Barcelona Day 1

Barcelona

Wowie! Barcelona was definitely an experience. Never have I (Michelle) visited a city so rich in culture yet so paradoxical - religious focused yet secular, large city yet still slow paced, amiable and helpful people yet the number one pick pocket prone city in the world. Oh Barcelona… we spent 5 days in the city and those 5 where no where near enough….
Day 1

Michelle and I arrived into barcelona on the overnight bus at around 730am into Barcelona Nord. From there we took the metro from the red line to the green line and bought a 10 ticket metro pass (7.70 Euros). We didn´t get too lost getting to Saint Jordis Arago, and we were allowed to rest and take showers before checking into our rooms. When we did, we took a nap till about 12 and got up to eat. Our room was a pretty roomy room for 7 and I felt the bunk beds had more space inbetween the top and bottom bunk compared to the other hostels we stayed at. There are only 4 rooms in this hostel with at most 25 people. It´s a nice sized hostel to meet people without feeling overwhelmed. Another person in our room just checked in as well and tagged along with us for food and siteseeing. We found this cafe near our hostel called cafe 7? I had the tortilla with tuna on a baguette with cafe con leche and michelle had the ham and cheese tortilla on a baguette with an oj. The portions were really big for the price (around 3.5 Euros) and I was able to eat the other half for dinner.

We then when on an adventure and went up to Parc Guell, where you can see a 360 view of Barcelona. We took the metro to Vallecarca and then we were suppose to walk up the hill (comparable to a SF hill). But, we were lazy and they just installed an escalator most of the way up. It was probably good that we took the escalator because we walked ALOT that day (I do not think I’d be going out on a limb to say that they probably installed the escalator for the lazy American tourists). At the top, there was this shady guy who sold Mojitos for 5 Euros and our hostelmate actually bought one. We ventured around the park to the surrounding attractions which consisted of a series of buildings which looked like something straight out of the smurfs as well as a series of benches finished with a mosaic of tile.

Afterwards, we decided to walk to Sagrada Familia. Right before we entered, we decided to get some cash since we were low. When Michelle tried to get cash out, the machine took her card! What a nightmare. But at least I have my ATM card so it was okay. (Mom don’t freak out I immediate called and cancelled my card). When we went into Sagrada Familia (which cost 11 Euros, 9 if you have a student ID) we also got the audio guide (4 Euro) and it was way worth it. There were things that I wouldn´t have thought of or looked closely at if we didn´t have the audio guide. We continued our walking journey to Plaza Catalunya to try to find a La Merce guide of all the shows that were going on the next couple of days. We also went to the supermarket so we could buy some food and snacks for the next two days. After only being able to rest for an hour, we went out again with some of the people in our hostel (10 in total) to see The Opening Procession in Placa de Sant Jaume. It was a parade with music that had huge figures of all different people, including Michael Jackson! There were also people walking with these figures and tossing confetti at the audience whenever we took pictures The group that we were with consisted of mainly Aussies, two from Wales, and one other guy from Chicago. One of the Aussies, Paul, decided to be our tour guide for the evening so we would occasionally stop and he would tell a story. Most of the time, he was totally lying but it was funny experience. He even ended up buying a Spain flag to be more tour guide-like and he got looks because in Barcelona, the Cataluyns don´t like being associated with Spain so Paul quickly tied up his flag to look like the Catalan flag! After that, we went to Chupitos (at the end of Las Ramblas) and it was so random but I saw my friend Lily from Cal Poly there! We knew we would be in Spain at the same time, but we weren´t in Madrid at the same time and I didn´t know she was still in Barcelona. She was leaving for Madrid the next day! Such a small world/coincidence!!