Barcelona

I had an amazing birthday. Definitely the best twenty-first birthday I could have asked for. The hotel I stayed in that first night in Barcelona was perfect. I had a great morning birthday workout in their gym followed by the biggest and most delicious buffet breakfast. I had eggs, roasted veggies, waffles, fruit, yogurt, toast, fresh OJ, coffee and more. I took the free hotel shuttle into the city of Barcelona around five and walked about a half mile to my hostel, the Sant Jordi Mambo Tango Hostel. We were all a little skeptical of whether a place with that name actually existed. It did! I checked into our mixed gender eight-person room and met a few of the other people Kat and I were to share bunks with. There was a Finnish man, a Portuguese grad student, an older Asian, and a couple of others, all men, which was weird but they were nice and quiet at least. We were lucky enough to have one other girl in the room, a recent graduate who was travelling through Europe for six weeks.

My 21st birthday!

Christopher Columbus

Kat arrived shortly after and we met up with my friend, Ryan, from DIS and a couple of his friends from home, one of whom is living and studying in Barcelona. We all went out to dinner and had lobster paella. We then went to the friend’s apartment and then to a club downtown for my big twenty-first. It was a lot of fun and couldn’t have asked for a better birthday. Thanks for making it so special everyone!

My favorite park in Barcelona

The next day Kat and I were up early. We hit the beach, running into our friend Nikita from DIS along the way. She joined us for the rest of the day. The beach was great but the solicitors were awful! Every five seconds someone would be in your face trying to sell you beer, mojitos, towels, sunglasses, massages, henna tattoos and more. The palm trees and Mediterranean were beautiful but I hated being constantly attacked by those people. Restaurants were like that too. Maitre d' would wait outside and practically grab you off the street to eat at their restaurant. That’s one reason I was very happy to leave Barcelona.

Triumphal Arch

After the beach, we walked to this gorgeous park. It was one of my favorite places in the city. From there we walked to the Triumphal Arch before meandering back to our hostel. That night Nikita, Kat and I went to dinner on the waterfront. It was the worst food, though, and the waiter wouldn’t let me order what I wanted and he was super pushy and tried to serve us more expensive things that we didn’t want. He was awful. I found that most restaurants in Barcelona have no concept of service.

We attended mass on Easter Sunday

On Monday, Kat and I enjoyed a free two and half hour walking tour of the Gothic District. We learned so much and took some great photos. Our tour was followed by a delicious tapas lunch. Tapas are huge in Barcelona and are basically lots of little plates of appetizers that you share. Afterwards, we hiked up to the 1992 Olympic sight. We saw the torch, the stadiums and all the venues. We then continued walking through beautiful gardens and up this huge mountain. At the top was an old fort from the seventeenth century, Montjuic Castle. It was used as a defense mechanism and was in use through a lot of the 20^th century too. It played a big part in the Spanish Civil War and many Fascist rebels were murdered here.  It is on a cliff overlooking the water so we had some gorgeous views of the water and city. Hannah and Stephanie arrived from Copenhagen that night and we all went out to eat with our friend, Nicole, from the hostel, Nikita and her friends from U Maryland.

 

Hannah, Stephanie, Kat and I went on the Gaudi walking tour on Tuesday. What a crazy architect! His designs were amazing. The first two pictures are of his houses, the next two are of the church, Sagrada Familia, and the last two are in Park Guell. I want to live in one of those houses in the park.

 

Stephanie, Kat, Hannah and I

I want to live in one of these houses - It's like Disney World's Blizzard Beach! 

Kat left Wednesday morning for Madrid and the rest of us moved to our new hostel in the nicer parts of Barcelona. Not only were we surrounded by Valentino, Armani and Dolce & Gabbana, but the hostel looked like a palace. It was newly renovated and absolutely gorgeous. We had an entire room to ourselves and I even got to sleep in a double size bed! Hannah and I spent the rest of the day at the beach and for my last night in Barcelona, we had an amazing dinner of tapas, followed by my favorite… McDonalds McFlurry.


Thursday night I met up with Nikita and her friends from Maryland and the five of us flew to Dublin, Ireland. We landed at 12:15 AM. The rest will come in the next post!