Day 5

Today was our free day in Barcelona, and a very eventful one!! We began our day around 9am and decided to feast on a breakfast of chocolate as the hostel breakfast was...limited and costly.  Off to the Barcelona’s amazing metro system we went via a rather convoluted route down a ridiculously high set of stairs, around corners and eventually arriving at a clearly marked metro entrance (Paris’ metro stations as mentioned being about as obvious as needle in a haystack on the moon...viewed from the earth with the naked eye...haystack being small as well).

Our first stop...the Sagrada Familia (Holy Family) which is a remarkably over the top cathedral designed by the late Antioune Gaudi and is still undergoing construction due to be completed in 2026 or so.  Absolutely breathtaking the organic nature of this structure and shear amount of sculptures adorning every face of the building.  Even the modern backdrop of construction about it could not take away from the sheer amount of awesome emanating from this building.

From there we ventured to the metro stop Cantalunya (Cata-loon-ya not Cata-lun-ya) which is the beginning of a very popular strip of road known as La Rambla famous for pickpockets but also several bars, shops, and the old city region of Barcelona with some amazing architecture.  Before exploring the old town though we stopped at the Hard Rock Cafe to pick up a souviner and after some exploration ventured off to Montjuïic to enjoy some breathtaking views of Barcelona from a fortress on the top of that hill.  The journey to the top of the hill was exhausting and Tracey nearly passed out near the top but like a champ rested for 27 seconds and pushed on (man I love her!).  Along the way there was a very nice fountain built into the hillside to view and fortunately alot of the route was shaded but that did little to combat the fatigue of bounding up the hill via the hundreds of steps and continuous hill incline (still worth it...do it if you’re there and able). We decided to take a convenient cable car down from the hill top which also offered great views of the city and was a joy to ride in as cable cars always are (at least for me as I’ve never grown up).

Now it was time for the beach.  Tracey had been looking forward particularly to the beach and after a brief inquiry with an information booth determined which metro stop and bus service would get us there the most efficiently (sun was still hot so water would hopefully be fine as well).  We made it there and ended up meeting with a few members of our tour group giving us the opportunity to change and take shifts on the beach watching over eachother’s stuff.  The water was indeed quite nice (cold to the Tracey though) and being my first experience on a proper sand beach was quite awesome indeed.  In addition the beach had an added novelty of being accepting of the topless nature of both men and women.

We stayed at the beach for a couple hours and with the last precious of sunlight approaching we departed to track down some exceptionally cheap sangria and a fridge magnet for our growing collection before heading towards another impressive work of Antioune Gaudi; Park Guell.  We attempted to get there via walking from a metro station relatively close to there.  Supposedly directions from the metro station were clearly signed but this did not appear to be the case and we found ourselves on a nearby but entirely different hill (that’ll teach me to leave my compass back at the hostle).  Wanting to conserve sunlight and the structural integrity of our feet we caught a taxi to the park.  It appeared the driver took a unnecessarily convoluted route but 6.50 euros later we were at last at Park Guell.  Now in Park Guell, Gaudi displays a trademark style of sculpture artwork using pieces of discarded ceramic tiles in mosaic patterns.  The sculptures and supporting structures there once again were amazing.  Similarly being atop yet another hill the view of the city was spectacular and Tracey and I enjoyed sunset in Barcelona (damn our lives are amazing!).

We ended the day finding our way back to the hostel.  At this point we had been on out for almost 14 hours and having climbed two hills, countless flights of stairs and walked likely twice the distance across Windsor we were understandably tired.  Unfortunately the map given to us did not have enough detail to clearly navigate back to the hostel but after 20 minutes of futile walking every which way we encountered a group of 4 locals who happened to going the right direction.  They led us up two enormous flights of stairs and a 5 minute walk later we arrived at our hostel from the opposite direction we were aiming for.  Exhausted but more than satisfied with all we managed to see and do we showered and did our best not to wake the others in our room who had already turned in for the night (sensibly as it was midnight at this point).  A 6:30am start awaits us but Barcelona has been the highlight of the trip thus far and there is still so much to see and do!

The Force is with us.