Barcelona, Spain

Next stop, Spain! Before arriving, we made yet another stop at a medieval fortress, one of the biggest most intact ones in Europe. Carcassonne was such a fun place to explore. Of course, while we were in there, we had to get our last french crepes of the trip.

Our first night in Barcelona, we took the trek up to Park Guell. I was extremely excited about this because of one of the Cheetah Girl movies. We got a bit lost...so the guys (who knew spanish) kept asking for directions, which led us to a whole bunch of stairs. After a while, we finally made it! The city views were stunning and the park was all I could have hoped for and more. I was in heaven. In the morning, we went on a guided tour of the city, which ironically started with Park Guell. I was okay with that as it was nice to hear more about its history and see it in the day time.

We then got to go see the outside of La Sagrada Familia. It is such a unique thing as it has been under construction since 1882, and has many different architectural qualities. Our tour landed us on top of a giant hill overlooking everything, but at the bottom of the hill, we passed by a castle that was so stunning we decided we had to go see it later.

The guys went inside a soccer stadium, while Tiff, Victoria and I went to find that castle. It started off with us getting off the wrong metro stop, and having to walk an extra mile or so. We had a drunk Spanish man yell "Mi Amor" or "my love" at us which was hilarious. We made our way up some steps, towards the top of a hill as that is where the signs for the Montijuic Castle (the only castle near us) was leading us to. We were totally lost since we knew the castle was at the bottom of the hill. We kept trying to ask for directions, even to some police but no one was any help. However, we did stumble upon a Olympic stadium.

It was free to enter so we went and explored that for a bit. As we tried to make our way down the hill, we found the backside of the Art Museum. We continued randomly walking down random streets as we were sure the castle was at the bottom. We then found Poble Espanyol (a place we will go to the next day). We continued walking for about 2 minutes and we finally found it!!! But wait...it is not a castle...it is the Art Museum. ... ... ... ... We spent half a day looking in the heat for a castle that wasn't even a castle. It was still stunning regardless. To top it off, we walking about a mile in the wrong direction of our hostel on the way home. We ended this day quite exhausted.

The last day started back near the Museum at Poble Espanyol. It is an architectural museum with stores, restaurants, and a park.

To end the day, we went to the beach to spend our last moments at the Mediterranean. Barcelona is known for the incredible beaches. The boardwalk was huge with stores on the beach and lots of people. As soon as we got in the water, the weather went from hot to chilly. We cuddled together in the water with the fish, and eventually left to go get dinner. This was one of the best dinners, hamberguers, garlic fires, and a shake.