Pyrénées to Catalonialand

---

Ola; welcome to Spain. I thought that this blog had died a horrible death so we started making a new one- then thanks to Matt for recovering most of it! Hopefully travelblog will hold it together this time as I'm not really in the mood to look for a new server. Our time in Barcelona feels like centuries ago, like back in the days when it was Muslim run, but here we go:

]

So after our hitchhiking trip through southern France, we decided to give Spain a shot and hitch to Barcelona. Our mate back in Le Fosset, who we'd stayed with, very kindly brought us up the Pyrenees mountain range to the border with Spain.

It was a fantastic trip up the range then back down and into Spain. We ended up outside some petrol station where we ate a box of muesli in celebration of reaching the new land and then started hitching again, this time with the Spanish section of the phrasebook open. We got to Barce in about 5 rides; driving through some amazing scenery at the foot of the mountains, through valleys, passed ski resorts and along windy country roads- avoiding Motorways. Our final ride couldn't believe that we'd come over the Pyrenees to reach Barce; he laughed and coudn't wait to tell others. Checking the map did explain it a bit I guess; there clearly were easier ways to reach ther city from France.

The first thing that occurred to us though was that we weren't really in Spain but Catalonia. All our Catalonian rides did make that clear- especially the last guy, with CAT on his registration plate, he worked for the Catalonian government. He had a few things to say about Madrid anyway which made for pretty good conversation. Lucky we wern't pro-Madrid activists.

So it all worked out well. Despite the hoards of tourists blocking the main street, Bareclona was great. After having a few drinks we walked around Barcelona in search for accommodation but no such luck- I guess it was midnight. The best we could find was a rip-off 19Euro hallway 'bed'. Well we wern't taking that, especially as the guy didn't even let us see it. All he said to us as we said Na mate, was: you'll be back, you won't find anything else. Well we did find something: in the city's hillside green area and the chance to test out our new tent. It was dark but we managed OK; we were soon joined by others (locals) and with the motorway doing an all-nighter down below, we had great company.

After an surprisingly OK night's sleep, we checked out the city the following day: Gaudi's famous architecture, the real touristy inner-city, the beaches and beautiful harbour- all pretty good. A drug seller on the beach asked us if we wanted a chocolate latte, then he elaborated a bit: hashish, heroin, cocaine. Thanks but no thanks mate. Later, we got some local knowledge to avoid the touristy areas and headed for the more alternative spots, where things were far cheaper and quite a bit more entertaining.

The next day we were all geared up for the buffet breakfast, but then slept in and ended up buying some rip-off omelet. Oh the bad memories. We then hungrily made it to the train station to see if we could get to Madrid in the afternoon but no such luck. Plan B was to get an overnighter all the way to Seville. We then had all day to kill so checked out the 1992 Olympic area and then it was more beach and then beach bars; we'd walked so far by the end of the night that we had to run to the train station; me in Jandles and Dan in something not much better, we arrived all sweaty after a good 40min run in and out of streets, dodging traffic and lights; People looking at us thinking "what the hell are they doing". But it was a good bit of exercise for the day.

---

Photos

Dan the hitcher
rejection!

Gaudi's work
Barcelona