Monday March 9, 2009

We woke up early again on Monday morning to finish off our site-seeing in Barcelona. To start off we took the metro to Gaudi’s most famous work, Sagrada Familia, an unfinished landmark church. He worked on it from 1883 until his death in 1926. It’s not supposed to be completed for another 50 years, but they are trying finish by the hundred year anniversary. Since the interior is still being built it wasn’t worth paying the admission to go inside (plus Cassie said not to).

So after we took our pics we took the metro down to Barcelona’s port. We took our time walking along the port, past the Columbus Monument (where Columbus was welcomed home after his first trip to America), and up La Rambla checking out street performers and artists as we went.

Before we went to grab our bags from the hostel we stopped for lunch at a vegetarian restaurant where I had my first experience with falafel. Ethnic restaurants are a big trend in Europe right now and since we don’t eat out in Florence we decided it would be ok to taste the trend even though it’s not authentic Spanish cuisine. It ended up being AMAZING…where has this magical falafel been all of my life? They gave us the basic wrap with lettuce and falafel and we were able to add all kinds of toppings…hummus, salsas, chickpeas, veggies, burnt cauliflower, all kinds of sauces…I’m a big fan of this concept. Even Mel who was very skeptical loved it.

We picked up our bags from the hostel, took the metro to the bus station, took the bus 1.5 hours to the Girona airport and from there flew back to Italy. The Girona airport was a much more enjoyable experience than Pisa. Overall we found the Spanish to be a lot friendlier than the Italians. There’s so much more of Spain to see and I would love to come back some day. Back in Pisa we waited for our bus back to Florence which, gasp, was 30 minutes late.
Once again it was a perfect trip. It’s crazy how much you can see in just 3 days. This was my first truly new traveling experience, since I’ve been lucky to have toured Italy before, and it made me even more excited for the rest of my semester abroad. I want to see everything! Feel free to mail generous cash donations:).