Barcelona Day 3 - Beaches, Guinness and SILENCE PLEASE!

I haven't described our accomodation yet. We stayed in 'apartments', which basically means that we had our own bedroom, but that the kitchen, toilets, showers and dining room were shared. Can't be beaten on price, and the toilets and showers were never being used when we needed them.

Due to the nature of the arrangement they ask for SILENCE between 10pm and 8am....I'm assuming what they mean is 'please be quiet for the sake of others', but you know these continental types, big on overstatement. Normally this would be easy peasy, I'm always happy to comply with the rules, and Nicki and I were hardly likely to be up partying into the wee hours.

However, for somewhere demanding 'SILENCE' they seem to have gone to the ends of the earth to make everything as noisy as possible. The very nature of the building meant that even the slightest sounds travelled, large vacuous spaces. The floors were tile or laminate, the doors slammed without any encouragement whatsoever, you really had to make some effort to close the door without making a noise. The locks on the doors were of the kind where you turn a little wheel mechanism and a bolt slides into place, it sounded like you were trying to crack a Wall Street safe with a sledgehammer.

On top of this, our room was off of the kitchen, so every morning we were woken up at whatever mad time one of our neighbours decided they wanted breakfast or a cup of tea. It wasn't their fault, people who had only just arrived didn't even realise our room was a room. The kitchen was also handily equipped with marble worksurfaces....extra good for clattering around with crockery.

This morning in particular we were woken by a very loud conversation between 2 50-something Scottish ladies who clearly didn't enjoy laying in. Nicki grumpily opened the door and asked if they'd PLEASE be a bit quieter, and the shocked ladies complied immediately, but the damage was done, we were up.

We bimbled down to the coast today, coming from London it's quite a nice experience to stay in a city that has a beach! We arrived firstly at the port, have you ever noticed how the boats all look so pretty bobbing around in the harbour, but as soon as you try and take a picture all you seem to end up with is a heaving mess of sails and masts that don't look very aesthetic at all!?

We MAY have had some Hagen Daas, but I shan't implicate us directly....you have no evidence!

Ahem....so we had a wander down the beach and a little paddle in the sea. At various intervals we passed those wonderful contraptions.....showers that they seem to have installed on all continental beaches. They haven't quite caught on in most british resorts I've visited, I'm sure they just need a couple more decades. Then....a sight to behold. Plonked down on the edge of one of these little shower platforms was a portly gentleman reading a paper. He was in his 60's I'd guess, wearing nothing but a little pair of speedo's and baring an inordinate amount of crack. None of this would have been remarkable in itself, you see it at every beach resort. What was remarkable was the shade of the chap, he had clearly spent FAR too much time in the sun. So long in fact that, in Nicki's words, he had 'begun to resemble a person of another race', I believe my words were 'one giant malignant melanoma'. In fact, he just looked filthy, as if he's been rolling in mud.

Scary. Clearly the warnings have been passing him by and he's still slathering on the cooking oil.

When the beach ended we visited the Parc de Ciutadella which houses Barcelona Zoo. It was lovely in there, the first thing we came across was the boating lake, then a little way down the path we found the randomly placed 'Mamuth' a large stone mammoth. I'm unsure of the provenance or purpose of this mammoth, but I shall endeavour to find out as I know you're on the edge of your seats. Then you walk around the corner and are faced with the 'Cascada'. This was built for the 1888 Universal Exhibition. It's a Triumphal arch with fountains and waterfalls, decorated with romanesque figures, and what appear to be griffin/s (plural for griffin??). It's gorgeous and very impressive. So impressive that we decided to take a pew at the café and admire it over an Estrella.





Such hard work....sigh.

A wrong turn on the way home takes us past the Arc de Triomf which was cool, we probably wouldn't have seen it otherwise!

The afternoon took us to La Rambla where we'd walked past La Bougeria on a couple of occasions. Neither Nicki nor I can resist a market. It turned out to be a huge food market, and despite the fact that we weren't going to buy anything we had to have a look around. The sheer quantity and variety of fruit, veg, chocolates, cheeses, meats, shellfish and fish on offer was mind-boggling. The shellfish was so fresh that the langoustines were still wriggling.

