Barcelona, Spain

I saved my most favorite trip for my last two posts! Four years ago I had the opportunity to travel to Spain with my Honor's College group at Houston Community College...for FREE! The trip was free, we ate three to four times a day for free and our transportation and entrance into all of the places we visited were also free. During the spring of 2008, everyone who was set to go on the trip had to take a special History class as part of the criteria for us to go. During the class we researched the history of Spain, the artwork, the transportation system and maps of the city so that once we got there we could all act as our own personal tour guides! It was AMAZING!

The first stop on the trip was to Barcelona, Spain.  We stayed in Barcelona for about six days and did just about everything the town had to offer. Barcelona is known for a lot of the unique architecture done in the town by the infamous Antoni Gaudi. One of Gaudi's most remarkable works is the Sagrada Familia church.  The church is one of the most beautiful buildings I have ever seen.  He started on the church in the early 1880's and the church is still not complete. Once he died, people from all over the world began donating money for the church to be completed by some of the absolute architects in the world. Some other great Gaudi landmarks we visited were the Casa Mila and Park Guel.

 Above: Park Guel; Below: A pic of me and the Honor's College at Park Guell

 Below:The Top of the Casa Mila; When Gaudi built Casa Mila he intended for it to be an upscale apartment complex

The guy was an absolute genius and all of his work is so beautiful. My friend Batoul was our tour guide and information expert on all of the Gaudi places we visited. She loved everything so much that whenever she mentions something that she thinks is amazing she calls it "Gaudi-licous".

Besides the architecture, another thing I loved about Barcelona was the food! While visiting we would eat about three to four times a day at the most wonderful restaurants and tapas bars in the city. Barcelona is where I fell in love with seafood paella! The dish is incredible and I encourage EVERYONE to try it. Another unique thing about Spain is that there isn't really an age requirement on drinking. We would see kids who looked about 15 drinking wine with their meals just about everyday.

Another incredible thing about Barcelona is the city in itself. Our hotel was further out from the city along the beach. It was so beautiful.  The city is also very clean and tidy.  On just about every street corner there were huge recycling and trash bins. It should how much pride they take in keeping the place clean. The weather was also wonderful. We visited during the spring but on most days the weather was quite breezy. The transit system was also very nice.  We mostly traveled on foot and the subway system. Since we studied the maps and routes in our class, it made it very easy for us to move around within the city.

After our six days in Barcelona were over, we all packed up and loaded our things onto a bus that would be taking us to the train station. Our next stop was Madrid, Spain!