to book entrance tickets online. I booked the Basilica entrance and the Nativity tower at 9:00 am and 9:30 am, respectively. However, when we reached the basilica, there was no queue. Nevertheless, I guess it is better to plan ahead than potentially have to wait for hours to get inside At 9:30am we took the elevator to the top of the Nativity tower and were rewarded with a great view of the city. We saw intricate details of the Nativity façade through the many windows poking out of the tower and also got to see some of the construction that was being done on ... read more
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Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona October 16th 2015

The day has finally arrived! After months of planning, my sister and I are finally going on our first Contiki two week trip to Spain, Morocco and Portugal. But first, we are spending an entire week travelling around Spain by ourselves. Our mission, to discover parts of Spain not included in the tour. Our first destination; Barcelona! Known for the famous architect Antoni Gaudi, great food and nightlife, Barcelona was definitely a destination we could not miss on our visit to Spain. We landed in Barcelona around 5:00 pm on Friday, October 16th. That gave us enough time to check into our Hostal, El Angels, and wander around the famous street, La Rambla and visit La Boqueria market. For the off season, La Rambla and La Boqueria market were surprisingly very crowded. La Boqueria market was ... read more
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Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona October 8th 2015

Not ever crossing the Atlantic Summer & I made plans to visit Spain, this was our first time in Europe. We wanted to see Spain as the first European country, we decided to go to Catalunya or Catalonia for some of you. We started we not plans at all but we wanted to see FC Barcelona and the old city, barri gothic or ciutat vella for some of you. We did las ramblas, the sagrada familia, the arch the triumph, also visited Montserrat monastery, this was an eye popping experience, we both have never seen anything like this. We stayed at the Regencia Colon hotel in the center of the old city, right across from Barcelona Cathedral, the old city is amazing, the tapa bars are a bit expensive compare to other Spanish cities but over ... read more
summer's first european meal ever
Placa De Sant Felip Neri
main entrance for Barcelona Cathedral

Europe » Spain » Catalonia » Barcelona » Barcelona October 3rd 2015

Thunderstorms through the night. Woke up to very grey skies but hey that's ok. Today our plans are Park Guell and sagrada familial...........good plans you may say........... here's how it went....... started at Barcelona Sant's stacion trying to book train for next day for our trip to madrid. Which incidentally is forecast to have storms the 2 days we are there! Cannot book trains on a Saturday cos nobody works.......ok we can use the machines tomorrow to buy our tickets on the day...... let's read metro map and find our way to Gaudis park.........4 hours later after having seen some lovely commercial areas all over barcelona and big housing estates and eventually realising that ticket is only single use not return and not an all day ticket BUT if you don't leave the stacions then you ... read more




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