I really really really wish we had something like that around where I live. I'd be as round as a beachball though....so maybe it's just as well.

Must admit, I didn't care for the tripe or lamb brains....but there's no accounting for taste.

After some food back at the apartment we hit the typical British hangout abroad.....the Irish Bar. Nom nom Guinness, I'd been gagging for one since we'd first walked past the bar on the way to the Cathedral. It was lovely lovely, but marred ever so slightly by the US dick behind us who was on leave from duty in Iraq. He worked in admin and was talking about how he got to stay in an office all the day whereas your 'stupid, average Jo infantryman had to go out and get shot' and 'if you ask me, we're the ones who do all the real work'.

I had to leave before I hit him and slapped the two mental friends hanging off his every word.

We headed to H3 just across the road from our apartments and indulged in the Estrella and more chorizo and Patatas Bravas......nom!!!

Then we crept back to the apartments in complete and utter obedient silence.

Disclaimer!

I've noticed a few people in Spain visiting the old bloggage since I ranted about the theft of my passport yesterday.

I'd just like to point out that...barring that nasty teenager....everyone I met in Spain was delightful and lovely, from Rebecca at the apartments who offered to lend us her own money for a beer until we could get some more out...to the waiter who took the mick out of Nicki picking dregs of meat off her lamb chops.

Barcelona was wonderful, I shall be returning, and the tits are in the vast minority :)

Thankyouplease

Barcelona Day 2 - The day of Discovery

A large portion of today was taken up in the Easy Internet Café and then in the Policia Station. In the Police station we actually had to take a number and sit and wait to be called to a little room to make a report. Now, I'm not sure how this usually works, as I'm not in the habit of having to visit police stations, but this seems extremely organised....perhaps through necessity with 1 in 10 tourists having stuff nicked every day?

We were sandwiched between a grumpy/hungover looking lady with no shoes, dirty feet and massive scratches down her face to the right, and a rather cute spanish gentleman to the left. We took great pains not to make eye contact with the lady...she seemed slightly agitated. The guy eventually started chatting to us, and I think Nicki was quite shocked at how little english he spoke. I know, surprise surprise...we're in Spain, but I think a lot of English people would be the same, especially those who don't travel around very much. We're far too used to being understood! He went through the phrases he knew:

Hello

Goodbye

I love you (?)

Beautiful (seeing a pattern?)

One, two, three, four, five (number of girlfriends he has?)

My name is (Casanova?)

In all seriousness he seemed quite sweet, but thankfully just as the convo was getting a bit awkward...he was pointing at Nicki's rings and asking about husbands....his number was called up...phew.

I'd have taken some pictures, but I was concerned I'd be genuinely arrested for trying to steal governmental secrets...and spend the rest of my holiday in a different part of the police station.

Later that day we went for our first wander around the city, we investigated Barri Gotic (please forgive the lack of accent..I haven't figured it out on pootah) and the La Seu Cathedral. Some of you may know I don't hold with religion, and cathedrals in general only illustrate the grotesque wealth of Catholicism (surpassed only by good old Benedicts BLING BLING), but one cannot help but be impressed by the sheer scale of the place. The architecture is incredible.

Catholicism is certainly alive and kicking in Barcelona, as was evidenced by the priests hearing confession whilst we were there. We walked past one box where the guy had no current customers, and was sat under a reading light with his hands folded, reading a paper. Everything fibre of my being wanted to ask him if I could take a picture of him....but my polite nature took over and I decided it may be too disrespectful. DAMN!!

After Barri Gotic we wandered back towards home and into a bar just across the road called 'Cerversares Ski Bar' for 'dos cervesa'.

This is when we discovered it.....Estrella. Spanish....cheap....and YUMMY!! We fell in love there and then. Plonked there at the bar we drank our beers, ordered some tapas, and some more beers. Semi-cured spanish snozzage and patatas bravas was the order of the day. Must say I was a little disappointed with the patatas, it was essentially chopped-up chips with tommy sauce on! If that's what genuine patatas bravas is like then La Tasca has been spoiling us!

Nicki was perturbed by the indoor smoking, I was a little too. Amazing how quickly you get used to the status quo, it wasn't so long ago smoking was standard in most places in Britain.

