Barcelona

Arriving in Barcelona after a 4 hour bus ride, we went on the metro to our hotel located near the university. The hotel was a little grim and noisy but at least it was air conditioned (well for some of us, poor Robbie who can't survive without AC scored a room that had a broken AC).

We headed out on an orientation walk where Delia, our guide showed us some off the main sites. We walked north to the Casa Battló, a famous Gaudi building that was inspired by a salamander or chameleon, the symbol of Barcelona. After this we made our way to Plaça de Catalunya, one of the largest plazas in the city with numerous fountains and statues. This plaza marks the beginning of The Ramblas, a wide mall that runs the length of the old city.

We walked down this mall and into the Gothic Quarter, characterised by narrow lanes, medieval ornaments and gargoyles. We visited the Gothic cathedral, which was pretty, even though it was quite dark and spooky.

After the cathedral we went back to our hotel, where the obligatory siesta was undertaken. For dinner a number of the group decide to go to a Vietnamese resistant for dinner as a change from all the tapas meals. It was a good choice, but Mick could not have anything too spicy as he was having stomach issues again. We then took the sweaty metro, with some of our dinner companions, to go and see the Magic Fountain, a light and music spectacular held each evening. The fountain was magnificent, with jets reaching over 10 metres in height while changing colour. But soon it was time to leave, as Mick was afraid that he would soon be putting on his own chocolate fountain show. We went back to the hotel via the sweaty metro with hundreds of other sight see'ers, before hunting down a 24 hr pharmacy then turning in to get some well earned rest.

We were up bright and early the next day with a busy schedule planned. First stop was the Sagrada Familia, which did not turned out as planned as there was an hour long queue JUST TO BUY TICKETS and then once you got to the ticket office you then got to choose an entrance time (earliest was 12:15). Rosey from our group had a great plan whereby we go to the Maccas across the road to use free WiFi and then buy tickets online (for a 12.15 entrance).

Given it was just after 9 am we decided to squeeze in our second agenda item of the day, Parc Güell. We walked for 40 min in the heat up some very steep streets and breathed a massive sigh of relief when we saw that there were no queues to buy tickets to enter the park. Our wallet earlier disappointment returned when we were told that the next admission to the park was at 12.15....FARK! So we walked around the free gardens for a little while before walking back to the Sagrada Familia. Thankfully it was all down hill, so it took less time.

Once we finally got inside the Sagrada Familia, all the frustrations of the morning dissipated. It is an amazing and awe inspiring cathedral. Gaudi was an absolute genius, and the Cathedral does not need tonnes of gold ornaments or massive paintings, the architecture is the masterpiece of this place. The cathedral is still under construction, so it's amazing to have been able to see it in its current shape. Construction started over 100 years ago and still has over 20 years to go.

The last bit of culture for the day was a visit to the Picasso museum, where Mick impressed Damo with his complete lack of art knowledge. When looking at a self portrait of Picasso, Mick said "so that's what he looked like with 2 ears!" Damo politely pointed out that it was van Gogh who cut his ear off...

We had our final dinner of the tour this night, where we paid 20 euros for unlimited food and drinks. Although Mick was still sick he made sure that he took part in this final dinner. The tummy troubles this time was different, rather than fearing an explosion in the underpants, Mick suffered severe upper abdominal pain immediately after eating. Mick was willing to put up with the pain. We said goodbye to a number of our traveling friends as half the group were leaving the tour the next day (us included) while the other half were doing an extended tour of northern Spain. As we had extra time in Barcelona this gave us an extra day with some of group and the opportunity to catch up with them again in San Sebastian when our paths would cross again.

The following day we made their way back to Parc Güell where we saw some more amazing Gaudi architecture and design. We took the bus this time so there was no 40 minute hike thankfully! After the park we did some shopping and then had a siesta.

We had a dinner by ourselves at '15 Nights' (English translation) which was really good (apart from the severe pain Mick felt). Following dinner Mick did some self diagnosis via Dr Google and determined he had acute pancreatitis (infection of pancreas)! One of the worse things for this is consuming alcohol, which Mick was massively upset about. Mick had decided if he wasn't better by San Sebastian in 1 days time he would seek medical help.

The following day we took a 40 min train ride to Sitges (rhymes with 'bitches'), a small beach town with small cobbled streets and white washed buildings. It was very similar to Mykonos.

Unsurprisingly there was a nude beach where Mick could do his 'extreme people watching' or as Damo would say 'being a dirty perve'. The highlights were (a) the old guy that was sporting a massive 'Prince Albert' piercing, he looked like he had a massive pendulum between his legs and (b) the 60+ year old who was walking out the water with an erection. He was furiously splashing cold water on himself in order for it to go down, but as that was not working and he was quickly approaching the beach he decided to fall into the water and sit in the shallow end for a while. He was obviously very happy to be there as even after his 'rest' in the shallow end he still needed to keep splashing water on himself.

After doing enough 'extreme people watching' we stayed around the town, having lunch and wandering the streets, before heading back to Barcelona. After a stop at the rooftop pool it was an early night as we had a 4:30 am wake up the following morning for our flight to San Sebastian.