Where in the world is Pieta: Barcelona

Our first night in Barcelona we decided to try some Sangria and Paella (pronounced Pie-a-ah). We had been warned not to go to the restaurants on the main street because they were too expensive but when we got there and had a look at some menus the prices seemed ok to us. The paella was really good, typical ones have seafood in them but we got a chicken one. I suppose It’s kind of like risotto but way better! Also I had my first taste of sangria and really liked it which Ewen was pretty happy about because he hates it when I order lemonade and he orders beer so he has to drink alone. Everything was awesome until we got the bill. 52 Euros!!!!!!!!!! We couldn’t believe it. Our meal cost about 30 Euros and then the drinks alone cost us 22 Euros! That was for only one drink each. They had menus up for food prices but not drinks but we thought oh well I’m sure drinks cost the same as everywhere else boy were we wrong. We had only bought just enough cash with us and no card so lucky we didn’t have two drinks each. Anyway after that we couldn’t afford to eat anymore hehe. It was cheap and nasty food from then on whilst in Barcelona.
Our first full day in Barcelona we had planned to do a bike tour but when we got to the meeting spot the guide told us that today was a public holiday and that people would be celebrating pretty heavily and bike riding would be a little dangerous and more importantly annoying going through all the crowds. He recommended we come back tomorrow so we set off to explore the streets. We walked past a couple of Gaudi buildings (Barcelona is kind of famous for its Gaudi buildings, he was this crazy architect who designed all these wacky buildings, a cathedral and a park) and through what we dubbed 'pigeon square' we also walked down the main street (I think it was called Rambler) and saw all the street performers and the 'very out of place ' pet stalls. All along the street they had pet stalls set up selling everything from guinea pigs to fish, birds to turtles. In the afternoon we went to the movies and saw The Switch was pretty good. We had the entire cinema to ourselves (I suppose because the movie was playing in English) which was nice. After the movies we went to the Sagrada Familia which is this incredible cathedral that Gaudi designed. Sadly he died before it could be completed and they are still doing construction on it to try to get it finished. I think it’s still expected to be a few years before its all completed. At the moment two entrances are done out of the planned three to be built. We spent quite a while at the cathedral first walking around the outside and then lining up to get in, walking all around inside and Then under the cathedral they had a little gallery showing how the cathedral had progressed over the years which was really interesting. We had a last look inside the cathedral and then went down to the crypt where they were holding a mass. We had a quick look around down there and then left to back to our hostel, on the way back we walked through a market on the main
street, picked up some cheap kebabs for dinner and went to bed. It was a good but long day with a hell of a lot of walking!
Our last day in Barcelona we again went to the meeting place for the bike tour but while standing around waiting for it to begin we decided it would take up too much of our day and was probably a little expensive, our Barcelona funds were running low. Instead we went to a park designed by Gaudi (called Park Guell). The walk up the hill to the park was a killer (despite them having installed escalators for half of the walk) but the park itself was definitely worth the hike. It had a lot of mosaic features including a lizard (which is on most of the cards you can buy in Barcelona), designs on ceilings and benches for us tired tourists to sit on. We spent a few hours wandering around the park before getting the metro back into town and walking to the Arch De Triumph and then from there we walked to a park that had a cascade waterfall apparently designed by Gaudi. It didn’t really seem to fit in with his other works. There were no crazy details or beautiful mosaics. It was pretty but completely different to everything else of his we had seen. Not too long after that we headed back to the hostel for a siesta (when in Spain do as the locals do. Here they open their shops about 11 then have a siesta from around 2-5 then the shops open again until around 9pm then everyone goes and has dinner and then around 3am everyone starts partying it’s a crazy lifestyle).