Well, as promised... I haven't done a "touristy" sort of blog for a while, so this has taken a little while. A bit over a week before Easter, I thought to myself - hmm, 4 days off, I've got to do something! After moving around so much since I left Perth in September, I was enjoying just being settled in one place in Manchester. So far I’ve managed one day trip to Chester (very old Roman town), lovely day, albeit cold and grey (it was snowing!).



But 4 days deserved some action. So I browsed the internet and found the cheapest possible flight out of Manchester, which just happened to be to Barcelona.

I landed about midnight, and shared a cab into town with a nice Manchester couple. I seemed to be the only person on the plane who had to fill in a landing card at immigration, but on the plus side that meant I was also the only person to get a stamp in my passport! I didn’t get any on my trip to Europe 6 years ago, so I was pretty happy about that.

The five star hotels a la Oman and Budapest (the suite in Budapest was bigger than my flat!) are strictly for when work’s paying; this time I’d booked into a 10 bed dorm in a hostel. I hadn’t been in a hostel for many years and had forgotten some of the basic protocols. This was of course a 24 hr place (it was Spain after all), and I was a bit befuddled in the middle of the night when I paid and got my key (no euros yet for the €10 deposit, so I handed over a £20 note). This is my excuse anyway for not looking at the key properly and stumbling into the wrong room. So picture me tiptoeing around this very dark room, listening to 9 people sleeping and searching for one empty bed, stumbling over bags….

Eventually I found one bed that didn’t seem to have a person in it, although it still had linen on it. By this stage I was exhausted and didn’t care much, so I just stripped it off, threw mine on (although I’d lost the pillow case somewhere on the way up and so had to use the top sheet in a very complicated arrangement) and fell asleep instantly. Luckily no one turned up to claim that bed!

Anyway, all sorted the next day and I ended up seeing lots of people come and go over the 6 nights I stayed in Barcelona. French, Portuguese, lots of Spanish (they tour their own country quite a bit seems), naturally some Americans and just as naturally no Brits. I don’t know where all the people on the plane went, but generally all the English I’ve met are strictly sun chasers. I showed the girls in the office a picture of Floreat Beach in Perth and none of them understand why I ever left!

It’s taking me a while to get to talking about the actual touristy bits, but then lots of people have been to Barcelona. Like them, I tramped many miles around the Gothic Quarter (the old part with tiny winding streets, apartment balconies almost touching, atmospheric late night bars appearing in odd corners)...

then travelling from La Rambla (the tourist trap main promenade)

down to the sea (where the architecture was a bit different)

and back past Plaça Catulunya (after visiting a few museums - there was really only one sort of art in the old days

through to the Eixample (tracking down all of Gaudi’s astonishing works, gaping in amazement at Sagrada Familia)

,

many, many miles through the Gaudi designed Park Guell (in an attempt to escape the veritable river of people flowing from the station to the main attractions I managed to get utterly lost),

up to the mountain (do you remember that amazing flaming arrow? well here’s the Olympic cauldron. Looked bigger on tv!)

to watch the sunset over Barcelona…



This was a beautiful church, one of the oldest in town. I was particularly struck by the way this window stood out from the others.



A particular highlight was the trip to Girona, where I met up with a colleague back home for Easter. He gave me the grand tour, a pleasant escape from the much bigger Barcelona.

Plus I got a trip to the beach near his home town of Loret Del Mar (a famous beach town) – and there were gum trees! I got a bit nostalgic at that, they were the east coast sort I grew up with too. They grow really well in Spain, but apparently are a big nuisance. Miquel, who used to clean pools as a student (and yes, he’d heard all the jokes) said they turn the water very acidic if there are any nearby.

Well, whatever, after a lovely day and sunset over the secret cove...



I caught the (cheap compared to UK) train back to Barcelona.

And then there was the food. Ah, the food. I probably took more photos in La Bouqueira (the fresh food market) than I did of everything else. Let’s just say it was a good thing I was doing all that walking.