The blog picture isn't ours, we didn't upload anything yet haha. So, it was pretty much impossible to pass through France without trouble due to the stupid strike so we went BACK to Italy to take a ferry to Barcelona from Civitivecchia(?). The ferry was more like a cruise line and we had deck passage which I thought meant we got a seat(since thats what one ferry booking website said...) but we just had to hang out in the public area near the bar, restaurant and casino. It wasn't bad and I don't think there was too many people on it anyways. Oh, it was Grimaldi Lines, by the way. And even though we were deck passangers(because a cabin would have been aroun 200 euros) the staff treated us real nicely like the ones who paid more (except for the food staff, they didn't seem to want to acknowledge us...). I didn't like it at all, I hate boats, but I think Brian had a nice time. He kept wandering off to go look at things. We slept on a couch there and others did the same, it was pretty comfy once you find the right spot haha. The lunch was okay... good pasta but the french fries were not spectacular but not bad for the price. It was supposed to be a 20 hour ferry arriving in Barcelon at 6:15pm but it was late due to diversion from a storm... so we finally got off around 9... We were going to take a night train to Granada or Seville just to have a place to sleep and figure things out in the morning but that kind of screwed us up since we wouldn't make it to the station in time to catch them... so we went up a popular street trying to find this place one of the guide books suggested was cheap or a hostel but after a while, I had had enough. Barcelona has a great night life with lots of performers and stuff but I was pretty upset about not landing on time so I was just done. I seriously hate boats. We went to the train station to just ride any train somewhere that was long but the big trains are merged with the smaller regional ones so that confused us and there were no bigger ones for that night when we got there anyway... so we were just sitting in the station and planned to take one around 4 or 6 to places outside of Barcelona but that didn't quite happen either. The station closed at 12:30am so we were kicked out and allowed to come back at 4:30. We huddled next to a tin storage thing outside the station since we really didn't want to be by the other stranded people or bums that were huddeled against the station... around 20 people. It was pretty cold! I'm really surprised I even fell asleep for about 45 min while out. I think Brian did too. We were keeping watch on people. Nothing happened but no one even looked threatening... mostly older people walking around that time, actually. Everyone stays out late I guess haha. So we went back inside and decided to sleep for a bit. Lots of people were. Nice and warm inside. We took a 7:00 train to Madrid. So far it looks like they only have one main system of trains which is super fast but that equals expensive :/. So we need to look into trains more. We did nix Portugual though. I think becuase of the past couple days, we were just tired and kind of wanted to go back to a bed. Seemed like it was a while since we had one but it was only 2-3 nights. The fast train was nice and they had a movie and gave out free headphones. They played Julie and Julia which was eh... I only caught part of it because I kept passing out and I think Brian was asleep for most of it was well. But it did make me interested in looking into reading the book. We got to Madrid at 9:52 and the station we got off at was nice looking. Kind of confusing. We got a map and left on the search for wifi and ultimately a bed. Saw a cute little cafe that had a wifi sticker so we went in. The waitress didn't know much english and also made me realized how much Spanish I have forgotten. :(. I can still read enough to know if something bads and what not but I'm not good at forming sentances anymore. On a semi related note though, each place we go, I learn a little bit of each language and for the train terms, I know how to function them(for the most part haha) without English. Anyway, Spain really does have a relaxed atmosphere. And there were a lot of places booked but managed to get one that has a view of more cats! Kind of expensive but its the end and our budget looks pretty good which surprised me since we only stayed at hostels twice(but took a lot of night trains which are kind of like them, though). We walked around to the direction it was and had a bit difficulty finding it since I looked at what I wrote wrong haha. Lots of cool things to see and I think we see a new bird. Went to the store since we haven't had much water or food in the past couple days. Now we are just relaxing and Brian is snoring haha. I didn't want to sleep yet since I won't wake up later if I do. Things should be easy now up until we leave from Madrid on the 3rd! Pretty ready to come home because I miss everyone and I miss my kitty! Also, don't want to leave because there's still so much to see and its just awesome over here haha!