Espana Uno

Espana!!!

Smart people pack the night before they leave for a trip. Smart people also have all required travel documents, boarding passes, clothing picked out, and plan to get to the airport sorted before they sleep. Frugal people decide it’s best to get up a bit earlier to take the very well connected public transit to the airport given the fact that their metro passes are valid on this route. Smart people set their alarm clocks so they wake up on time.

Stupid people forget to turn their alarm clocks on.

Yes, that is right; I forgot to turn on my alarm clock. I woke up at precisely 7:36 am. My flight Boarded at 8:55 am.

And so, my weekend in Spain begins.

I remember waking up so relaxed, really, the sun was shining, it was warm, but not too warm, it was like waking up on a Sunday morning, you know? Then I looked at the time and remembered that I had to go somewhere. My relaxation was shot right then and there, and I had a mad scramble to find the number a cab company, call them, get them to my house (requiring me to put forward my best Hungarian street pronunciation), and make sure I had everything I needed to go. Luckily, the reference to ‘smart people pack and pick their clothes the night before’ saved me a lot of thinking that morning.

I got to the airport at 8 33. got on the plane at 8:55 and arrived in Milan an hour later.

Had an espresso in Italy (out of a ‘take away’ plastic expression cup complete with a plastic handle), and jumped on the next plane bound for Barcelona, home of Gaudi, Picasso, Shoes (lovely shoes), and Sangria.

Barcelona was beautiful! It is on the coast of Spain and it was nice to smell the sea, and fish and inhale the clean air, see the palm trees and just enjoy the relaxed atmosphere. I met Max at the airport and we took the shuttle into the middle of the city (Place Catalunya), where our hostel was. As we approached the hostel, I heard…’jEssIEEE’ from a far. There sitting on the hostel balcony was Mi mama in a bright green t-shirt. It was very exciting to be in Spain, a country I’d always wanted to travel too, and to see familiar familial faces, but the two together was priceless.

As a note: The cheap airlines were not so cheap on the Budapest-Barcelona route, so I ended up taking a normal airline. I’d forgotten what normal service is. And what a padded seat was. It was wonderful!

So after we met up at the hostel, and chatted, caught up, and drank cervesa numero uno, we changed and went to town. Really we went to the Ramblas (I think that’s what it was called). It’s the main pedestrian drag that connects Place de la Cataluyna with the Port of Barcelona. The street is actually in the middle of a larger street (the cars drive on either side of it), and it is filled with artists, souvenir stands, those people statues and a pet shop. Yes, there is a pet shop, where apparently kids take their parents to buy their little critter friends. And birds. I don’t like birds…

Anyway, we actually took some side streets and found the big market in the city centre. Barcelona, like Bpest, has a very large ‘farmers’ market too. But this one was so colorful and bright and cheery with all the fresh produce, watermelons, strawberries, figs, dates pineapples, oranges, dragon fruit, lettuce, tomatoes, asparagus, all the different colours felt like I was a candy shop. We bought some fruit for breakfast, and went on our way to another place to buy some saphron before heading to the port to visit Columbus (at the port, there is a large statue of Columbus). .

The smell of the sea was wonderful, and the cool air coming off the sea did just the trick for cooling down in the hot Spanish sun. When we were at the port we noticed some cable cars that seemed to be traveling across the whole harbour….so we went to investigate them…..after walking around for what felt like ions, we finally found proper information, jumped into a cab and drove along the sea to the cable cars, and took one across the harbour to the large mountain in the middle of the city. It was a great view of the entire city! The cable car had two other Canadian travellors, who noticed that we were all wearing Canada pins (it was Canada Day after all!) In fact there were a lot of Canadians there, wishing us a Happy Canada Day. (I also found out that the owner of one of the souvenir shops’ sister lives in Toronto, and he is going to visit her next year). When we got to the top of the mountain (thanks to the cable car!). We also had another cerversa (this time with lemon, yum!). then we went back to the Ramblas and decided to check out some of Gaudi houses near by.

Canada Day dinner night was Paella and Sangria. Yum!

For those who don’t know: Paella is a rice dish with lots of different types of sea food. Here’s a photo of david and the Paella.