That was the proper Spanish experience, sat at a smoky bar, drinking beer, eating tapas and passive smoking......oh yes. I loved it :)

Barcelona Day 1 - Pickpocket Hell

Barcelona Day 1. When I say Day 1, I mean, we landed in Girona at 9pm, so...Day 1 really consists of 21:00-00:00, and yet, such a lot can happen in such a small space of time.

Everyone knows the sensible advice that's given out whenever you go away, make sure your stuff is insured, keep your money in a few different places, not in one wadge together, take some travellers checks and make a note of the numbers, photocopy your passport and keep the copies separately. Etc etc etc. I've been looking at all this advice seriously in terms of the 3 months I'll be in South East Asia next year, but when it came to a week in Barcelona with my sister it all got forgotten.

I'm not sure why this may be, complacency? An ingrained sense of 'nice white Europeans wouldn't really steal from me' that I didn't even know I had? Laziness? Stupidity? A misplaced assumption that just because you'd zipped your bag shut no one would be able to steal from it? Nicki and I were also damned tired and grumpy from travelling all day.

The bloody annoying thing is that we were warned constantly before we left, by people who had been to Barcelona and knew what the place was like. To the point where we were left wondering why people seemed to be being so negative about the place.

Cut to Nicki and I on the Metro. We were knackered having arrived at the airport assuming that because we had flown into Girona airport, that there would be a transfer. There wasn't, and so we'd been on bus, train and were now on the Metro headed for a station that we thought might be near the apartments.

A group of about 6 teenagers get on, I guess they were about 16. They stood behind Nicki and were jostling about a bit in the boisterous way that slightly drunken teenagers do. One stop from ours Nicki looked down and realised her bag was open, and when she looked inside her travel wallet was missing.

This was the travel wallet which contained....wait for it:

-BOTH our passports

-BOTH our money which was due to pay for our accomodation

-Paperwork containing the number and address of our accomodation....you'd be correct in thinking we hadn't written those details down elsewhere....we're WELL clever like that!!

We've never been pickpocketed before and in that initial panic we lost all sense of reason and jumped off the Metro at our stop. Only then did we realise it must have been those bastard kids..no one else had got close enough since the last time Nicki had seen it to have taken it. She was wearing the bag the whole time and it had been zipped shut, but it had been like taking candy from a baby.

It was a bloody shock, but it had happened and we had to deal with it. We found a hotel with an internet connection we could use to find the phone number of the accomodation, got a taxi with the little money I had in my purse, and went to bed hoping all would look brighter in the morning.

Over the following days we sorted out the mess by spending an hour in a police station filing a report, contacting the consulate to organise appointments to collect emergency passports at €79 each, spending a couple of hours faffing around at and around the consulate whilst waiting for the passports to be processed. We also spent far too much time at an internet café photocopying, faxing and looking for details of various people/places in the internet.

In the end everything turned out ok and we managed to get home on the flights we had booked, but the whole thing was a massive waste of time and money. However! We learned some valuable lessons!

-Keep EVERYTHING separate!

-Never buy a travel wallet unless you plan to strap it to the inside of your thigh like a hooker in a Western movie.

-Spanish police people are very friendly

-Keep your bastard bag in front of you and secure at ALL times!

I'm VERY glad I learned these valuable lessons whilst with my sister in Europe...rather than by myself in Siem Reap next year.

Despite the horrideness of this first experience of Barcelona, we did go on to have a lovely time and I will also blog about that I promise! It's up and coming ladies and genst, I have some lovely pictures (mostly of beer) for you to peruse :).

Love love x

Day 2 - Jaunty Italian Policemen

I have resolved to try and use a little more basic Italian, thus far I have mostly got by with broken english, It's mostly a self-conciousness thing, I think they might laugh at my exceptionally poor Italian, and all the while my brain is shouting 'IT'S POLITE! THEY'LL APPRECIATE YOUR EFFORTS!!' I won't let logic take over. It would be lovely to remain blissfully ignorant and safe in the long-held belief of all English people that everyone should be able to speak english, but I know it's rude.....gah!

Today I shall speak more Italian!

