Flying solo to Barcelona!

Well it is finals week at the fund (which doesn't actually mean very much), but I have enough to do to keep me busy all day... or at least to keep me feeling guilty if I'm not studying. Barcelona was already ONE WHOLE WEEK AGO, and I have not yet blogged about it. I usually like writing about a trip right after I get back and it's still fresh in my memory, but I was behind already, and I was so busy this past week that anytime I thought about writing a post, I felt guilty (again) and decided to work on a paper or do homework. Such a good student, right? I have decided that I have studied enough in the past few days to give my self a blog-break.

Barcelona was just a fantastic weekend. It came after probably the roughest week I've had here, and it was the perfect, most relaxing way to just take a few days off and have fun! Here's why:

1. Except for Paris, this was the only other weekend where I made my own travel plans and booked my flight, so instead of just going for the best dirt-cheap flight out there that means you have to sleep in an airport and you only actually have 1 1/2 days in your city... I actually planned this out way in advance, and waited for the optimal flight that was reasonably priced, yet gave me 2 1/2 days in Barcelona! No rushing from site to site, no sleeping in airports.

2. The weather was amazing. When I left Toledo on Thursday it was maybe in the 50s, sunny... and that's pretty nice. All weekend in Barcelona it was sunny and in the 60s! In late November! That's crazy.

3. PAIGE SCHAEFER. I believe Paige has made a guest appearance on the blog before... she is my friend from high school who is studying abroad in Granada, Spain right now. We briefly met up earlier in the semester when I went to Granada, and we will be traveling together again in Italy after our programs end! It was so great to see Paige again and just hang out with her all weekend! 

Bike tour with Paigey!!! 

A few great things about Barcelona:

Our hostel: we stayed in a pretty cool hostel that had a kitchen in which we could make our own meals (can you say MONEY-SAVER!), and it was very social/interactive/helpful. Paige and her friend arrived the day before me and went on a free walking tour through the hostel. The next day we went on a bike tour through the hostel that was SUPER COOL. We were able to hit up a bunch of different locations in just one afternoon, our guide was australian and super funny, we stopped and had wine and tapas, and we were getting exercise! It doesn't get better than that! The hostel also showed us what the nightlife was like and on Friday night Paige and I checked out Barcelona's hottest new club: Hyde (I hope you said that in the Stefon voice... if not, we should perhaps revaluate our friendship). And we just met a ton of cool people around the hostel and on tours and such. 

Passing the beach on the bike tour... no big deal.

Gaudí: Antoni Gaudí was an architect who was kind of a big deal in the Catalan Modernista movement. He has a bunch of works all around Barcelona, including what is probably his greatest/well-known work, the Sagrada Familia. Construction on this church was started in 1882, Gaudí continued working on it until his death in 1926, and it will probably not be finished for another few decades. Yes, that's right. Gaudí was also greatly inspired by nature, which he worked into many of his buildings, making them appear very unusual and different than the norm. In addition to the Sagrada Familia, we also saw Casa Mila and Casa Batlló (my favorite) on the bike tour, and we ventured to his Parc Güell on our own.

The Nativity Facade of the Sagrada Familia

Casa Batlló

Parc Güell

Wandering: Barcelona just had an awesome vibe, and it was so easy to wander around the city and find something cool to see or do. The main avenue is Las Ramblas, a big walking street that runs from Plaça Catalunya down to the harbor. It was probably really cool a while ago, but now it's pretty touristy and not that great. It was a lot more fun to take a side street and explore another neighborhood, finding a church, or a christmas market, a cute little street, an organic foods grocery store, a cool statue, etc. On Sunday Paige and her friend left early, and I had until about 2pm to myself, so I literally just packed up, strapped on my backpack (w/ belt strap), left the hostel at 10am and just walked around for 4 hours. I walked to the harbor, through a park, to the cathedral, came across some Sardana dances, a christmas/art market, chocolate con churros (okay I searched for that one), and up and down countless more streets until I forced myself on a bus to the airport.

My day alone in Barcelona... not all of my selfies were successful

Also, there was a chocolate museum. My ticket was a chocolate bar.

Chocolate museum!!!

Another one of the best things about this weekend is that I'm going back to Barcelona in 2 weeks with my mom! We kept to pretty chill, cheap things this weekend, so there were a lot of places we didn't get to: museums, inside the Sagrada Familia, Montjüic (nearby mountain), and more.

Okay, time for me to get back to studying and eating chocolate. Peace.