Corner of Whatever

It’s my first visit to Europe and my trip takes me to Barcelona, Spain for my virgin excursion throughout the Mediterranean for a week’s cruise. What a relaxing vacation it looks to be…filled with family, cameras, and hardly any Internet connection, save what’s on the boat.

Okay, okay…I can’t resist being online simply because it was my hope that I would be able to upload my pictures to my Flickr account so you could live vicariously through my pictures, but unfortunately ’tis not the case. Nevertheless, I’ll abuse my credit limit by posting on my blog. Hope you’ve found it okay.

Anyways, we left BWI on Thursday morning and I’m all set to go. There was a troupe of kids from the Washington Historical Society either coming or going to a trip. Who knew, but the plane was packed. In fact, both legs of my trip were filled with people and there was hardly any free space, but luckily I managed to find space for my THREE bags and still had my checked-in bag slightly under the 40 lb. mark. Score for me!

We left BWI a little bit late simply because there was too much air traffic surrounding Newark that they had to ground planes for a little bit. I was too tired to notice it when we actually took off and before I knew it, we were in Newark, NJ…ahead of schedule! Yeah, imagine that…the pilot was speeding in the air.

One thing annoying about the flight though were the three people sitting across from me. There was this one guy who decided to be ignorant and discourteous and stored his bag in the overhead compartment sideways instead of wheels forward. Way to jip people out of space for their luggage douche-bag. Then there’s this other guy who doesn’t pay attention to his bag and it slams right into my right shoudler when I’m sitting down! WTF?!? Well that wasn’t the last I saw of him because he comes back and sits across from me in the aisle and is on his phone non-stop even after the cabin doors are closed. Am I imaginging things? Is this guy a complete @$$hole? C’mon! And that’s just getting started as when we deplane, the three people are pushing through to get their bags. BE PATIENT FOLKS!

Well we deplane and find a place to grab something to eat. Where? Not at McDonalds or A&W or any fast food joint, but the Garden State Diner in the same terminal. It was some good food and I was quite content. Then we decided to walk to the gate…only to find out that it was clear across the airport! Yeah, apparently the domestic gates are not in the same area as the international ones. Thankfully we had plenty of time. Actually found out that our flight was a tad bit delayed anyways leaving New Jersey for Barcerlona. They were actually oversold and had upped their flight vouchers to any volunteers for $900 and also included in hotel and meal vouchers and another flight the next day. No, we didn’t take them up on their offer. It wasn’t cash, you know! Flight vouchers don’t hold that much muscle around here anymore…

So we board our plane and it seemed to be quite comfortable. I managed to sleep a majority of the way through the flight and woke up to eat dinner and whatever they called breakfast (it was just a croissant, ‘fer cryin out loud!). Well managed to break through customs and experienced Barcelona life for the first time. It was awesome! It’s been over 10 years since I last tried my Spanish - in fact, I only took 3 years of the language during my high school years. That’s the funny thing…I wanna now learn these languages. I think I took a half-ass approach in learning Chinese and Spanish and who would have thunk that it would have come in handy? Well, obviously not me even though I went to China/Hong Kong and now Barcleona! Duh…

Well okay, so we catch a cab and somehow my Spanish (albeit rusty) comes back to me and I’m trying as easily as I can to explain where we want to go. Barcelona is a really nice city (except for its pickpocketers, which I have yet to encounter…thank goodness) and I have a lot of pictures. Definitely should come back though and, for those of you who know me, I did NOT hit up any McDonalds or Burger Kings while I was here. I’ve tried new things (with plenty of pictures)…quite proud of myself, actually.

We took a tour around the city and saw the famous Sangrada de Familia and Olympic Stadium, along with a spanish village, the gothic part of the city, and much more. We had delicious steak & seafood dinner in Barcelona and saw a bunch of Goudi architecture houses that I’d love to explore a little bit further. We even passed by the Catalonia National Gallery of Art. That place is HUGE and almost resembles a palace! It’s crazy…and you’ll spend hours wandering around the museums and city. The place is pretty clean although has a tendancy to smell like a New York street. There are street cafes and you can enjoy the environment and it definitely seems like something out of a movie. Outstanding.

Our hotel was the Regente Hotel and was situated in the center of Barcelona along the Ramblya de Catalunya. It’s definitely not a four-star hotel, although they “claim” to be one. I couldn’t even find an electric socket and all the shows on tv were in Spanish, save any BBC channel…and that was when it worked. Very old fashioned, but the city was beautiful. I only wish that I would be able to post my pictures from the boat, but alas, I’m unable to find a USB connector. And me without my laptop…

More from the road later on…

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Sightseeing, Travel