Last week 8 of us took a trip to Barcelona, a 12 hr bus ride that left at 5:00 Thursday and got back at 6:00 am Monday. When we first got there we headed straight for a coffee shop, then down to the beach for sunrise. It's a good thing we did too because that was the only cloud-free part of the day. Sean, Ginny and I were the only ones that came on the bus--the others flew but that didn't work out too well because they had to be at the bus station at 3 am Sunday morning to get back to the airport for their flight. That's the problem with RyanAir-the airports they use are usually out of the city, but with the bus we went straight into down town.

We walked along the beach to the Olympic Village and ate breakfast at a little café. After that we walked to the hostel and they let us check our bags until we could check into the room. They didn't really feel up to much else but I did, of course, so I headed off to see the Futbol Club Barcelona stadium "Camp Nou." Along the way I checked out the Royal Palace and Plaza de Toro, a couple cathedrals, and the architecture of a couple neighborhoods- Poble, Hostafrancs and Sants.

At the stadium I took the museum/complex tour. The stadium has a really interesting history and so does the club. Spanish isn't the primary language there -they speak Catalan which sounds like a mixture of Spanish, French and German, but I couldn't understand much- and the people are very serious about maintaining their own identity, and the F.C. Barcelona is a source of great pride. And it doesn't hurt that they're #1 in the league right now either, with another win last night.

After that we met up at the hostel- great location, on a plaza off Las Ramblas, the main road from downtown/the port/Christopher Columbus to the other side of town. We got beds in a room for 20; it was the last one available. 17E/night but it included breakfast and dinner, we each got a locker and 20 mins/day of internet access for free. We met a lot of different people—from different places and just plain different too. A girl who just graduated from high school in Canada was travelling with her boyfriend for 4 months around Europe, a guy from Australia who had made the hostel his home for the last month, and of course groups of Americans too.

That night we ate on the plaza and walked through the Gothic quarter later that night. The next morning I got up early and headed out to the Park Guell. Along the way I stopped for Café con Letche y pastels, tried to get in on a bocce ball game (but it was tournament play, unfortunately, and the 'older crowd' was taking it pretty seriously), stopped at the Barcelona Cathedral (where I went up on the roof!), and saw the buildings that Gaudi designed. The lines there were really long so didn't go inside.

Park Guell was my favorite part of the city, it was supposed to be a neighborhood with around 60 homes, all designed by Gaudi, but he never finished it. It was paid for by a businessman who wanted his factory workers to have a nice community to live in. Today there's one house that's been turned into a museum with his work, and you can walk around through the ridiculous maze of grottos and bridges carved into the hillside. There's really no way to describe it, you have to check out the pictures.

After that I made my way to La Sagrada Familia, the Cathedral that Gaudi started in the late 1800's that they're still working on today. This was packed too, so I walked around the outside and went to a couple other monuments. I came back during siesta when there was hardly anyone around—that was nice. Again, you just have to look at the pictures. It was awesome. And there's a museum that tells all about his research into the shapes, methods, and all the symbolism he incorporated into the building. The one bad thing about the city was that it was pretty polluted, there was a haze of the city even when the sky was clear, so I didn't go up into the towers because the view wasn't that great anyway.

From there I took the metro to the other side of the city, to the Olympic complex, palace, and Montuic Castle. I got up to the castle just at sunset, which was perfect because I could see the city lights better. The city has grown out on all sides of the mountain, so I walked around the battlements before heading down. I didn't really know how to get off the mountain, but I knew down was the right direction so I followed trails that were sloped. There was a huge crowd of people outside this hotel on the mountain side with horns and bells going crazy; Real Madrid was staying there before their game later that night and the crowd had been waiting a couple hours for them to get on the bus. I hung around for a little while but we were meeting up for dinner so I didn't get to see the team.

Later that night we went to see the monuments lit up, but they had all already shut down for the night.La Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family) is lit up with colors and there's a fountain in front of the palace that has a big show, but we missed both.

Sunday morning I got up early again for the Catalan Mass at the city Cathedral. I thought the choir was good… couldn't understand a word they said but they sounded good to me! Then I went to the Maritime Museum before catching the bus home.

Our 'friend' was on the bus with us again, but this time he had headphones for his phone and he went right to sleep. On Monday after class I took a 5 hour siesta. That wasn't my fault though, I asked Sara to wake me up for lunch and she never did. And when I woke up I definitely thought it was the next morning and went to eat breakfast… some things don't change haha.