Sunday, March 29, 2009
We woke up and headed out around 9:00 (which was actually 10:00 - more on that later) and tried to get breakfast at the market again. Of course, it was closed since it´s a Sunday and nobody was out. We wandered to the cathedral and grabbed the most delicious powdered sugar pastries and glazed donuts covered with a thick shell of chocolate from a little pastelería. I could´ve eaten 5 more of those but thankfully, I resisted. We went into the Santa María cathedral which we thought was Santa María del Mar (why are there two Santa María churches within 10 minutes of each other?) but there wasn´t much inside. It was being repaired like the rest of Europe. We went to the big Cathedral after that and what do you know - more reconstruction/reparation work. I swear, if I have one more crane in my pictures I might scream. We went inside (for free) and they were having mass! It was so cool to hear the priest speaking in Catalan and wearing his purple robe. They had a little section in the back where tourists could sit without disturbing the ceremony. (ceremony? that doesn´t sound right.. my English is getting worse and worse). They even had LCD tv´s all around so we could see what was going on up front. After we left we wandered back across Ramblas to another building we had passed a bunch of times that looked important. Taylor said she had read about it but couldn´t remember what it was so we went in to find another mass! This church totally stuck out though, it wasn´t like any of the others inside and that´s why it was important. It looked so boring but in reality, it´s way more ornate than our churches at home! I´m excited to get back to Prairie Ridge and Third, but it could be a little disappointing since I´m a little jaded. After that we went by the Opera house (considered one of the most impressive in Europe) and Theatre (Friday was the international day of theatre) then to Palau Güell. CLOSED for reconstruction. Ughh.. We hopped in a little hotel and looked at our maps and read our books for a few minutes, surprised the whole time that we didn´t get kicked out. Pretty much all seating areas inside and out in Europe are either full or you have to buy something to sit. We walked across to the Plaça Reial or something like that (Unfortunately, I didn´t pick up Catalan while I was there) where we saw a couple lampposts designed by Gaudí and a bunch of Spanish men catching up. We walked toward this park, stopping by the Picasso museum, city history museum, getting free samples of smoothies, and scouting out where to eat lunch. We passed by a clock on the street and Taylor said, wow - is it already 12:30? I looked at my watch which said 11:30 and immediately remembered that we went through Daylight Savings Time during the night. I´m so glad she said something and the clocks were right because our phones didn´t change automatically and we would´ve missed our flight! Whew.. that was a close call. After that, we went to the Museu Xocolate (chocolate museum, in case that wasn´t obvious - Catalan is easy to read but tricky to pronounce!) and were really pleased that we didn´t have to pay. Well, we didn´t exactly go through the museum but the entryway/gift/café area was separated from the chocolate sculptures inside by glass. Obviously we stood there, took some pictures, and called it good enough! They were pretty good - we saw some in little shop windows too and I´m impressed. I bought the cutest little yellow chocolate chicks in eggs on a sucker stick for Kael and Kylee for Easter :) I hope they make it back to the US in one piece! When we left we were finally close to the Parque de la Ciutadella and we stumbled upon the celebración de la Primavera! (Spring celebration festival). It was just adorable - tons of families, little kids to grandparents everywhere. I forgot to say that it stopped raining mid-morning and the sun even peeked out! We got as many free marigolds as we wanted so we each grabbed two and potted them at a little workshop they had set up. It was probably for little kids to teach them how to work with plants because the worker laughed at us and said, "muy bien, que bonito" when we finished! I didn´t really care, I love our little flowers :) We wandered around and saw the zoo, science museum, face painting, clown shows, balloons, and a lake with rowboats and little tiny ducklings swimming around. It was so cute and we were so lucky to have gone at that time on that day! On our way back to the hostel we stopped by a pizza/foccacia place that was delicious.. except Taylor got a slice with anchovies that she thought looked like chicken. Oops! We also saw a bunch of people salsa dancing in the tree-lined paseo between the park and the Arc de Triomphe. Who knew Barcelona had one of those? It was really big and georgeous. We picked up our bags, headed back to the bus station and caught the airport bus that took about an hour. We got to the airport in plenty of time. After another unpleasant flight (RyanAir is cheap but not the most luxurious..) and yet another bus ride, we were back in our piso showing Juli Juli our flowers and telling her all about our trip over empanadas, french fries, and bread with Laughing Cow cheese. She lived there for 10ish years so she was happy to hear all about it. We unpacked and I checked my email while Taylor did some studying (mid-terms are tomorrow and Tuesday and I still haven´t cracked open my notes yet..). Then mom and dad called!! I was so excited to talk with them - I can´t believe they´ll be here so soon! They sounded good and we´ll have a lot of catching up to do in Italy. It´s going to be so fun :) But first, I have to think about Morocco. I just left my backpack out since I´ll be repacking it in a couple days anyway. What a life!