Such resolve as I have was brought about by a painful telephone incident this morning. I woke up and my phone was telling me it was 19:05. Impossible! But in my bleary morning haze I was confused and decided to call reception and find out what the time was. It took so much slow explanation and broken english to explain I just wanted the time, when all I should have said was 'A che ora?' or something along those lines and I'd have got there quicker. She then told me the wrong time anyway and I called 123 lol!

Yeah, you can get 123 in Italy! I was amazed too.

..................................................

It's now 8:35am and I'm at breakfast, Italiano primo colazione, which is basically croissants and coffee. The croissants were ickle and I wasn't sure how many I was allowed, so I stole 2 and moved furtively away before being accused of being a chunky croissant thief.

Now croissants aren't good for the old diet anyway, and as it turned out one was full of what I can only describe as custard, but with a lemony tang to it. I SWEARZ I didn't know when I picked it up. Delicious, but how long will it sustain my trek around the sights today?

They're sneaky, put everything on the room so they hope you lose track and have to pay an extortionate bill when you check out. I'm onto their game.

For my next Italian speaking foray I shall book my shuttlebus for Saturday to Rome Termini at the reception desk.....wooohay.

'Er..........un.......shuttlebus (that doesn't sound italian!), Sabato, alle otto per favore

...............................................

*cut to me outside the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II*

Ahh, I have found a shady spot on a stone bench just next to the monument, I haven't been to look at it yet. I wonder if I'll see the changing of the guard this time? This is what I call it as I'm english and everything is english.

Big fail on the shuttlebus front, after deploying my faultless pigeon-Italian the receptionist replies in faultless english that you can only book the day in advance.......buggery!

My journey in felt like my commute to work, bus to the tube station, tube to town. One of the most surreal experiences the whole holiday was when I emerged from Metro B tube stop 'Colosseo'. As you walk out of the exit there's the colosseum right away, rearing up in front of you, surrounded by morning traffic, there's a ring road running all around it. Beeping cars and tourist buses swarm around it like insects while it sits there, majestic and eternal, chilling out. It was already quite buy even at 10am which is about the time I arrived, and there were plenty of tour guides trying to nobble you as you wandered across the road towards the sleeping giant.

Apparently the colosseum was one of the first places where allocated ticketing was employed. An advanced system showing your row and seat number and allocated entrance number was issued, and this allowed them to seat 50,000 people in 20 minutes through 79 separate entrances.

I took a walk around the colosseum in the morning sun and took lots of pictures as is my joy, and then made my way towards the ruins of the roman forum.

The ruins of the Foro Romano are on your left hand side as you walk up Via dei Fori Imperiali towards the Monumento Vittorio Emaunele. The Roman Forum was the economic, religious and judicial epicentre of Rome, built between the Capitoline hill and the Palatine hill. It began to fall into disrepair even within the 8th century, much as the Empire itself had begun to.

The portico you see to the far right is the remains of the Temple of Saturn, built between 501 and 498BC. It was built as a tribute to the agricultural deity Saturn, but was also used as somewhat of a treasury, holding the gold and silver of the state, and official state documents and insignia.

I can't quite decide if this is the remains of the Temple of Castor and Pollux (the two twins of Gemini, sons of Zeus), or of Vespasian and Titus. More research required!

I was by now mostly relieved at the fact that I'd managed to dodge the 'centurions' wandering around trying to charge you for having photos taken with them on your own camera! How cheeky is that? I bet they make a mint too. I wasn't approached by any this time, I think I had my best I'm walking, don't mess with me, face on. I only saw them at the colosseum last time, this time they were absolutely everywhere, obviously a lucrative rackett.

Just got screwed for a bottle of water, €2, thieving gypsy bastards! Actually, he wasn't a gypsy, and probably not a bastard, teach me not to bring my own water out though.

Rightho! Off to check out King Emanueles Monumento.

.......................................

*cut to me now sat in the portico of the Pantheon*

Ooooooh, I'm sat on the base of one of the pillars of the Pantheon portico. Something I haven't mentioned is that I have a biiig hole in my jeans crotch that I forgot about when I put them on....argh. Every time I sit down I imagine this hole creeping bigger and bigger, right up me bum so everyone can see my sexy knickers.

