Barcelona

Erin and I arrived in Barcelona early in the morning at the Estacio de Franca. We headed over to a coffee shop in Pla del Palau called Negro Carbon and had breakfast. No more cafe creme, in Spain it's just cafe con leche. We took the metro to our hostel, the Garden House Hostel Barcelona, which is located in the northern part of the city, the Zona Alta region. Erin rested (she wasn't feeling too well, food poisoning ) while I sat up in the terrace and caught up on email. It was very sunny, palm trees with wild canaries here and there, and you could see the ocean off in the distance. We met some of our roommates, students on spring break from Connecticut, and they suggested a few places to go and have dinner. A couple of hours later, Erin decided she was didn't want to miss out on her two days in Barcelona, so we went for a walk, thinking we would try to make it all the way down to the waterfront. Walking through the northern part of the city was a great way to get acquainted with the locals, as we were far out from the tourist attractions to the south. After wandering around for about and hour or two, we realized we still had a way to go, so we decided to take the metro the rest of the way. We got off at a station that was located in front of an impressive monument honoring Christopher Columbus. We were in the southern part of the Barri Gotic neighborhood which is just full of tourists. We decided to try to go to a less crowded area, and went back to the metro section. As we were boarding, a guy jumped between Erin and I and starting pushing her backwards as if to push her back onto the train station platform. She pushed back with both of her hands, and at that point a second man reached into her front pocket and stole her iPhone. Apparently this happens pretty often, the second man then throws the phone to a third person waiting on the platform and then they run off, while the victim remains in the train car, not able to do anything but get off at the next stop. The police call it a sandwich. It happened very quickly, and it was very upsetting. Thankfully, Erin was not hurt. We went to the police station and filed a report. We also wiped the info on her iPhone by using the Find My iPhone app. The police said that the chances the pickpockets are interested in stealing info off of a phone is very low, they just want to sell it as quickly as possible. We were really bummed but realized it could have been much worse (and it was for someone else later in Madrid; a girl staying in our hostel had her passport, credit cards, and I.D. stolen right off the plane). The Madrid police were very helpful and after Erin filed a report, they let her use their phone to call the US to call her parents and AT&T to cancel her service.
Later in the evening, we headed back to the hostel. We another roommate, a fellow San Franciscan, who was headed to Madrid meet his girlfriend the next day to see a bullfight. He was really nice and shared a bottle of wine with us to celebrate his last night in Madrid.
The next day we were determined to let go of what happened and explore the rest of the city. We got off the metro in one of Barcelona's most eccentric modernista neighborhoods, L'Eixample, starting at La Sagrada Familia, Antoni Gaudi's masterpiece. We then walked the rest of the neighborhood, finding more examples of his work, including Casa Mila, which resembles a building made of coral. We then took the metro back to Barri Gotic, this time at the northern end, and walked down La Rambla, a street filled with shops, cafes, and street performers. We also managed to squeeze in a little shopping in near the Vila Olipmica, by the waterfront. It was a great day and we had managed to shake off the bad vibe from the day before. We headed back to the hostel for dinner that night, as we were leaving early the next morning to meet Jenny in Madrid...and celebrate my birthday!













Apparently, this is a desayuno americano. I call it desayuno d.e.l.i.c.I.o.u.s!!!






The view from the hostel's terrace.









































































La Rambla






Street performer






My kind of music






The waterfront





Columbus Monument






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