Barcelona, Spain

ROAD TRIP!

We’ve made it! After a long six hour car ride which turned into nine hours, we have finally made it to Barcelona, Spain. Friday night we began to prepare for our road trip by picking up our rental car. All the cars are stick, luckily for us; we had someone in our group who knew how to drive a standard. The car was very nice, we thought we were going to get a small beaten down car; however it was the total opposite. After we checked out the car and we were on our own, he had to reverse the car; however, the reverse function was a little bit different then back in the states. Since we could not figure out how to reverse the car, we put it in neutral and we had Joe, and Kelly push the car out. It was too funny. We eventually went back inside to ask how to reverse the car.


View driving to Barcelona

We left early Saturday morning March 30, at five, we packed the car and we were off. We did not have a GPS so we were going to Spain old school with  printed out directions. We started off great until we were about twenty minutes in. This was when we got off the highway and had to go through about three roundabouts. None of the signs had where we were going. Since it was so early in the morning, we spent our time going around in circles, stopping in the middle and reading all the signs. We tried each exit on the roundabouts until we figured we had to turn around. We finally went the other way and continued until we noticed that we were in Le Puy en Velay where we were the other weekend. We decided to stop at the train station to ask for directions. They gave us directions and continued to follow the signs until we reach the highway. Once we reached the highway it was smooth sailing until we got to Barcelona, and had to find our hostel. Somehow we found our hostel after getting lost yet again. While on the highway we had to pay close to 40 Euros in tolls on the way there. It was a little bit more on the way back. I can tell you one thing; there are too many roundabouts in Europe!


Las Ramblas

After we arrived to the hostel, and check in and unpacked, we made our way to Las Ramblas. The weather was perfect! The sun was shining and it was not cold. For everyone who doesn't know, this is a very busy street with a lot of tourist, shopping, and human statues. We spent our afternoon and evening like any tourist shopping, and dinning.

On Easter Sunday, we got up early and did a sightseeing tour of Barcelona on a hop on, hop off bus. The weather was beautiful out! There were three lines, blue, red, and green. We started on the blue line and eventually switched to the red line to see everything Barcelona had to offer. The green line was not running that day. There were so many breathe taking views. We saw everything such as the Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, Camp Nou which is the Futbol Club of Barcelona, Placa d’ Espanya, Poble Espanyol and Anella Olimpica.



Sagrade Familia

The Sagrade Familia was huge. It was still under construction which had begun in the late 19^th-century. I didn’t get to go inside of the cathedral because the line was so long. It was wrapping around so many blocks. I was so amazed just by the outside of it.

Anella Olimpica

Two of my favorite stops were the Futbul Club of Barcelona also known as Camp Nou and Anella Olimpica. Camp Nou is the soccer stadium. Everything there was all about soccer. The stadium was huge and I absolutely loved it. It would be so cool to play there while thousands are watching you. This stadium is known to be one of the world’s largest stadiums. One the other hand, Anella Olimpica was also very cool and amazing. This is where the 1992 Olympics were held. I got to see the stadium where soccer was played along with track and field.

Camp Nou

Placa d’ Espanya, and Park Guell both had great views. Both of these spots were great for pictures and to take in the breath taking views.  

At the top of Park Guell

Poble Espanyol

Finally, I visited Poble Espanyol. This is a Spanish village where I had a nice lunch outdoors and got to go shopping in the village. It was great here with more fantastic views. However, it felt more like a castle then a village.

Chelsea and I spilt up from the rest of the group, so we could see more. We ate a nice lunch in Poble Espanyol, and continued the tour until the end. Later that night, Chelsea and I went out for dinner and went to a bar to get some drinks. We each got a strawberry daiquiri. They were so good and much needed; however, they were 10 Euros each, but totally worth it!

We left early the next day to drive back to Yssingeaux. Before we got to Yssingeaux, we stopped at the train station to book our next trip to Paris!
The ride back was just as long as the drive there. We left at 9:30 in the morning and got back at 6:30 in the evening, after making a detour to the train station. Yes we got lost! We actually got lost coming home from the train station.

This week I start my entremet class. I am eager and excited to learn about entremets, as they are very popular in France plus our project is on creating our very own. Check back later to see how my week in entremets went.