Bar-TH-elona

The second largest city in Spain is like a mosaic. A plethora of colors, shapes and sounds provide the background for a place that is truly bursting with life. As this past weekend was the first trip we organized independently of school, we were fortunate to find ourselves in a location with as much excitement as Barcelona (pronounced Bar-TH-elona by locals...and those in the know!)

Friday after class we hastily grabbed our backpacks and booked it to city hall to catch our bus to the Nice airport. (Disclaimer - in this post "we" means a group of 4-8 girls as we went with some of our fellow AIFS students) To our surprise, the plane to Barcelona was slightly larger than a greyhound bus. We joked that it was our own private jet but that was just to cover up the trepidation we felt. Relieved - we landed in Barcelona at 4:30 in the afternoon. From the city center, Plaza de Catalunya, we navigated the unfamiliar streets to find our hostel - Gothic Point. GP is known for being a "backpacker friendly" hostel. This means that A) They have covered the walls with graffiti art to appeal to a younger generation & B) Taking a shower is at each individuals discretion. Despite the odd and unfamiliar smells, we absolutely loved hosteling and can't wait to do it again.

The first night in Barcelona was spend exploring the many shops on La Rambla. We found ourselves at an amazing market, La Boqueria, that had endless stalls of fruits, meats, veggies and candy. It was a colorful and beautiful site. After a few more hours of navigating the architecturally beautiful side streets of Spain, we returned to our hostel to get ready for dinner. Now, in Spain, locals don't eat dinner until really late at night. By this time it was 10:30 and we thought it would be safe to appear at a restaurant, fashionably on time. Even though we had one of the BEST meals ever (tapas and Sangria), we learned that it was still pretty early to be eating dinner. The remainder of Friday was spent finding a hot night club to go to; after all, that's what one does in Spain. Our hot night club ending up being a bar, located in a wax museum, decorated to look like a forest. The wax figures surrounding the bar were a bit creepy, but we just laughed it off and ended up having a good time.

Saturday, we joined a tour group sponsored by our hostel. Our guide led us to some of Gaudi's most famous architectural sites. We saw a house he constructed for a wealthy Spanish family and one of the most expensive apartment complexes in Europe. The highlight of the tour was La Sagrada Familia. A massive church that has been under construction for over 100 years and is still not near completion. The complicated design and sheer size of this structure is completely breathtaking. Having walked for two and a half hours, we were relived to take a bus to Parc Guell. This park was intended to act as a gated community for Barcelona's elite. Instead, tourists come to enjoy some of Gaudi's most outrageous/fabulous designs. The park also houses the longest bench in Europe!



Starving and exhausted we enjoyed another meal of tapas near our hostel. Here we learned that in Spain you ARE NOT supposed to wait for everyone to get their food to start and eating & you HAVE TO ask for the bill at the end of the meal or your waiter will leave you hanging for a very long time. Lesson learned. After lunch we shopped. And shopped. And shopped. Barcelona is famous for having some of the funkiest style at the best prices. It was definitely a relief [from Cannes] to walk into a store that wasn't Chanel or Louis Vuitton. After shopping we siesta'd from 8-9:30. Being Valentine's day we wanted to do something fun for dinner and found ourselves on the candlelit terrace of the Dali museum. Despite the meal being super Americanized, the ambiance was quite enjoyable. Saturday night was spent attempting to dance the night away in a Spanish club. The atmosphere was really fun, but we learned that we are not true locals. As most Spaniards party all night long, we gave up around 4AM and retired to our hostel.

Getting up early the next day to check out, we carried our luggage around the city before it was time to go to the airport. After our excruciating initiation into the backpacker's lifestyle in London, Barcelona was a breeze. Even though we spent 45 minutes in the airport trying to locate our terminal, our newly developed spines of steel, didn't let us down. Our flight home was at 2:30 in the afternoon and to our horror, this plane was even smaller than the first.

Safely back on solid ground we gave thanks for the fun-filled and pick-pocket-free, 43 hours spent in Barcelona. We also took a second to marvel in the idea that we had just left Spain to return home to Cannes, France. It's a crazy concept that we are still getting used to, and the second that we do - we probably don't deserve to be here.

Hope you're all well!

-MoffTar