So it begins.
Day 1.
Mack and I wake up early, eager to start our journey on a good foot, mainly meaning not missing our flight to Barcelona. After a few quick fact checks to plan our real goal of reaching Andorra and reading the Wikipedia entry for Andorra (population: 80.000, tourists a year: 10 million) we head to the airport, and without a hitch, we are off to Barcelona.
As I have found, Ryan Air is really pretty dependable if all you need is a flight, and it has continued to be great. We touch down in Barcelona on time and head to the info desk for Andorra bus information. We decipher the schedule, bum around the airport for awhile, and board our bus to Andorra, tiny country number one of the trip.
About three hours, a car crash (all I know is that we collided with a white car, I am not sure whose fault it actually was) and a beautiful ride through the Pyrenees later, we arrive in Andorra la Vella, capital city of Andorra.
My first impression of the city? Well, it was basically a large ski resort town, with a lot of shopping. And I mean A LOT of shopping. Reason? Well, Andorra is a tax haven, meaning it doesn’t have sales tax and has a very low income tax. Good thing too, because of my customs fiasco (I will explain later), I need to shop. Winter clothes will come in handy once we get to Switzerland, I suppose. I needed a new camera, too. Thank you Tarifa, your sandy beaches are like sirens, beautiful, tempting, and deadly, to cameras at least.
So we walk through the city to actually the neighboring city of Les Escalades, locate our hotel and drop off our stuff. After a stop at a small market, we eat dinner in our room and hit the town to explore! Well, if you can call walking around staring into all the closed shops exploring, then we explored. Really, Andorra? You are worse than Spain! You close shop at 8! Fine, we will meet again tomorrow, small country.
Day 2.
Mack and I set out from the room early to take advantage of our precious time in Andorra, only to find that stores are still closed! Come on! Really? You wait until 10 to open again? And some of the stores even take siesta? How does anything get done in this country?
Well, Mack and I explore the city a little more by walking down to the old part. Honestly, if you are looking for history, skip Andorra. It turned out to be great for cheap cameras and clothes (when the stores eventually opened), but the only old building was a church, and it wasn’t too spectacular.
As I just mentioned, I buy my camera and we catch a bus to Ordino, an even smaller city in Andorra, located further up in the mountains. Ordino afforded us some spectacular views of the mountains and was really quite quaint. But after exploring on foot and hiking up a path that essentially led us to nothing but some melting snow and mud, we decide that Andorra has shown us everything it has to offer. Mack and I walk to another city, La Massana, catch a bus to Andorra la Vella, and head to Barcelona.
Notable Achievements in Andorra:
1. We walked between two cities, verifying the viability of walking across the country.
2. I bought a camera so I can document everything that is to come.
Notable Failures in Andorra:
1. They did not stamp our passport.
2. We did not get to play in the snow. The capital is in the valley, where it rained, but did not snow.
We get into Barcelona after dark and have to navigate the metro. Good thing we kind of planned most of this out. We get on our metro train toward the hostel, walk through a very cultural (read: Indian, really? In Barcelona?) and a somewhat seedy neighborhood to get to Barcelona Mar. A stop at Dia and a pasta dinner later and we are out exploring Barcelona a little before we hit the sack. Travelling really takes it out of you.
Day 3.
On our way out of our room at the hostel we are shushed by our fellow roommates. Seriously? We didn’t talk, we didn’t turn on the lights, we just made the necessary rustling of belongings finding our clothes and such in the dark. If I remember correctly, you came in at like 2 am last night, turned on the lights and talked amongst people in your group while I tried to sleep through it. Don’t be rude, asshole.
Anyways, we walk down Las Ramblas to the pillar/column/statue commemorating Columbus. Here in Spain they love the guy. Seville, Madrid, Barcelona; this guy is everywhere. As an American, I am a fan of him too, and can’t complain. He has good reason to be popular, discovering a world that was already inhabited (but by savages!) and I wouldn’t be American if not for his ballsiness of risking sailing off the edge of the flat world!
After marveling at Mr. C, we headed to the dock to check out the sea. It was nice, but to be honest, the beach in Barcelona isn’t anything special. Santander actually has a nicer beach. And, theirs is fake! Yep! Fake. Along with the palm trees that they shipped in from Hawaii, the beach was made for the 1992 Olympics by bringing in sand from Egypt. They have to dredge more sand up to the beach each year because, being fake, it isn’t supposed to be there and the sea devours the sand. We learned this fun tidbit on our tour of the city, which is what we headed to next! (segway!)
The tour took us all through the Gothic part of the city. We saw the cathedral, old haunts of Picasso (apparently hookers didn’t like his first cubism paintings of them and chased him down the street, naked and very angry), the George Orwell Plaza (under video surveillance, Big Brother is watching) and other interesting sites throughout the barrio, including Space Invaders!
