Barcelona

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Day One
We took an overnite train from Paris to Barcelona, which included a three hr wait at the Paris airport with guards with machine guns. Any yes we did get one of those cute little couchettes like last year WendyMum! It was not a restful sleep and when we arrived at our hostel on Las Ramblas they were still serving breakfast and we had to wait 3hrs to check in. It was extremely hot and we were exhausted, but couldn´t waste the day sleeping. So after check-in, the first order of business was food. Our first offical meal in Spain, the country with the best food in the world, was KFC! We were so hungry and that was the first thing we saw, and it was delicous 😊 Anyways, the day was full of Gaudi houses and architecture. We visited 2 apartments he was commissoned to work on, and they were abosolutely stunning. The guy is a genius! There were no straight lines in any of his buidings, and he takes all his shapes and curves from nature. There really are no pictures that could do it justice.

Day Two
Another day full of Gaudi. We went to the Sangrada Familia, and yes Cathy, I paid the 5Euro to see the scaffolding on the inside. But, in my defence, we actually climbed 300 steps to the top of one of the towers and saw Barcelona from a different view. Our next stop was Park Guell. I thought is was beautiful last year when I saw it and was so excited for my sister to have the same experience. It has the longest park bench in the world that curves like a serpent and has Gaudi's famous mosaic look to it. We walked down to that area and my sisters reaction was priceless. She looks over at me with a confused look and says "I thought it would be bigger." I suppose it is all about perspective right? There was also this wall made out of stone and its hard to describe, but it looks like giant plant holders because there are flowers along the top of them. Again, I thought they were beautiful, and my sister turns to me and says "They look like a bunch of skulls smiling at you." That was it, I will never see the park the same again! We saw the famous drooling lizard, and stole some lavender from the garden (after one and a half months of traveling, you come up with some creative ways to make your stuff smell nice!)

Day Three
We were all Gaudi-ed out by now, so it was just a day of wandering the streets. We strolled the Barri Gothic (Old City) and another famous cathedral in the area, also covered in scaffolding. We also found the zoo which is surrounded by a large public park with a massive fountain. Very beauitiful. The parliment building was also in the park and had a pond out front with a lonely turtle. It was very cute to watch the turtle try and climb out. Angele went into the Dali Museum, but I was all arted out by then and just wandered Las Ramblas for a while. There were some great street performers, including this devil that would fall competely into this little box until someone gave it money. I also strolled the market and got some fresh squeezed orange juice which Spain is known for. We had a proper spanish dish of Paella and a pitcher of Sangria for dinner to make up for our KFC experience, and it was delicious!
Amie

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Comments

[Cathy]

KFC???
I am so proud of you for eating KFC... kinda makes me feel like I can have the Europe experience just by going down the street. FYI - My mom will be happy to hear about the train however, will not be commenting on it for a while since she is off camping until the end of the month. Cheers, Cathy P.S - Angele the park really is GREAT and the bench really is BIG!!!