I’m currently in Lyon France, but more to come on yesterday’s travels soon 🙂
Barcelona has started to feel easier to get around. While I still don’t know much Spanish or any Catalan (though I am told Catalan is less commonly used), things no longer feel completely alien to me and I feel confident getting around.
My first goal for the day was to get coffee with Declan, a friend I’ve known for a couple of years. They used to live in Portland, but moved in September to Barcelona for a graduate program in stop motion filmmaking, which cost them a whole $10k (for tuition). Walking to the coffee shop would have taken over an hour, so I finally braved Barcelona’s public Metro system. After a few fumbles (trying to put the ticket in the wrong way, then going the wrong direction for a stop till I realized I was getting further from my destination), it was easy!
I kept using the metro system and (I think) ended up taking it a total of about 6 times over the next day and a half. It was clean, fast, easy to navigate, and felt pretty easy despite not being able to understand any of the announcements.
I forgot to get a selfie with Declan 😦 but I did snap a photo of this vintage scooter! It looks a lot like a clone of the Vespa P200E.
Declan showed me their school’s studio where they’ve been working with their classmates on their final project – a stop motion movie about a little clay boy inside a cave created from his mother’s body. They showed me the puppet itself, and the different heads, expressions, and such that can be swapped or moved – and then the actual set itself. I wish I’d taken photos, but I was too busy to think of it.
After parting ways with Declan (they’re a busy grad student!) I headed to Parc de la Ciutadella, a large park with a bunch of old buildings (including a couple of greenhouses), a fountain, and a pond that you can paddle around on with ducks (for 30 minutes, after paying 7 euro).
There I met up with Ronan, a friend I made while in Barcelona. I thought when I met him that I’d found someone who could show me around – but it turns out he’d just moved from Ireland two weeks before! So we decided to explore more together.
At this point my camera died, and I hadn’t been able to charge the backup battery – so the rest of the photos from today are on my phone.
Josh had recommended La Boqueria, a street market in the (Gothic quarter?) – one of the sections of Barcelona that is very old, so we went to check it out after we finished walking around the park.
The gothic quarter was really cool – a lot of what you imagine when you think of old europe – narrow cobbled streets with shops on all sides and buildings leaning in over the top. A lot of it was pretty touristy and crowded, but nonetheless neat to see.
Once in the market, we both started to get a little hungry (it was past lunch time). There was a lot of seafood, fresh fruits and vegetables, and empanadas.
There were a ton of stalls with fresh juice in small plastic cups for 2.50 euro each – after hunting for a bit, Ronan and I found one selling them for only 2 euro, and we each got one. I got a strawberry coconut. I also got a spanish sausage empanada, and a bag of (deliciously crunchy) green grapes.
After this we checked out a nearby cathedral that was an easy walk:
At this point we were both a bit tired, so I went and checked into my hotel for a small rest.
The hotel had a pool on the roof – the view was great, but the pool wasn’t heated, so I didn’t get to go swimming.
Dinner was a couple more empanadas I picked up from a nearby stall on my walk back to the hotel, and then I turned in early since tomorrow was my next travel day.
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