Barcelona

Well, time for another late update! About two weeks ago I had the opportunity to go to Spain, and the Catalunya region in particular. So let the chronicling begin!

Day 1: I went on this trip with a guy named Jeremy because I had heard that Spain was a dangerous place. We took a later train to Munich and caught our plane to Barcelona. We got to the city pretty late, and had a forty minute train ride to the area our Hostel was in. I had directions, and it seemed simple enough. It was easy to find, at the very top of a very steep hill that seemed to stretch on forever at 12:30 at night. We finally made it to our room, and crashed.

Day 2: We woke up in time to eat breakfast, then headed out to a famous park in the city that was designed by it's most famous artist-Gaudi. The park was owned by a man named Güell, who was a patron of the artist, and even had him design his home. The park was beautiful, and we enjoyed hiking around it and seeing all the different installations by Gaudi. After taking in our fill of beautiful scenery to a soundtrack of local musicians, we headed into the heart of town to see the famous cathedral Sagrada Familia, also designed by Gaudi. We took a round-about route, taking in more of the local flair. We marveled at one of the most unusual and magnificent cathedrals in Europe, and thought it was quite the sight. After that we went to see a big building that looked a lot like the Gherkin in London, and walked a bit more around town, including the famous Las Ramblas shopping district. By this point, we were both pretty tired, because all this sightseeing entailed several miles of walking. So we got on the train back to our hostel and called it a night after once again braving what came to be known as "The Hill".

Day 3: Our first task of the day was looking for the Picasso Museum. When we finally managed to find it, it was closed! Sad! So instead we went to the Choolate Museum. I thought it was a suitable substitute. We ate some chocolate (our tickets were actually small bars of dark chocolate), looked at some amazing chocolate art, and then ate more chocolate. After filling up on that, we headed back to the shopping district to actually do some shopping. For the rest of the day we wandered around looking into interesting shops and such until we were ready to head back to the hostel.

Day 4: We both agreed that we needed a break after ll that walking, so we headed down to the beach on this day. Once we located a suitable spot(which, incidentally, involved quite a bit of walking), we laid out for a good four hours. Of course, I slathered on tons of sunscreen and did not get the least bit of color. But its okay, because pasty is my favorite color. When we were finished baking, we went straight back to the hostel.

Day 5: This was another busy day! We began by heading up to the top of Mount Tibidabo to see a huge church on it's peak. We had to take two trains, one bus, and one funicular(small, one-segment train) to the top. Once there, we paid two euro to take an elevator to the middle floor of the roof, and from there climbed to the very top of the cathedral. The view of the city from this platform was incomparable to anything we had previously encountered, and we took a lot of pictures. It was cool to see Barcelona from that point of view, because we could also see all of the surrounding countryside. When we had taken in the beauty of the Catalunyan countryside, we made our way bak down the mountain, using all of the aforementioned means of transportation. When we were back in the city, we went to the National Museum of Catalynan Art. We walked through a teeming mass of Futbol fans gathered before the biggest game of the season, and incidentally, the stadium is located directly behind the museum, so they were completely surrounding the place. Once we fought our way through, we saw some amazing art from the Byzantine era all the way up to the most modern art. When we had finished at the museum, we went back to the hostel and were in bed by 8:30. We were bushed!

Day 6: Going home! We woke up, got packed, took one last jaunt into town for a few last minute items, and then made our way back to the airport, and eventually rain-sodden Garmisch! Yay!