Vicki Cristina Barcelona…with more tourists

The night before we departed for Barcelona we watched the film “Vicki Cristina Barcelona”. We thought we had the plot figured out, and then we learned it was a Woody Allen film-and all of our expectations were shifted enormously. Anyways-it really set the bar high for a trip to Barcelona and we wanted our trip to turn out just like theirs (not). If you don’t get the joke- then go watch the movie J

Barcelona is known for its incredible architecture, beautiful location and the nightlife. And probably lots more things, but these are the important ones.

First order of business is discussing travel partners. Who you choose to travel with can make or break your trip. But more than that, you have to learn how to look past certain annoyances and go with the flow. The only way for a travel partner to “break” your trip is if you let it. Your attitude is everything and therefore the fate of your trip is in your own hands-which is the way I like it! This is just a general side note about traveling and is not directly related to my Barcelona trip. I have just been traveling with lots of different people and it is interesting to see their travel attitudes and how they deal with stress/strange situations.

I traveled with two girls for this trip-one from London and one from Holland.

Barcelona is incredible. It is everything people have made it out to be and more. It is the perfect combination of charming (from its ancient architectures), rustic (with its graffiti-ed walls), to industrious (in certain areas). The one thing I can say without a doubt that was my least favorite was the tourists. Granted, it was only in the super touristy areas where it was hard to even walk. In the neighborhood where we stayed it was rather quiet and at first we were wondering where all of the people were!

We got up super early on Friday morning to catch our flight from Nice to Paris which was, of course, delayed for 40 minutes. The flight attendants moved our seats to the front of the plane so we could make our connection. We landed in Paris at 12:40 and our flight was leaving at 12:55 (boarding at 12:25). We sprinted off the plane and ran recklessly through the airport-and ended up having to go through security because we got confused. I got patted down-and we still managed to make it on time! Although, we walked onto the plane and all of the passengers shot us death glares for being late. I sat next to a few girlfriends from New York going to Barcelona for vacation-so cute!

When we landed, we found our couch surfer, Ismail. He has lived his whole life in Istanbul but moved to Barcelona in October to get his masters in Information Technology.  He told us to buy a metro pass for 10 rides for 9 Euros. The card was perfect and lasted us the whole time! We used our 10^th ride returning back to the airport on Monday. We met a German guy who didn’t know which metro card to get and spent 3 Euros on just one pass (so we got really lucky!).

We refreshed up at his house and drank some tea and then set out for a little evening stroll around the area.

Ismail’s flat is just a few blocks from the famous Sagrada Familia so we walked over there and peeked around the area. It is absolutely breathtaking. It is completely hand carved and has taken over a hundred years to finish (it’s still not done). It was about 7pm and it closed at 8pm so we didn’t think we had time for the tour. We got lost a few times, but eventually found our way back to the flat.

Ismail decided to take us to a Turkish restaurant for dinner. I had falafel and I practiced my Spanish (and learned a few Turkish phrases-but everyone laughed at my pronunciation). There were seashells in the toilet seat in the bathroom-so that was fun.

After dinner it was about midnight and we had had a long day so we returned to the flat. I offered to sleep on the couch and boy, do I regret it. I couldn’t sleep at all, I only had a little sheet and it was freezing!

The next morning we woke up and Ismail made us breakfast of little cheese rolls, cream cheese, bread, nutella, tea, honey, etc. It was really sweet of him. We got ready and set off to explore the city.

Unfortunately, the line to the Sagrada Familia was extremely long and we ended up waiting in line for an hour and then spending about an hour and a half inside. It is absolutely incredible. I could get lost staring at the architecture inspiration and stained glass. If you can look past the massive amounts of people sharing the same experience as you, you can imagine the history and culture that stood in the same place as you a hundred years ago.

We walked into the city and saw the Arc, many street performers and the zoo. The sun was out and we were getting pretty warm-so we stopped into a little Italian (I know) place for lunch. The waiters were Italian so I felt comfortable speaking to them in Spanish because it’s not their first language either J It was a nice ambiance and we felt refreshed enough to continue “tourist-ing”.

