Spain

It's been a long time since my last blogs but that is not because I haven't written,... well partly, but mainly its because I started some blogs but then kept editing and then forgot about them. So I left off at the beginning of one of the best weeks of my life. And it was a bad beginning. Needless to say it got better. We did not crash entering Spanish airspace, nor did we land somewhere in Ireland or Finland where our plane was from. No; we landed safely in Gerona, Spain - an hour outside of Barcelona. This hour was quickly (as quick as an hour can pass) consumed by Tania and me in a 25 Euro charter bus. But afterwards we had finally reached our long-awaited for destination. Starving and tired, we were torn between eating and finding our hostel. We decided to head to our hostel, but if we found any good-looking cheap-looking clean-looking restaurant. We laughed because the first one we crossed was a Indian döner shop. This was funny because döners are everywhere in Germany, and they're delicious but really bad for you. Besides, we wanted to try something more Spanish for our first meal in Barcelona. We didn't find any other open place before we got to our hostel, and we were completely exhausted. A man let us in even though it was close to midnight. The outside of the hostel had marble inlays of angels which made us think we were in the wrong place since we booked the cheapest place we found, but the man assured us we were in the right place. He let us into a small room occupied only by an empty wooden desk and a staircase. He showed us up to the next floor, and into an apartment we were to be sharing with up to 8 other people. However this place was surprisingly nice. It was neat, and large, and it had a kitchen. The man showing us the room was really nice. Maybe too nice. We were exhausted and after what seemed like hours of hospitable chatter, I wanted to make him leave. So I paid him and he left. As tantalizing as sleep was at this time, we were still hungry. So we agreed to meet a couple of friends for dinner.

The next day was the best day of my life. We left early into the heart of Barcelona where we ate tapas at a cheap restaurant. Then we went to Gaudi's park in the north of the city. It is on a hill so you can see the whole city. It was really awe-inspiring. And the Gaudi's architecture is fantastic! The air was fresh with sea salt and the height of the hill, and the inhaled air from being chronically aghast was reviving. That night we went to the Ramblas to get some paeya. We found a nice place and ate too much. We were tired and pregnant with food so we decided to call it a night so we took the tram back to our Barcelona home.

The next day was the best day of my life. We woke up late - which if one can spare to do in a vacation (and it is arguable whether we could spare the time or not) can be a highlight in and of itself - and headed to the Sagrada familia cathedral. We saw an ice cream stand, and I sighed when they said they did not have pistachio. Tania took charge and took me out of that shop and around the park in front of the cathedral to find me a pistachio ice cream. I was telling her to give up when we finally found one. Two large scoops of pistachio gelato later, we were sitting on a bench admiring once again Gaudi's work. We saw the sky change colors as the sun set behind the soaring building and then headed once more to las Ramblas. We had a coupon given to us by the hospitable innkeeper to a tourist bar for a free dinner, but the food was horrible. The plate of chilly that we got was nothing but ground meat with water. We were watching the soccer game in the TV - as was the whole city - but we didn't want to stay in the restaurant. We headed to anywhere else the Ramblas area and went into a huge market. We got a couple of HUGE strawberries to snack on before dinner. We had a hard time finding a restaurant that had the a TV and seating, finding many that only met one of these conditions. We passed by a nice looking place called 4 Catos, but it had no TV, so we agreed to get a drink while we watched the game and then come back to that place for dinner. We found a little paeya restaurant and watched the game. Barcelona demolished A C Milan, and the city went wild. The waitress - who by the looks of it also co-owned the restaurant with her husband the bar-tender -  tried to convince us to stay for a meal, but we wanted to find 4 Catos again so we apologized and left. We walked to where we had seen the 4 Catos, but didn't find it. We spent close to an hour retracing our steps before we gave up and went back to the paeya restaurant.

After Barcelona, we went to Madrid.

In Madrid we saw my cousin, Susi with whom I get along with amazingly.

She recommended a hostel that was located smack in the middle of the city.

The first day in Madrid we met up with my cousin and one of Tania's friends who is studying physics and Math.

We went to a Tapas place which was nice and fancy.

Afterwards we went to an Irish bar close to the hostel, drank and ate and played pool. It was AWESOME!

Next day we slept in. We went late to the Museo del Jamon which is actually a restaurant not a museum. there are many of these in Madrid, each is as great as the last.  We then went to a park and had ice cream and talked. Tania succeeding at Spanish more than she would admit. We liked the bar so much the night before that we decided to go back. We ate and drink and played pool. And we met a person from Ohio who had just graduated and wanted to travel Europe before he started working. He was pretty cool.

Next morning we woke up and went to the Museo Sofia which was amazingly abstract. All modern art. All very weird. We met Susi afterwards to go to the Prado Museum which was amazing but a little to classical for my taste. The paintings were all very religious and that got tiring after the 6th room out of about 30. We said goodbye to my cousin and went to nice restaurant bar which we were attracted to because of nice piano music emanating from its door. The restaurant was very well decorated with art and quotes from mainly Spanish authors. We saw that we didn't feel like eating tapas again and because Tania had liked the quesadillas at the Irish bar the previous night, we went to find a Mexican restaurant. this proved to be a more difficult task in Madrid than we had anticipated.

We went to a karaoke bar, and I, along with everyone within hearing range was aghast at Tania's voice as she sang 'Black Horse and a Cherry Tree'.

The next day Tania got woke up feeling sick. The quesadillas had poisoned her!

The next day we went back to Bonn through 11 hours of miserable travel

The trip was amazing altogether even though it was sandwiched between 2 horrible travel experiences.