Day 3

Tuesday, December 29th

As decided yesterday, we all agreed that the hop on, hop off bus was a good plan for the day. We all got up early, 8 a.m., to shower and partake of the free breakfast at the hostel, before our adventures. The free breakfast consisited of cereal, juice, biscottie, toast and coffee. It was at least something. We also got a chance to hit the computers in the lounge before the area got busy. The wifi in the hostel had stopped working, so I didn't get much use out of taking my little computer with me, this is why the posts are being done after I got home. We set out at about 9:30 a.m. and headed for the bus. It was absolutly beautiful day and the temps were great, so we purchased our tickets and got our seats on the top of the double decker. The route of the bus had 2 lines, blue and red. The Blue (Azul) line took you around the South part of the city and the Red (Rojo) line, took you around the North. The plan was to take the Blue line all the way around, about 2 hours, then transfer to the red line and get off at the cool places we wanted to spend some time at. Well, as with every good plan, we didn't stick to it. After about 1/2 of the blue line, we got off in the Plaza de Catalunya, a very busy Plaza with lots of people and excitement down the side streets. We stopped at Hard Rock Cafe to see what the New Years Eve entertainment would be. I was appaulled at the price of 140 euros per person!!!! That over $200 dollars, WOW! That option was emidiately removed from the list. It did include dinner, but I wasn't willing to spend the money, let alone ask the other 3 people in the group to do it, they were on stricter budgets then I was. After that shell shock, we left and went on a little tour of some alley ways. They were quiet charning and I was surprised to see little stores and thing and cafes in these allies. We walked a few blocks and found a neat little antique market, that Andrew and Alex loved, me and Kyle found it cute for a few minutes, then went and sat on some stairs. We thought we were at Gaudi's Church, la Sagada Fimiliar, but instead we were at the Cathedral de Barcelona. It was gorgeous and we walk all the way around the inside. Once finished with the cathedral, we decided it was time for lunch. Since we were not going to go to Hard Rock for New Years Eve, we decided to go there for lunch. It was a smaller Cafe, but still cool, yet I forgot the gift cards I had received for Christmas, so I didn't purchase my normal t-shirt and glasses, at least not on this trip. Lunch took a little longer then expected, so we jumped on the Red line bus and headed over to la Sagrada Familiar, what an amazing place. Gaudi is the architectural artist of this building and in his lifetime, he never got he opportunity to finish the church, so it is still under construction, but still awesome to see. His buildings, which includes an apartment building, were all inspired by nature and mainly by the movement of the Mediteranian Sea, so they are very odd and round. I have a buch of pictures of couse. We didn't spend to much tme here, but I did get a chance to buy some souvenirs, which are really cool and are very Gaudi-esq. Once finished, we were back on the bus, headed to a park by Guadi, Park Guell. It is an amazing botanical area, that continues to show off his ideas of art in architecture. It has many little intricacies and we tried to explore as much as we could. Rain began to fall as we were leaving the park and we had to attempt to catch the bus again; along with almost everyone else that took the tour that day. I think it took us 2 or 3 buses coming by on the route to have space for us and it ended up being on the top deck. We got pretty wet and it was now getting dark, kinda funny actually. Instead of us heading back to the hostel, we decided it was time to jump back onto the blue line and finish the tour; I wanted to see Moutjuic, a large hill at the South West end of the city. It was the area that most of the Olympic stadiums were from the 1992 Olympics. It was a fantastic place to see the city at night and although we didn't get a chance to jump off the bus and explore a little, I'm very glad I go to see it. By the time we got back to the beginning, the rain had stopped and we had a nice walk back to the hostel. Once we got a little dryer, it was time for dinner. We asked at the front desk about a good place to eat, this is where we met the activities director Simon. Simon was born in Tokoyo and then lived in New York, had worked in another hostel last year and had recently come to "Hello BCN" to start up their activities department. He told us of a little dive bar place that served good foor, local beers and was super cheap, so we jumped on it. Just a couple block from the hostel, I don't even remember the name of it, but it was really good, I had some turkey dish. We then all decided it was time to call it a night, we are going to head North tomorrow for a town called Figueres, where the Salvador Dali Museum is; Simon gave us all the details for this too, haha. If I hadn't mentioned it, he was super cute and I had a little crush, pretty funny!

Adios for now!