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A day in Barcelona... no sleep required
Entry 23 of 27 | show all | print this entry |
The alarm stuck 7:15, Dan and i had somehow packed the night
before in a "haze". Our packing style was pretty unique because we
couldnt take anything more then a carryon bag. Lets just say we barely brought
anything. I used my large new nice hiking bag and just prayed that the ryan air
officials couldnt see it/didnt care. Our taxi was waiting outside right at7:45,
we werent... we were still running around throwing stuff in bags and making
sure we all had passports and money. The guys were finally ready and we were
off... Dan, jake, pierre, and myself. 3americans and a French boy, great mix. It
was pouring rain and the streets flood here... bad, they have no drainage
system and things are alittle 16th century style. We got stuck in morning
rushhour and on a couple of closed roads because of the water and flash
flooding. We ran into the airport, grab ryanair's cheap booking tickets and
jumped on our plane. Everyone passed back out(i wrote and ate a breakfast i had
made for myself the night before). The flight was an hour long and in no time
we had landed, found the busses from Girona(where ryanair bases their flights for
Barcelona because the main airport is too expensive to land at) to
Barcelona(2hour bus ride). We had pulled into the main bus terminal by 1pm,
locked our bags in security lockers and we were off to explore the city. We had
nothing but some water, money, a couple hours worth of sleep and an alarm for
5am to get a bus to the airport. We decided that sleeping wouldnt be worth it
and we were just going to stay up all night long.
Within 5minutes of the bus station you can see the Barcelona Zoo, The arc de triomf,
park de la ciutadella, and the beach. We explored the area for about an hour
admiring an actual city(weve been stuck on malta alittle too long) and ended up
on the beach. Absolutely beautiful beach 5minutes from most of the large office
buildings, we were all in jeans(Stupid) so no swimming took place but we all
got an afternoon siesta. Just laid back, Admired a city full of beautiful
people and buildings(alex, the architecture is amazing here, absolutely
breathtaking... so modern and well thought out design, every turn revealed
another stunning building, dont worry i took lots of photos!). As we walked
along the beach, we grabbed a quick lunch... talked about the trip, how excited
we were, made a bet not to shave for a month(oops), how amazing Barce was, and
everything else 4guys could talk about. We ended up walking into a scooter
rental place and convincing eachother to rent scooters in a city we had never
been in and ride around from 3pm till 8pm. We worked the sales lady down to
10euros a pop and in no time we were on two seperate scooters( i made the
decision to sit on the back with pierre because he was french and owned one,
jack sat with dan who has driven scooters in Vietnam and laos... hard
decision). We all had huge smiles on our faces(i mean comeon we were guys,
jumping on scooters to see Barcelona!), even myself(who knew the dangers of
getting on one of these things. Anyways, dangers aside and laughing alittle to
myself seeing my parents faces', we were off, we wanted to visit the Olympic park
on the top of one of the hills in barce... We had to navigate our way across
the city(jake's job.... literally sitting on the back of the scooter yelling
directions to us), all the way taking photos(my job...) and not get us
killed(dan and pierre's job, pierre alittle less so then dan; who within
5minutes of being on the scooter yelled ive never done something so crazy, my
response: but you did this in laos?!? dan: yeah, not a major city). So after
some nice sight seeing, we got up to the Olympic village, and were alittle
taken back by the size of it... must of been an amazing summer Olympics, too
bad i was 5, and the views from there of the city were just breathtaking!
I had been trying to get in touch with my close friend from UVM all day long, i
had told him online that i was coming to the city for a night and i wanted to
meet up. I finally got in contact with him, talked to him for 3minutes and
talked about meeting up later that night, used up like 5euros of jake's
vodafone credit but it was worth it. We pulled out a map, picked a couple more
sights we wanted to see (Barcelona Football club, barcelona cathedral, and a
couple of other sights) and started off. We would drive for a little bit and
then stop, check out an area and jump back on. The scooters honestly gave us
the opportunity to see more of the city in an afternoon then we could of any
other way. We headed back to the shop, dropped them off around 8 and headed off
to grab some food. We found a really nice cafe and plopped down after a long day.
I tried to figure out details of meeting up with my friend but al the phones we
eating my euros and none of the guy's had credit on their phone. We finally got
in contact with him, talked for 10seconds and made a meeting place at a metro
stop. Met up with him, hugs and catch up conversation... we headed to one of
his friend's apartments by the water. Hung around with them for a while and headed
to a bar, met another friend from UVM who i had no idea was studying in
Barcelona. We stayed at the bar till around 3:30 then headed off to the bus
station. We all fell asleep on our bags for an hour and then got the 5am bus to
the airport. Slept on some chairs for another hour or so and boarded our flight
for Brno, Chech Republic.
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