Una mas, por favor

If you have a list of things to do in your life before you die get ready to add one more: Go to Barecelona. Tom and I spent a week and we did just about everything we enjoy most; relaxed on the beach looking out over blue waters, rented motos and zipped around the city (including the highway; oops!), rode on a gondola ride to the top of Mt. Juic, went to the movies, took a tram car to Tebidabo (the amusement park on the top of a mountain) and spent many, many hours sleeping in, enjoying the sights and multiple pitchers of sangria inbetween. We also completed the Spanish triatholon in our spare time, there was just no stopping us. But when asked by a newcomer what he should do in the few days he had to see the city, Tom's reply was flawless, "Come with someone you love." We could have met under a bridge in Brooklyn and I would have had an amazing time, it is not where you go, but who you choose to go with that matters the most.

Now, if you have that part figured out, take them to Barcelona. I promise to post pictures the minute I can along with a few very choppy home videos because you just have to see this place to believe it. We walked throughout the entire city in about an hour and our hotel was about a 20 min. walk to the beach. A walk through narrow spanish streets, passed ancient ornate churches, under archways with saints carved into their sides and alongside rows and rows of palm trees. Of course it was very rarely a straight shot as we were constantly distracted by the endless line of tapas bars along the waters edge that advertised generally the same menu everywhere of calamari, spanish sausage, tapas bravas (fried potatoes with a spicy creamy sauce)and of course the staple of sangria. It was really quite amazing how the sangria worked well with every meal, from the lunch time tapas, to the evening tapas to the dinner of paella or seafood. Notice I skipped over breakfast, which we literally did without fail every day as we went to bed around 3am and rolled out of our hotel close to noon. We didn't even try to rebel against the established schedule which would start serving dinner around 10pm and end close to 1am. The euro's value certainly tried to rain on our parade at 1.44 to the dollar. But we prevailed by buying groceries for lunch and a bottle of rum for the hotel.

The language proved slightly difficult as well with the local dialect resembling my archnemesis of 'Quebecoise.' When I went to Montreal I thought it would be the perfect time to practice my french. Only upon arrival did I realize that they could be speaking japanese for all I knew because it was not french, it was 'Quebecoise'. To the local population their dialect of french was the original language since France had become trainted by American and english influence. But to anyone who has studied the language that is recognized by the National Language Asssociation, they were speaking jibberish. So this was the kink that made things interesting for Tom whose spanish was immpecable, but Catalan, was apparently not up to par. We asked our waitress on day one for a new glass as mine had mysteriously become full of orange and lemon peels, her response, 'No, I don't know where that is' and she was off. When we wanted to know what time the amusement park on top of Tibidabo closed we were informed it will open at 5pm. At 4:55 we were suspicious when the bar we were waiting at started to close and people started to board the last tram car down. 5 minutes later the loudspeakers confirmed our doubts as they announced the park was closed... maybe the park attendants should understand spanish, just a thought. But we worked around it by avoiding people from Barcelona and finding any english speakers we could, we're crafty like that. And of course we understood the only phrase really necessary; one more please. As in, one more pitcher of sangria, or one more beer, however you phrased it, it worked just fine.

Whether it was having dance parties in our room, walking along the boardwalk, sipping sangria and looking out onto the ocean, or having picnics on the beach; all in all it was easily one of the greatest vacations I have ever had. With the weather at a consistent 80 and sunny we had the luck of the irish with us the whole way. I am looking forward though to many more adeventures with the man who chose to bring me, my best friend, my everything, who reminded me that this is not monopoly money. Thank you.