July 2016 – just meesh

The next morning we headed out to conquer Park Güell…the thing is, no one tells you that you have to get your tickets in advance and that you then have a specific entrance time…same goes for the Sagrada Familia. Also, no one told us that you can purchase tickets online ahead of time…Sooooo after we walked all the way to Park Güell and bought our tickets to go inside that afternoon. We then somehow walked from there all the way to the Sagrada Familia only to find out that couldn’t get tickets for the next day in line, you have to get them online…

At that point I was exhausted from walking and so pissed off that we couldn’t just go and see things as we pleased. It took a lot of the fun out of traveling and just became a pain in the ass because we wasted a half a day just figuring out how to “sightsee” in Barcelona.

After that debacle we got on our hop-on hop-off and got to relax and see a lot more of the city, that we hadn’t the day before. Woah, is Barcelona huge…the guide on the bus was listing all of the things you could do in different areas of the city and it was like you could easily spend a week there and still not see/do everything.

At that point we were starving so we picked up baguette sandwiches on our way back to Park Güell …I only mention the sandwiches because 1. they were incredibly delicious (pic to come) and 2. it reminded my mom of when she traveled Europe back in the 80s with my dad. …And so we proceeded to spend 20 minutes trying to recreate a photo in which my dad was eating a sandwich, only instead it was of me eating a sandwich. No, the photo did not turn out…

Okay, so we finally got into Park Güell and….don’t get me wrong it was really really cool/unique but it just wasn’t what I expected. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that my only reference point to Park Güell was how it was portrayed in the Cheetah Girls movie…but still. It was just a lot smaller than the vast openness I had expected.

After that we enjoyed the hop-on hop-off bus some more before doing some shopping around the gothic quarter, getting dinner and calling it a night.

cheers.

~meesh

For anyone that followed along during my study abroad travels then you’ll know that my favorite way to travel through Europe is by train. It only seemed fitting that as we traveled from Madrid to Barcelona that we did so by train.

We arrived in Barcelona in the early afternoon and both my mom and I were eager to get to the water, after all Barcelona is a port city. So we dropped our bags at the hotel and headed out to find the water. Our hotel was near Las Ramblas, the major street that takes you to the port so that’s where we started. We stopped for some lunch and sangria and then soon found ourselves at the water’s edge.

What better to do at that point then get on the water? So we boarded a ferry that takes you around the port and the nearby beaches. The views were stunning all around, though a bit windy it was worth every penny. And, we even got a little show as we passed by one of the many cruise ships and got mooned by one of the vacationers.

After our boat ride we (and by we I mean me) decided to head up towards Montjuic which at the top you’ll find Montjuic castle and gardens along with the Olympic stadium and a bunch of other things. Man did I put my mom through the ringer on the hike up there…I don’t think either of us where prepared for the climb, but luckily we took the Teleferic de Montjuic (aka cable car) the rest of the way up which offered incredibled views of the city and sea.

Once at the top we explored the castle until it closed and then headed down towards the Font de Montjuic to see the water/light show. On our way down we stopped at the Olympic stadium and got to see some of the plaza and arenas where the 1992 summer games where held.

Finally we arrived at the Font de Montjuic eager to see the magic fountain show, we grabbed some ice cream and settled in to await the show, which doesn’t begin until it gets dark….so here we are waiting and waiting and it’s getting darker and darker out but no show…we waited some more before we finally called it quits and headed in for the night.

Once I got wifi back at the hotel we were able to find out the show only takes place Thurs-Sat, of course we were there from Sun-Wed and of course would not be able to see the show. I guess that’s just a reason to go back someday…