The first half of my lovely winter break was with Mama, visiting a ville hors de Paris! J'ai fait un bonhomme de neige! (Snowman!) However, after an adventure in which we left 3 HOURS to spare to drive to CDG airport, I flew to Barcelona with two friends!
Très long post ahead! (You have been duly warned...)
Un petit problème: So my Spanish is at the level of "I know some words plus I know enough french to vaguely understand". Clearly I was mistaken. Unfortunately all the spanish I've ever heard has been university students. Who surprisingly don't speak as fast as native Spaniards... sooo it was really humbling to just stare blankly at merchants, sort-of understanding what they had asked me, but having absolutely no capacity to respond. Ouch. I just wanted to say, "I'm not a dumb tourist! I DO know another language, just not this one!" It did, however, make returning to France and hearing the language literally sound like music to my ears :)
Flying into Barcelona was great! Sunny, blue skies, and warmer than Rennes :) The first thing we did was find the hostelm Equity Point Centric, henceforth referred to as the Best Hostel Ever. Jessie compared it to being on the Champs Elysee (a super rich, famous street in Paris) of Barcelona, as we walked past Louis Vuitton, Burbery, and the like. For 9 euros a night, we got a really good breakfast, a 10 person room with our own bathroom (YAY!!) and free tours! It was such a blessing to have found something clean, friendly, english-speaking, and perfect for our needs :)
 |
| Sangria! |
 |
| Our last day, at Park Guell. Sunny and warmest day by far :) Worth climbing every mountain to get there! |
 |
| Shopping like independent adults |
 |
| No winter coat! A miracle! |
 |
| The bunkbed of Molly and I, plus nice lockers to lock up suitcases during the day! |
 |
| First thing we say after getting off of the airport shuttle |
 |
| Daring photographer braving the horde. This was taken before I fled through the cloud of pigeons. It went from cool to scary REAL fast... |
 |
| Giant bubbles!! Awesome! |
 |
| Us at the fountain. left- right Me, Jessie, and Molly. The first incarnation of the ATT bars by height. |
 |
| Surprise more bubbles! |
 |
| You can buy boxes of wine for less than a euro. We decided against it, but really what would possess someone to buy that? |
 |
| Bubbles |
 |
| Octapus? Squid? |
 |
| My first flavor of gelato! |
 |
| Really quite terrible picture of the great breakfast/lounge/kitchen place! |
 |
| My second type of gelato! Are you sensing a theme? It was a daily occurrence. |
 |
| This is where our free tour of the Gothic parts of the city began. The palm trees were donated by the Bacardi (like the alcohol) family for the Olympics. |
 |
| Art commemorating George Orwell being shot in the neck, at least that is what the tour guide said! |
 |
| George Orwell Square! It used to be really sketchy with drug use so the city built cameras every where (hence the 1984 reference) and a playground... |
 |
| According to the guide, this is an escargot restaurant where famous people eat, quote, "like Shakira and Richard Nixon" |
 |
| Roman ruins 2000 years old! |
 |
| This is the school where Picasso studied art at the age of 13 (if memory serves). Recently, the roof collapsed and the city refused to pay for it, so the people of Barcelona retaliated by spray-painting the facade! |
 |
| Beautiful cathedral |
 |
| More ancient ruins! |
 |
| Gorgeous croisée de transcept et choeur. Architecture class has paid off already! Only problem being that I only know the terms in french. |
 |
| Flags of Spain, Barcelona, and Catalonia. |
 |
| :) |
 |
| This is un bas-côté voûté en arrêts. |
 |
| Le nef voûté en arrêts de 4 travées. Sorry, at this point I'm counting the captions as practice for my exam :P |
 |
| Manifestation! As we left the restaurant after the tour, we walked right into a huge group of protesters. Walking in the opposite direction, we saw all the damage with paint and broken windows. |
 |
| Had I room in my suitcase, i would have bought some awesome teacups! (Thanks for the yarn, though, Odile!) |
 |
| Crypte of Santa Eulalia, a young girl martyred at age 13. |
 |
| La Sagrada Familia! We made the decision to not wait in the huge long rainy line to go inside. So we went to McDonalds! |
 |
| Its everywhere! |
 |
| (Idea borrowed from Molly) McDo and the famous church :) Everything in the restaurant was in Catalan, not even Spanish! |
 |
| The same restaurant where my parents ate in Paris last summer, then Mama and I ate the weekend prior, in Spain! |
 |
| The Magic Fountain, triumphantly found after walking for well over an hour. Worth it! |
 |
| I took so many pictures fiddling with the settings to try and capture the beauty. |
 |
| A museum of Catalan art stunningly lit up behind the fountain. |
 |
| Our lovely, perfect hostel! |
 |
| We literally climbed a mountain to get to Park Guell. Parts of the journey had escalators in the road. |
 |
| Lovely pizza, where incidentally I caught a man trying to pickpocket someone else! He left after I gave him a look of "Yeah, I saw that" It was exciting to say the least. |
 |
| Park Guell= mosiacs by Gaudi |
 |
| Mosaics!! |
 |
| On the top of the top of the mountain! |
 |
| Molly and I are certain that an episode of America's Next Top Model was filmed here... |
 |
| A lovely ceiling mosaic |
 |
| Look! The Mediterranean sea! |
 |
| This is my "I'm on a plane going somewhere sunny and I have the row to my self" face. |
 |
| My awesome beautiful travel buddies |
Once we unpacked a bit, we headed back out for lunch. We found a nice restaurant and the awkwardness of knowing barely any spanish began! Luckily the waiter understood us. The food was delicious, however we spent quite a long time there debating how to ask for the check. I took one for the team, announcing, "L'addition, sil vous plait!" I figured that French is better than English, maybe the word in Spanish was similar? (It wasnt.)
The lovely fountains were next, where we took pictures and saw hordes of terrifying birds. But really, when the woman threw the birdseed everywhere. They flew at your face! Little children were having a blast, though,
toddling towards the birds and scattering them away.
The first appearence of dreadlock-ed bubble blowers!
Then, on to shopping! We were lured into a store due to the *ahem* interesting shop window that was COMPLETELY not indicative of what the interior held. Imagine Nordstrom's/ Galérie Lafayette/J C Penny's. There were like 7 floors, which got more expensive as you climbed. Molly and I bought hoop earrings!
Later, we saw the Magic Fountain, Sagrada Familia, walked for HOURS, and adventured in general! We even did a tour one night to a discothèque and met some nice Irish and French people, all who spoke french. What are the odds! They were dancing and shouting instructions in Gaelic and it was hilarious :)
So if you are still reading, it was great! The pictures tell more than I can. My hands be tired!
One last one :)
Barcelona Beach, with all our luggage before heading out.
<3 Katie
No comments:
Post a Comment