So after class on Friday we went home, showered and packed for our weekend adventure to Barcelona. Knowing we didn't want to miss the bus this time, Tara let me make us leave as early as I wanted. Thinking our bus left at 3:00, I decided 2:00 would give us plenty of time to go to our favorite bakery for a bocadillo and walk to the bus station. When we arrived at the bus station at 2:35 I looked at my ticket and read that our bus was actually not scheduled to leave until 3:40...and Tara knew the whole time but didn't want to be in charge of time. So we waited in the beautiful sunshine for an hour. Once we got on the bus and sat down the bus ride was very enjoyable. We even had two really loud men sitting behind us that were playing games, taking phone calls amd smoking in the bathroom. The ride took about 7 hours including a half hour stop. When the bus stopped we grabbed our backpacks and walked into the station, later finding out we got off at the wrong stop.. Once we figured out which way our hostel was we hit the metro and were off!
Our first stop in all new places it seems is a pizza place. Pizza must be a comfort to us bevause it is always the first food place that seems logical to stop into. The pizza we had was far from extraordinary but the service was great and the waiter even told us which way to walk to our hostel. Once we found it and went inside we were pleasantly surprised. The guy showed us around and then told us we could use the wifi, computers and printers for free as well as all of the kitchen supplies. There was a ton of juice for us to drink and yogurt, muffins, croissants and toast for breakfast. We both brought towels with us, which was unnecessary because we had a towel, a pillow and a comforter on our bed waiting for us. The whole place was really clean and it was way less sketchy then our last hostel experience.
As you know from our London experience we are expert metro travelers. The metro in Barcelona was no different and we maneuvered through the huge city easily. Saturday we got up had breakfast and then Ericky (hostel guy) showed us where we should go while staying in Barcelona. First, we took the metro across town and then walked up levels and levels of stairs, sidewalks, and okay escalators too..until we reached the top of Park Guell. Here you could see the whole city below and it was truly beautiful. There were a lot of people around and it had a large population of trees surrounding the hill. After hitting some shops we took the metro back to another part of town. Here we spent the day walking around this huge area. First stop was lunch and then walking around a big mall. We saw the Museo Nacional d'art de Catalunya, Torre de Calatrava, Palau Sant Jordi, Estadi Olimpic, took a sky trolley to Castell de Montjuic, and finished that area with a fantastic light and water show at Font Magica de Montjuic. Basically we saw some cool buildings, walked into the stadium where the 1992 Olympics were held and jammed out to Disney music in Spanish while watching water do tricks. It was a great day. After this we went down by the beach for an ocean front dinner. We shared paella and a bottle of white wine, it was superb.
Sunday we first went to the Sagrada Familia, a huge church in the city. It was so amazing. The outside and the inside were incredible and it was well worth the time in line as well as the ticket. There was mass going on downstairs and areas where you could go and pray as well. After this we walked around some more and found lunch. The next few hours were spent at Las Ramblas. A really long street full of vendors. We both bought Barcelona jerseys and had delicious gelato. We spent an hour on the docks basking in the sunlight and watching and old man feed the seagulls. After walking up and down the roads and seeing all the museums and buildings Ericky said we should see we walked back to our hostel and got our stuff together. We had a really interesting dinner, Tara had carbonara, "ain't like mama fixed it," I had a tortilla de patata sandwich and until this night I didn't know you could make a bad batch of tortilla de patata. We all learn the hard truths sometimes. Barcelona was a really great city, it is a definite place to visit and spend a week but we are still 100% happy we chose San Sebastián as our city to study in for the semester.
We have a really busy week ahead of us. We both teach this week, we have a presentation on Tuesday and our final for our second class this Friday. Our roommate Dylan's family is coming to visit as well so we will probably hang out with them. We will also be finalizing spring break plans because the countdown is on...18 days! Did we mention we bought our tickets for Disneyland Paris!?
Until next time,
Tara and Taryn
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