Friday March 8
Jie misses flight and arrives to Barcelona in the afternoon. Meets Mei in the hotel and raves about the awesome weather and beautiful city. Both sisters walk down La Rambla. Went shopping at department stores and discovered great clothes at affordable prices. The clothing is very classy, simple yet stylish!
Stopped by Café L’Opera for churros dipped in chocolate.
Visited old town and the Barcelona Cathedral. It was one of the grandest we'e seen and covered in a lot of gold. Stopped by a souvenir shop to look at our map and was yelled by the lady owner for blocking her precious aisles for tourists, which we were one of many. Geez...
Dinner was in Barrio Gottique at a bar with lots of pieces of bread with a myriad of toppings. Reminded us of California sushi rolls!
Mei bought a classy Miu Miu bag and saved $500 bucks back including getting taxes back.
Strolled along Plasig de Garcia and went to bed early at 9 pm.
Saturday March 9
Mei wakes up at 2 am, Jie wakes up at 3 am. Mega jetlag-yikes! Got up for breakfast at Boqueria Market at 7 am. Highlights include chickpeas, eggplant omelette, tomato bread. We did not like the croquettes. We also liked Mei’s kiwi orange juice and a basket of grapes.
On the way to breakfast, a couple of Spanish guys approached Mei and she ran like the wind. Our first encounter with Spanish "thieves".
Went to Casa Battlo, one of Gaudi’s creations. Highlights included an old fashioned elevator chimneys that looked like castles, windows with ventaliation inspired by gills of a fish, and bathroom like ceramic tiles.
Casa Mila was also Gaudi’s creation. Highlights include faces on the roof top, sea shells, paper cuts, ergonomic chairs, a lot of windws, designs inspired by nature and the theme of sustainbablility such as using broken glass as decoration.
Then stopped by Cacao Sarapaka where Mei bought an assortment of 16 chocolates from curry flavor to pine nut flavor for just $16. What a steal.
Stopped by Camper to get Jiea pair of sturdy comfortable walking shoes.
Ate lunch at Tapas 24 where Mei had her bikini sandwich. Small triangles of spanish meat, cheese and truffle on thin, crispy grilled bread. Amazing. Just the right size to still fit into a bikini ;)
Next stop is Park Guell one of Gaudi’s earlier creations. He was inspired by the mystical creatures of Catalan and had serpents and dragons built into the decoration. We also saw a bride taking her wedding photos. Her wihte dress was covered in dust/ Park Guell ended with a park with a view overlooking Barcelona. Another highlight was the huge recycling cans.
Ended the day with tapas at Cerviceria Catalana. Highlights included Coco’s uno mini burger which we shared. Half a bite each. Sangria was delicious. So was the mushroom and asparagus. We then roamed around at Boulevard Rosa.
Tien almost got mugged on the subway/ She was surround by several teenagers who kept looking at her purse but then they let her go.
Sunday March 10
Started the day at breakfast at Starbucks. Kind of Meh.
Took the Renfe train at Passieg de Gracia to Figueres home of Salvador Dali. The train lady said that we’d lget to Figueres at 11 30 am. Both of us fell sleep around 11 am. By that time we had passed Figueres. Not knowing we passed our stop. We sat until the end of the line at Cerebre where we go off. Since we were in France and didn’t have our passports, we were taken into custody by the French police. After one and a half hours, much paper work, several mug shots, and finger prints later the police woman let us go with a stern warning of taking our passports with us at all times. Two policemen drove us back to Spain. We took in the scenic route of an ocean to one side and mountains to the other. . Thank goodness the Spanish police let us back into Spain.
We took the train back to Figueres and went to see the Theater of Dali. The highlights include egged roofs Dali jewels, the beating hart, the teary eye, melted rock, looking glass, and the one boobed gala. On the way back to Placig de Garcia we saw the Arc de Triomf. We finished at 7 Portes with delicious Paella and Fiduea. Coco planned another fabulous trip.
Possible blog titles: Arrested in France, Fugitives, Home of the Crazy Artists, Gaudi! Dali! Land of the beating heart. All is revealed through the lens hung between the camel’s legs. No light at the end of the tunnel.
Other: great metro system (time to next train, actual time, temperature outside). The walking green light can be improved and not flash right before it turns green. The lisieu metro station was very serene with leaves. The people could be nicer.
