We are leaving Barcelona in the morning. What a great time it has been. Now that we are actually on the road, living from our packs, and exploring the unknown, we have a lot more pictures and stories to share. So without further delay, we present to you some of our favorite parts of this amazing city.
Gaudi
What a guy! The famous Spanish architect, Antoni Gaudi, drew much of his inspiration from nature’s constructive beauty. Through this revolutionary style of design, he made so many incredible contributions to Barcelona. He has even made Amy’s “Top 5 list of people to bring back from the dead to have dinner with.” We dedicated one full day to exploring Gaudi’s contributions, including two of his most famous works El Templo de La Sagrada Familia and Parc Güell.
Mercats
We spent a ton of our time in Barcelona simply walking around the city. While not high on the list of must sees for most tourists, we found the neighborhood “mercats” in Barcelona to be a bright point of our time here. While exploring a quaint old part of town known as La Barceloneta, we encountered our first mercat. Imagine the produce section of Whole Foods on steroids. These are different than the make-shift, bazar style markets that you find in much of the world. They are a well built structure, clean/sanitary, and packed with some of the best food we have ever seen. Upon returning from Barceloneta, we found a very similar mercat just a few blocks from our hostel in the neighborhood know as El Clot. Since we had access to a full service kitchen at our hostel, we took advantage of the incredible produce, meats and seafood to cook affordable and yummy dinners.
Sitges
After a few days in Barcelona, we were eager to get out of the city and see more of Catalonya. Based on a suggestion from Mike’s cousin, Lilli, we hopped on a train one morning headed towards Sitges. Sitges is a pristine beach town, just 30 minutes south from Barcelona via a regional train along the coast. Shortly after arriving, we stopped for breakfast where Mike enjoyed toast with “pata negra” ham, the most delicious cured meat he has ever tasted, and Amy a cafe con leche y croissant. We had a fabulous time strolling the beach and walking through the narrow, well kept streets. It was a welcomed change from the hustle and bustle of Barcelona.
Tomorrow evening we will be boarding a cruise to Spain’s Canary Islands, Portugal’s Madeira Islands and Málaga/Granada. We found a killer deal on this cruise before leaving the States and it is an exciting change from hostel living! Looking forward to sharing our travels upon our arrival to Valencia following the cruise. Salud!