First stop: Barcelona

Just a quick update. Hilary and I flew to Barcelona on April 2nd and had an absolute blast there. We stayed with an awesome host named Paloma who we found on couchsurfing.org. She was so gracious and kind and showed us what Spain was all about. Our first night there she took us out with her friends and we met another couchsurfer, Miguel, from Madrid. They taught us a lot about the Spanish culture which was awesome. Our second day we went to Park Guell, where I had gone 4 years ago. We walked there and it was quite the hike up a fairly steep mountain but made for a fun adventure. It was a hot beautiful day and Hilary and I were snapping pictures left and right. Miguel called us and we took the Metro to meet him at La Rambla for lunch. It was a busy day there and he showed us around and what was good. Hilary and I walked to Casa Batllo after saying goodbye to Miguel and also saw Casa Mila by Antoni Gaudi on our walk home to Paloma's. That night we went out to eat with Paloma's good friend Carlos who also had a couchsurfer with him named Kayla. We had tapas at a nice restaurant and then they took us out salsa dancing at one of their favorite places. They are both SO good! They go multiple times a week and it was so awesome to watch. Carlos tried teaching me but I don't think I was born with that Latin feel. The next day we just knew we wanted to see the beach so we started walking there. On the way we saw the Arc de Triomf which was pretty cool and stumbled upon a nice park. It was another gorgeous hot day and we laid around the palm trees for awhile. We saw the Barcelona Zoo but didn't go in and walked around it to get to a bridge that crossed the train yard. The bridge was awesome and had a concrete park on top of it! It had a river running through and awesome playground equipment including a teeter totter Hilary and I could not get enough of. We finally made it to the beach after that and laid out for awhile in the sun and people watched. We ate at a little cafe on the water and it was delicious. We walked back around the harbor to La Rambla where the Christopher Columbus statue was and walked down the crowded street another time. The market was open that day so we took a stroll through the yummy looking fruits and vegetables and bought a very delicious fresh strawberry smoothie. After that we were tired and decided to take the Metro back to Paloma's instead of walking. We just chatted and hung out that night and made friendship bracelets for our gracious host. The next day Hilary and I were off to Marseille France! I'll post about that later, in the meantime check out my pictures on facebook of our recent travels!