It being Christmas Eve we treated ourselves to some great Indian food and went to Midnight mass at the cathedral, but which I mean, we attempted to go to Midnight mass, were apparently late for the 10.00 mass and sat through about 40 minutes of Catalan before heading back to the hostel and wishing each other a Merry Christmas, Feliz Navidad, and Bon Nadal.
Day 4. Christmas.
Where better to spend your Christmas than the Sagrada Familia? Okay, yea, the Vatican is okay I guess, but still. We slept in, walked along this one street with a few Gaudi structures and made it to the defining monument of Barcelona, Gaudi’s opus magnum of modernist architecture. With spires shooting into the air like drip sand castles and ornate sculptures depicting scenes from the bible, this church is definitely impressive from the outside. But that wasn’t even the tip of the iceberg. The building on the inside was gorgeous, with columns that looked like trees springing up, creating a canopy above. And the stained glass was super colorful and bright, making the entire building flooded with red and green and blue and orange etc light. Finally, we went up to stand between the spires on the top of the building. The view of Barcelona was beautiful. You could see for miles (or perhaps kilometers) all around.
Hours later we headed off to Parc Guell. The day turned out to be pretty Gaudi exlcusive. Parc Guell is a park that was designed by Gaudi to be a planned residential community I am pretty sure, and it lost funding so it was left as is, with a few Guadi buildings surrounded by really interesting arches and paths that make you almost feel like you are in some type of bizarre ruins.
Hungry, we head back to the hostel before going to the Picasso Museum. Mack will probably tell you, this was the worst decision of our trip, at least for her. As I got my fill of sandwiches, Mack sat on the couch in the common room, calling friends and family from home, wishing them a Merry Christmas.
Well, apparently Christmas is not as sacred as we thought, because a man comes in while I am away and asks Mack to translate some Spanish written on a piece of paper for him. We are all accustomed to strange occurrences in hostels by now, so she kindly acquiesced, leading to her ultimate downfall. The man held the paper over her lap as she tried to translate a gibberish word and as he slyly pocketed the iPhone that she had right next to her. Come on! It’s Christmas!
Clearly shaken, Mack had a minor freak out, but we managed to overcome the crisis and decide our best option was to report the theft to the police.
Great! Trip to the police station on Christmas! What could top this? Okay, yes, still the Vatican. Probably most things in this case, actually. As we stand in line to report our tourist mistake, we listen to the sob stories of countless other tourists recounting how they lost their wallet, their backpack, their camera. I couldn’t help but laugh, thinking they needed an AAesque stand where everyone could go up to and announce their mistakes, “I am a tourist and I lost my iPhone.”
Needless to say, we missed the Picasso Museum, but we did have one thing to look forward to! Shu Jian invited Mack and me to dine with him and his family later that night. Good thing! We were getting tired of the same old same old pasta.
Dinner, as those of you who know Shu Jian could expect, was enchanting. His family was lovely, the restaurant he chose was nice, and who doesn’t need a little semblance of family on Christmas?
Day 5.
Mack and I split up for the first time, to do our own things. I make the hike up Montjuic to see the castle and the Olympic buildings while Mack goes to see the history museum. After spending three weeks together, you can tell how perfect this is. I see buildings to wonder at, Mack sees historical ruins.
Again, the views from Montjuic were fantastic. I have found throughout my travels that I am a sucker for views. I have no qualms in paying 10 Euros to go up your church spire if you promise I will be able to see the entire city from the best vantage point around.
So I walked around the castle and the Olympic area for a few hours until Mack and I met up to go to the Picasso Museum. We walk all the way to the Picasso Museum and find out that IT IS CLOSED! Christmas break is a really great time to travel, except everything closes! Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, how many days off do you need! I understand that I have off, but that is exactly why you need to be open! I can’t come any other time.
Oh well, we went to the beach and walked along the coast a bit instead. We stopped by to watch some surfers take on the winter waves, too.
Eventually we head back to the hostel and eat dinner. This was our last night in Barcelona, and as I have said in earlier posts, Mack and I were looking to go out. It is here I will refer you to the quick stories about the trip I posted first.
Day 6.
Wow, two countries down and we are already on our way to Switzerland? What? I am going to miss your sunny and 55 degree weather Barcelona.
Notable Achievements in Barcelona
1. We took in Gaudi for Christmas.
2. Enjoyed some delicious Indian food.
3. Went out with a fun group of people from all over the world, and got to hear about a guy slapping a hooker.
Notable Failures in Barcelona
1. Lost an iPhone. Goodbye easy access to the internet, hello inside of Barcelona police station.
2. Missed an opportunity to see Picasso’s earlier works.
3. Showed up 40 minutes late to dinner with Shu Jian. SORRY!
No comments:
Post a Comment