The Monument was cool, though many locals consider it an eyesore, large, square and glaringly white, it's visible from many places in Rome. As you may have already gathered, it's a monument to King Emanuele II who was the first king of a unified Italy. As well as many sculptures including the controvertial bronze of Victor Emanuele himself, the monument contains the 'Tomb of the unknown soldier' and an eternal flame. After WWI, the remains of a soldier were chosen from 11 unidentified bodies, he was placed in the monument in a funeral ceremony on 4th Nov 1921.

There are policemen guarding the tomb and the flame, and it seems they enjoy striking incredibly camp/jaunty poses.....SO Italian :)

This is considered a sacred place and it's an offence to sit or lay on the steps, smoke, drink or 'pet'. Damn....all my favourite things!

Tip - when looking up to take a picture of a statue from directly underneath, brace yourself against a wall,or you may find yourself falling backwards....ahem.

I found my way to the Pantheon without getting lost! The great thing about Italian cities is that they're so easy to navigate. Sitting here I have pigeons pecking around my feet, bugger off!! I swear it's just like London.

The first thing I did was to ignore the Pantheon completely and head to my favourite Gelaterie. 3 scoops, novella, cioccolato and crema. The novella is like the inside of a Ferrero Roche.....divine! She also gave me a free bottle of water....how nice....maybe I looked like a dehydrated piece of leather. So I went and sat in Piazza della Rotunda which is where the Pantheon lives and ate my gelato.

I was MOST upset to spy a McDonalds......right opposite the Pantheon. This place is an old/ancient temple, built around 125AD dedicated to all the Roman Gods.......and someone has built a MACDONALDS opposite it. Consul Agrippa must be turning in his grave.

Now it is used as a Christian church, but still contains the tombs of various people including old Victor Emanuele and Raffaele, the famous artist/architect. One of the most striking features is the oculus in the centre of the perfectly round ceiling, letting spirits out or God in? I canny remember.

This last one is my view from my perch on the Pantheon pillar. Hang on.....someone....somewhere.. is playing 'My Way' on a concertina. There are many many tour groups around in all the places I've visited so far, each tour guide has a stick, and they each tie something different onto the end of their stick and wave it around in the air so their crowd know where they are. You know, like a teatowel or a pair of knickers.

I think I'll leave it there for now before you all fall alseep....I'll pretend you didn't do that half an hour ago!

Day 1 - The Journey is half the adventure!!......Bo**ocks!

Argh!

I was all set, all set and confident and ready to get the bus from the airport to Piazza Whatsitsname, Metro B to Ponte Mammolo and the 508 to the hotel.

That was, until I got to the airport and couldn't make head nor tail of the place. Where to these mythical buses stop? Does my freshly purchased 2 day travelcard get me on that big Cotral bus that stops outside? Surely this place has a cash machine! After having roused myself at 3am in order to catch my taxi, train and plane on time, and after 45minutes of wandering around a strange airport I gave in. I'll go to the station and get a train. It's more expensive, but hey, it'll get me to Termini, I'll know what to do from there.

Once I've found the station I wander up to Information and ask whether my travelcard will get me on the train to Termini. 3 Italian men look up at me and frown, shake their heads, 'No no no no no no no', in a fashion vaguely reminiscent of the Vicar of Dibley.

*sigh*

'Where you go?'

'Oh, a LONG way, but once I get to Termini I'll know what I'm doing'

'Where you go?'

*furtive roll of eyes* 'You know the Roma Congress?'

'Via Prenenstina?'

'Yes'

'Is far, you sure you want train? It's a long time, get the shuttle, €30'

'I'm on a budget'

*shrug, pout* '€12 to Termini alone, we take you the whole way for €30, door to door'

Who can resist the Italian shrug? I've never come across anything else which put across the 'YOU FOOL' concept better than that. I gave in and the shuttle driver appeared a few minutes later and led myself and an older couple down to his minibus.

Being the sharp thing that I am, I twig the older couples US accents, oh yes, I have ears. All is peaceful initially, then I feel a pat on the shoulder:

'So where you from da'al?'

'Oh, er, I'm from London'

'LONDON? How lovely!'

'Where are you guys from?'

