Mi aventura española!

“Hopping on the bus is an exercise of liberty.” –AV

So this blog is called Kyle’s European Travels, thus this weekend, I stayed true to the title and the purpose of being in Europe, I continued exploring and hopped on the bus to go to none other than Barcelona, Spain. As the capital of Catalonia, it is Spain’s second largest city with two official languages: Catalan and Spanish. Do I speak either of these? No, I do not. This adventure was something else; it was the first time I felt like a foreigner in Europe. Thankfully, I took one year of Spanish in high school, and somehow all of my vocabulary came back to me. I survived using these simple words/expressions: “Sí, no, Me gustaria..., Donde estan los baños?/ Una cerbeza por favor/ Muchas gracias, zumo de naranja.” I was very proud of myself; going to Spain proved to me that Germany will (hopefully) be a piece of cake. I hopped on the bus Friday afternoon, and after crossing the Pyrénées (the first snow-capped mountains I’ve ever seen, by the way) and a seven hour drive, I was dropped off in the middle of the hustling and bustling of the Spanish/Catalonia city at night. Now, this may be hard for some of you to understand, but instincts are amazing. For example, back home, I am terrible with directions (or at least, I use to be), after three hours in Barcelona, looking at the map, memorizing landmarks, I knew the city. You can ask me where something is today, and I bet I could tell you how to get there from my hostel. I knew that I could not get lost (because I didn’t have the ability to ask someone where I was, or how to find a certain place). My instincts kicked in and I had the city memorized in no more than three hours of being there, I was quite impressed. That’s the power of instinct for you. Saturday was my day of exploring. Did I ride a bike? No. Did I take the metro? No. Did I take a bus? Are you kidding? Did I walk? You bet your companion lost in France I did. I walked all over this city. I saw everything one could in Barcelona. I started at eight in the morning and walked all day with nothing but my shoulder bag, two cameras, and a curiosity to see what Spain had to offer me. I toured the Sagrada Familia, a huge testament to modern art, to the Spanish religiosity, and to nature. The cathedral seems to be growing out of the ground. It’s a piece of organic art that is completely unlike anything I have ever seen. Every brick, every door, window, etc., had been designed by a Catalonian architect named Antonio Gaudí. His presence in Barcelona is everywhere. It almost seems that he designed the entire city. The architecture in Barcelona is quite stunning and bizarre at the same time. You’re constantly turning your head and saying, really? I also went to an awesome garden called Parc Güell, which as far as I know, was at one time Gaudí’s residence. The garden is stunning, and it’s on the side of a mountain, even better. It offers spectacular views of the city, and the sea. It’s worth the entire trip. It’s very tropical as well: palm trees, orange trees, cactus, lilac, etc. There’s such a huge diversity of vegetation. Of course, after walking all day long, I found my way to the beach. The Mediterranean is simply amazing, and the coldest, yet clearest water. I fell asleep on the sand and woke up with my face on fire. I have a raccoon face now because I left my sunglasses on, mais c’est la vie, n’est-ce pas? Anyway, here’s a healthy round of pictures from my adventure in Barcelona. I hope you guys enjoy them, and as always, stay tuned because I am doing a lot of traveling this week and weekend to come. It’s an awesome dream, and we still have plenty of time until we wake up :) À bientôt!