May 21 - Madrid to Barcelona

We left the bus station in Madrid before midnight. As a big dude I wasn't excited at the cramped conditions, but I figured we'll see how comforable it is to maybe catch some sleep. The idea was to take a night bus to Barcelona instead of a night train because it was roughly half the price. Save on one night's hotel and get to a new place to sightsee in the process. Well, I would have gladly paid to take the dang AVE superfast train during the day instead...but before we get to that story, here's roughly how we traveled that night on the bus:


Too long on a night bus.

We left the bus station and it was amazing to see the bus seem to drive up narrow underground ramps until we finally broke through to the surface streets. About an hour into the ride...well, let me just say it was horrible. The dude in front leaned his seat back, I couldn't get mine to work to give me more room, it was hot and the little air vent was barely poofing out air. We suffered for miles and miles and miles. Thankfully we stopped every two hours and got off at least to stretch, etc. Lisa wanted me to switch seats with her so I'd have the aisle and more legroom, which did make it better but I think it just made it worse for her. Sun starts coming up, and we're just sitting there exhausted ready to get to Barcelona. We finally roll into the first station and just grab our bags and get off. It felt like escaping! Later we were talking about it and both found we had been thinking the same thing...to get off the bus at the next town that had a train station and continuing on in the morning instead of one more minute on the bus. Haha. Yeah, it was the worst decision I'd made in a long time.

Anyways, we get down into the Metro system, make our way to the stop nearest our hotel, and wander the couple blocks to find it. The front of the building is all different than I remember seeing in pictures because of remodeling, but we found it. You buzz the door, go inside and up a narrow winding staircase to the lobby which is on the second floor. The guy, who obviously doesn't know we are just wanting to crash out so bad, tells us that they only have a single (though I requested a double) and to put another bed will be ten euro more a night. By this point we don't care and say yes, just get it ready, etc. So to wait for check in we leave our bags, then go down to the street in front. Barcelona is famous for its "ramblas" which are big wide streets that people can walk down the middle of, if not entirely pedestrian only. We plop down on a bench and watch time pass as people begin setting up the sidewalk cafes for the breakfast crowd, fend off a gypsy beggar lady, and go into one of the cafes and get something to drink and eat. It got to a point on the bench where I was just about to lay down on the ground and go to sleep, when we went in to check on the room, and it was ready. We went to sleep.

That day we figured was pretty much lost because we were so wrecked by the stupid night bus which was supposed to benefit us...haha, we just took it slow. Later on we went to the main plaza a couple blocks away to the big department store El Corte Ingles which had a supermarket. We bought a bunch of stuff, probably more than we needed, checked out the protest here in Barcelona, and went back to the hotel. We were going to go check out Casa Batllo, which is a famous building nearly designed by Antoni Gaudi, but we got there and forgot our student ID cards...so we figured we'd come back tomorrow to get the discount. Instead we went on the metro across to a little hill area named Montjuic where they have this "magic fountain" from the Olympics in 1992. Imagine the Bellagio one but with more movement and color, but not as big. Anyways, Lisa had wanted to see it and so we avoided all the pickpockets and such to make our way over and walked forever around a building to get there...because they had a big car show going on and the main entrance was blocked. Haha, Barcelona was being real crappy to me so far.

Anyways, on to the pictures!


The protestors in Plaça de Catalunya. We saw these all over Spain, mainly a youth movement. Umemployment in Spain is something like 20%, and even worse for younger people, esp. those coming out of university. So, combined with everything going on in the world, they're out there trying to have their say as well.


At the supermarket...some nice octopus! Spanish food is probably 65% seafood, which made it hard sometimes because Lisa won't hardly eat it. It was fun to look at anyway!




The "fuente magica" near Montjuic. You can see a building up on top there which is an art museum.


The street outside our window at night. It looks pretty quiet here, but that is totally misleading. All the cafes below on the street, scooters zipping around like little buzzing bees...made for pretty high street noise well until 3 or 4 in the morning that first night.

With that day pretty much blown, we looked forward to seeing some of the famous architecture in the city the next day.