On the topic of language, I go through language phases like people (not me ;)) go through mood swings. Since I have been studying Spanish for more years than I care to mention, I feel like I should be able to enter any Spanish speaking country and properly communicate and get around. My first day in Barcelona, I was a wreck. In my defense, the accents and expressions of Spain-Spanish are MUCH different than the Mexican-Spanish that I was taught and am used to. I felt like I couldn’t even carry on a normal conversation and I would forget easy vocabulary words.

Luckily, after that first day I continued to get more and more comfortable speaking and asking for things.

I would never in a heartbeat trade my experience studying in France for anything else, but for a moment I could imagine studying in Spain. I would have become truly fluent in my Spanish (because even after 3 days of being there I was more comfortable).

But there are tradeoffs for everything and if I was in Spain I wouldn’t be learning Arabic and French and about the fascinating political history of the Middle East.

After lunch we walked deeper into the Gothic area and were greeted by ancient buildings, enchanting musicians, and TOURISTS on every corner.  We munched on gelato (obviously) and drank fresh fruit smoothies in the covered market.

When the sun started going down we made our way to another part of town where there is a fountain/light show on Friday and Saturday nights. They are held at a large fountain outside of an incredible castle. It was probably by favorite part of the trip. You could climb all the way to the top and just look out over the city and look down at the pretty fountains. The water show was to the beat of a bunch of Disney songs in Spanish-it was awesome! Ismail joined us for the light show and then we went to get tapas afterwards.

Tapas are officially the coolest idea ever. We went to a tapas bar and they just have little “tapas” or like finger food snacks and you can help yourself to as many as you want (or your wallet will allow you to have).  After I ate 4 we decided to go to a little classy bar in the center of town.

 It was a chill atmosphere and Ismail said there are normally more young people there but with the holiday there were a lot of older tourists. After that we went to another “younger” bar with cinema posters all over the walls and popcorn to snack on. Someone asked me if I was Argentinean-how chic! When we finally left it was about 1:40 (early for Barcelona) but Claire was tired so we all decided to head back to the flat.

On Sunday morning we slept in a little bit and then went to a little café and ate croissants and tea before walking up to Park Guell. Park Guell was designed by Gaudi and built at the beginning of the 20st century. It is also a World UNESCO site.  The park (although at the top of a steep, steep hill) is absolutely magnificent.  You can see the whole city from the top of the park. It is filled with wildflowers, grassy areas, and benches to sit and contemplate. That is if you can find a quiet place away from the tourists.

We sat overlooking Barcelona and eating yummy Pink Lady apples before snapping back into the real world and heading back down into town. We took the metro to Las Rambles and walked around the streets looking at two of Gaudi’s old buildings. We stopped to eat on a patio on the street. We people-watched and ate delicious food as the sun beat down overhead. It was a particularly warm day and it was heavenly to soak up the sun and enjoy a nice lunch.

After lunch we walked to the Port area-or as I like to call it, the Tourist area. Tourists were jammed into the Port area like sardines (very fitting, I know).  We lounged on the grassy hill for awhile and then walked around and found a little band playing so we stopped to listen to them for awhile. It was a mix between Latin and hip hop and a few people started salsa dancing. It was a little slice of heaven. After this we went to a gelato place-but not just any gelato place-my new favorite gelato place ever! They had so many delicious flavors, and I only chose 2 (what was I thinking?!) Tiramisu and Banana Split. Era muy delicioso!  Despues, fuemos a un supermercado to buy some drinks for dinner (we were going to cook at Ismail’s flat). It had been a long day so we returned to the flat for a little siesta.

After we woke up we made some snacks and got ready to go out.

We experienced Barcelona’s fun and exciting nightlife on Easter Sunday, nonetheless! It was a blast. I would write more details but my mother prefers that I leave anything alcohol related out of my blog posts. So yall can forever wonder how my final night out in Barcelona really was ;)  Adios amigos!

A cute parting thought-

There is something about seeing new sights, stumbling through foreign languages, and sleeping in funny-sized beds (or no beds at all) that has a way of refreshing your mind and harmonizing your soul.