A few weeks ago, I decided to book tickets to Barcelona for Chris’ birthday, so this past weekend we went on our last “3 day get-a-way” before moving back to Canada.  Brianna had exams coming up this week, so there was no way she would be able to go and study for 5 exams while touring Barcelona non stop, especially with all the travel time at either end. Luckily, she was willing to stay back and study at the apartment.  Holly, (our ‘couch surfer, colleague and friend’) offered to stay with her and oversee the studying.  Holly is our recent ‘roommate’ who we offered a ‘couch’ to because of the train strike over the past month. She would otherwise, not have been able to get to work (2 hours travel time normally for her, using 3 trains).  She works with me in Learning Support and so we were happy to help her out. We all have a lot of fun together and it has been an adventure in itself, having her stay with us! So, with this in mind, Holly (age 26) was the responsible one who had the big job of keeping tabs on Bri and trying to get her to study while we toured Barcelona with Greg.

We were excited to be celebrating Chris’ birthday in Barcelona while having a last bittersweet trip with Greg, since he will move out this August for University.   It was a really nice way to top off the memories of seven years of living in Europe (in total), with just the three of us on a mini vacation together.  So, we researched Barcelona on our way there and made plans as to everything we wanted to see or do.

{like drink the best Sangria in the world}.

There are so many beautiful sights to take in around the city of Barcelona. We planned on hitting Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, La Rambla and Casa Mila ( a Gaudi masterpiece) once we were in our Airbnb and settled. That in itself is another whole story, because I thought it would be cool to rent a yacht and sleep on a boat in the harbour for the weekend.  However, when we finally got to the boat at 10pm after dragging our luggage on 2 subways for 40 minutes from the airport and walking almost 1 km to the boat, it was much smaller than the picture appeared on Airbnb. None of us wanted to sleep under the bow of this boat, so we decided to leave the keys and check out as soon as we checked in!! We took a taxi into the city center, found a restaurant/bar with wifi right away and went to work trying to book another Airbnb for that night. We still had to pay for the boat for the one night, but it was worth paying double to be in the center rather than the harbour.  In two years, that was probably our only Airbnb blooper.  🙂

We ended up staying very close to the famous square, Placa de Catalunya, right in the city center. We were on a quiet side street (Carre des Tallers) about 50m from the square and enjoyed walking La Ramblas late into the night after full days of touring in the Spanish sun. We ate dinner at about 9pm each night, outside on patios, with lots of stops during the day to snack and have drinks. The atmosphere was relaxed and electric at the same time, set in a historic city with beautiful architecture.  Antoni Gaudi was the architect responsible for the city’s many UNESCO Heritage sites which are very unique and detailed in their design.

We were amazed by the awe inspiring Gaudi village and picnicked there with a few beers and food we bought on the climb up to the park. This is where we also bought two paintings that we hope to bring back to Canada with us.  Greg was so hot, he had his t-shirt off in the park and then he was warned by a local to put it back on before the police saw him and fined him.

We wandered all over the city center reading about it’s history and soaking up the warm weather. The heat made us want to stop for drinks on patios in the many squares we passed and we ordered tapas to try everywhere we went.  There was cool sculptures and plenty of graffiti to take in as we walked the streets.

We had read about a wonderful market called ‘La Boqueria’ off of La Rambla so we ventured there one day and we enjoyed more tapas and Sangria of course!  We also stumbled across the ancient Roman Temple of Augustus that is situated behind a tapas bar we were at…It was truly amazing finding them around a hidden alleyway. The columns date back to the 1st century BC and were discovered in the 1800’s.

 

Another interesting ‘thing’ we came across was a ‘nitrogenie’ ice cream shop where they made your ice cream, or gelato, in this case using liquid nitrogen! It seemed to ‘cool’ to pass up, so we ordered one and this is how it looked as it was being made:

We spent our last few hours on the Sunday at a beach named ‘Nova Icaria’ which is where the body (metal sculpture) artwork you see above was taken.  The weather was nice and we dragged our suitcases down the boardwalk and then changed into our bathing suits in order to lie on the beach for an hour.  We played some frisbee and Greg actually swam in the ‘cold’ ocean!! Greg always want to be in the ocean no matter what time of year it is! I slept on the beach while he and Chris walked up to the pier, only to realize that entire end of the beach was a fully nude beach. Greg found it disturbing to say the least. We had a good laugh when they woke me and told me.

Overall, we covered a lot of ground and made the most of our 3 days, yet it was all very relaxing! I will never forget the inviting architecture and beauty of Barcelona! The hot weather, made it a great start to our summer and a nice way to celebrate Greg graduating from grade 12 in Paris!