'Oh we're from the US, Indiana'

The rest of the conversation revolved around the difference in cost between me visiting Rome and them visiting. I think my flights with Easyjet came to about £60 all told, theirs cost $1000 a piece! Hence they were travelling Italy for 40 days. Despite their ages (63 and 65) I got the impression that they were a relatively new couple, she had been to Rome before with her ex husband and kids. I also got the impression that the guy was perhaps a less than willing travel partner, a fact that she chose to ignore, 'I've been to 23 countries!!' she proudly proclaimed.

I never caught their names, but they seemed a nice couple.

They got dropped off somewhere close to central Rome and we started the trip to my hotel. It went on, and on, and on, and on, and on........................and on. The further we got from the centre of Rome the more I began to despair, how was I going to do this trip every day without driving? I also became increasingly amazed that I was only being charged €30. At the end of the day, despite my silent cursing of the Italian trio at 'Informazione' (shuttlebus company in disguise), I'm glad I took that shuttlebus. Had I taken a bus to the hotel I would have missed the stop I needed, wandered around helpless for a while and finally collapsed in a ditch somewhere. What kept me going was the thought of the hotel in Florence, a stones throw from the station and the centre.

Once we finally arrived at the hotel and I checked in, I just felt like crawling into bed and staying there for 3 days, but fear not, after a shower and a chnage of clothes (immediately feeling human again) I trotted downstairs to harangue the hotel staff about local public transport. They had a leaflet explaining that they had daily shuttlebuses to Rome Centrale €4 each way, and I was almost resigned to paying this every day. Then I grew some balls and thought 'No!! I have this bloddy travelcard, I'm going to use it!' but not yet, I went for food first :o)

They have a snack bar at the hotel 'Zero Sei', or 'Zero Six', I don't know either. The lovely little chappy serving said his special today was lasagne with chicken salad, my tummy grumbled a yes in reply and I sat down to wait for my meal. Espresso for afterwards. If you just order a 'normal' coffee in Italy you get an espresso. If you want a long coffee you have to order Caffe Americano. I was a bit high after my caffeine hit, but that didn't stop me going back to laze around in my room for a bit. It was late afternoon and I wasn't sure I had the strength or enthusiasm to trek into Rome at this time of the day, so I spent some time planning what I'd do with my whole days to explore. Here is what I came up with:

Thursday: Colosseo, Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II via the ruins of the Foro Romano, Pantheon and then Piazza Novona.

Friday: Piazza St Pietro and the Vatican City, Castel S. Angelo, Fontana di Trevi, Piazza de Spagne and Villa Borghese.

You like my pik-tures? :o) ha ha.

I was ready to faff around all evening, but then a terrifying thought struck me....shite! The good thing about the travelcards here is that you buy them, and then you validate them the first time ou use them, and they're valid for however long after that, mine for 2 days. However, you have to validate them within 24 hours of purchase. I bought mine at 10:30am, which meant that I'd have to be up and out and on the bus before 10:30am in the morning. Chances are that I would be, but I'll be damned if I'm setting my alarm on holidays, and you never know how late I might sleep. Gave me the kick I needed to egt my ass out of the hotel room and go exploring.

On my first go I missed the bus-stop completely, so concerned was I at the lack of pavement, and the prolific spread of broken glass in conjunction with my sandaled feet. Anyone who has crossed a road in Italy must realise how nuts it is to be walking down the side of a busy street with NO pavement! I eventually found it on my walk back up towards the hotel, and jumped on the next 508 to validate my ticket. Seeing as I was on the bus now I thought I'd check out this Ponte Mammolo and the Metro B. Turns out it exists!! Huzzah.

I got back to the hotel quite pleased with my activity and cursing the sun. It was still very warm even at about 7 in the evening, and my sun lotion was very greasy. People had been using my forehead as a mirror all day.

The outward journey was done, looking forward to my first day of adventure tomorrow.

Blog of Travelment

Hello thar :o)

Just a little pre-word to warn you that this won't be a continuously regular bloggage. It'll be visited and updated as and when I travel anywhere and take one million photographs as I tend to do.

My most recent travels have been to Italy, or Rome and Florence specifically. While I was there I kept a travel journal, which I shall now transfer to blog for your viewing pleasure (or boredom, you decide!).

One only hopes you enjoy x