Back where they speak English

Spain was simply brilliant.

While we weren't able to see any Bullfighting in Barcelona (it's been banned in the city for some time apparently), we were able to have a few amazing days in the town. Sean, Mark, and I rolled into town a couple hours ahead of Dan because of a train mix-up, so we went to Camp Neu, which is F.C. Barcelona's football stadium. It holds 100,000 people, and is very impressive (much bigger than Bernabeu, Real Madrid's stadium). Once Dan got in, we hung out in the hostel (which was one of the nicer ones I've stayed at) before grabbing some quality Spanish cooking at a local restaurant.

After some card games, Dan, Mark, and I hit the town. We went to a bar for shots of rum (as convinced by some random Cuban guy) and met two girls from San Diego State University who are studying in Preston, a town outside of Manchester. We ended up going to an Irish Bar with them and just talking to them and hanging out. Neat girls, and nice to be able to converse in English with random people!

The next day we went to Ghoti's Temple of the Holy Family which is an unfinished, impressionistic cathedral. It is massive. They started building it in the late 1800's, but stopped after Ghoti's death in the 1920's. In the 60's they resumed work, and continue to work on in to this day. We were able to climb one of the eight 100 meter tall towers, and a central tower is planned that will be twice the height. Very impressive, although at this point it's essentially become one big construction zone.

After scrambled eggs and cheese for dinner, we hung out with some people in our hostel. Vito was from Glasgow, Scotland, Adam was from Brighton, England, Paul was from Oxford, England, and Mike....was from somewhere stateside. We played cards and then went on a pub crawl, with six of us going out. We each picked a cool bar we saw and bought rounds. Mike picked a hard rock club, I picked a bar built around trees, Vito picked some random techno place, Dan picked an Irish Pub, Mark picked the London Bar, and Sean ended our trip by buying us Guiness in another Irish Bar. All in all, a great night, albeit a late one...we got home around 5am.

The next day, after a very late rise (read: 3pm), Sean and I chilled in the Hostel watching Spanish TV while Dan and Mark went to check out Olympic Park. We decided to go to a nice place for dinner, and ended up at 'Quixote's,' which was really nice, but overpriced. I spent 25 euro for water, wine, roast duck (which was actually very good) and cactus sherbert (....interesting). But it was our last night, so a little splurging isn't so bad.

To cap off our crazy Barcelona trip, we met up with Mike and Vito again, along with four girls from the University of North Carolina (two of which are from Charlotte...yay!). After some more cards, we went back to the tree bar and then to Club New York, which was a blast. Instead of the usual mix of hip hop and dance music, the club played a sort-of jazz/Spanish fusion all night long. It was a ton of fun, and we stayed nearly until the club closed at 5am.

At 6:30 am, Sean, Mark, and I caught a train back to Reus (so no, we didn't sleep last night...unless you count sleeping on the train, plane, and bus). The flight back was ok, but there were tons of loud kids, and apparently disciplining your kids isn't cool anymore. We had no problems with customs or baggage, and got home in good time, safe and sound.

And now I'm getting ready to go watch the Real Madrid - Barcelona football match at a local pub. I'm out for now. Cheers!

P.S. Pictures soon....most of them are on Mark's and Dan's cameras...