This past weekend (3/18-3/20) I finally got to Barcelona! What a gorgeous city. I enjoyed every minute I was there and it was seriously SO comforting to see some friends from home. I'm so beyond glad that I went and it was truly worth every penny!
My travels started on Friday morning! My flight was at 8:40 am and I'm proud to say that I successfully figured out how to use the airport bus system and saved myself about 18 euro because it only cost 2.40 euro!!! Everything went well, I got to the airport went through security sat at the gate and there were actually students that I knew waiting at the next gate so we were just chatting for the next hour! Then they changed the gate...then they delayed the flight...12 hours. Pretty much we all got incredibly nervous and were wondering whether that could possibly be real, I mean a 12-hour delay is pretty much unheard of. So we all rushed to the customer service and I sat in line for about an hour and a half just trying to get a ticket to Barcelona, there were flights at 10am, 12:30pm, 3:30pm and 8pm. Luckily, I managed to get on the 3:30 flight, so I just sat at the airport for about 8 hours. What a day! But I was very fortunate and met a girl a few years older than me who talked with me for the next 8 hours so we roughed it together! Wanna know the great thing about that? I had an 8 hour conversation with a native spanish speaker IN SPANISH! I mean, I'm not going to say I was speaking fluently and saying everything in correct grammar, but still!
Anyways, I landed safely, and got to my friends house! And, being the amazing world traveler I am, I used the train and metro to get there for only 5 euro, when a cab would've been about 30 euro...I'm such a good saver :-) Friday night, since we'd both been traveling all day (she'd just gotten back from Madrid) we just decided to relax and talk!
Saturday was my first day walking around Barcelona. We started out by walking down one of the commercial streets that was filled with designer stores and other fancy stuff. There were some buildings by the designer Gaudi on this street as well. Gaudi had a HUGE influence in Barcelona. His designs are based on not having a single straight line. He also designed the church named 'La Sagrada Familia,' which I never actually got to, but it's very famous.
Plaza Catalunya was the first actual stop we made:
From here, we decided to go to the Mediterranean Sea! While we were walking there we walked past the Cathedral in Barcelona, kind of something we just stumbled upon but it had really pretty gardens in the middle!
We went to the Port Olimpic by the Mediterranean Sea, and walked by the Barcelona Aquarium
So we stayed here and relaxed a little while, it was actually really hot in the sun! From here we started walking back to her apartment. We walked back to her apartment via 'Las Ramblas' which is a famous street comparable to State Street but with more people, more stands and more street performers. It was really, really fun. We found the famous market right off of Las Ramblas and it was AMAZING! There was a ton of fresh fruit and vegetables and unfortunately, meats! There were skinned rabbits, pig feet, etc. etc. However, there were delicious-looking chocolates that evened it out! I got a fresh kiwi-pineapple smoothie, pineapple, strawberries and an organic enchilada-type dish. Soooooo good!!! We went and sat in the Plaza Catalunya and ate lunch in the sun. So perfect :-) Then, we walked back to her apartment and waited for Tracy to arrive!! Here are some pics from the afternoon:
Tracy arrived that night! She pretty much hadn't slept in 24 hours due to her long flights and layovers. So although we had though about trying out Barcelona nightlife we decided instead to make dinner at Leah's and go and see a fountain and light show at the Font Magic! I tried uploading a video but it's not actually working unfortunately, I will show you some pictures instead.
The next day we went to Parque Montjuic. It's a park near the sea that is basically on a hillside. It's where the 1992 Olympic Games took place and there's a gorgeous view of the whole city up there!
Since my flight was at 6pm we went back to Leah's apartment after this, made lunch and then I left for the airport! I was definitely sad to leave them but I always look forward to going back to Seville! Plus, Tracy was coming to Seville on Tuesday to see me!
I got to the airport, found out my flight was delayed 45 minutes and then to just top off my airline experience when we landed in Seville the walkway was broken so I had to sit on the plane for half an hour until they could get some stairs over to us so we could get off!
So the flights didn't go well, but all in all very excellent weekend :-)
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