Day 2: The Holiday

I opted out of the run this morning. I did make it to breakfast though in the hotel. (couldnt miss out on that could we!?) It was even better than any of us expected. They had an assortment of cheeses (even brie!!), meats (not that it matters to me), cereal, scrambled eggs, hardboiled eggs, fruit, dried fruit, nuts, desserts, coffee, and juice. It is quite delicious to say the least. We even took some fruit and nuts back with us to the room to save for the beach. Oh yes, thats right. We are finally going to the beach! I have only been talking about the beach since I saw it on the plane ride in. The water is absolutely beautiful and the mountains are right there!

The group (the Fantastic Four, tyler, kyle, kyle 2.o, eric, scott, josh) walked down La Rambla to the beach. It is amazing. I am sure that the buildings between the beach and the mountains were hotels and condos, you just cant tell because they are not as gaudy (not to be confused with Gaudi, the arcitect I saw yesterday) as the hotels on the beach in america. Oh yes, there were topless ladies on the beach. I probably saw more boobs today that I have seen in my entire life. It wasn't a nude beach, just normal spain. I went on a walk with Tyler and Kyle and then another later with Nina. Kyle, Tyler, and I went for a swim as well. Not quite as voluntarily as I wanted since the water was absolutely freezing. Lets just say I got guilted/pulled a bit. They may not put ice in their drinks in Spain, but they sure do in their sea!

We spent alot of the day laying on the beach and people watching (which sounds creepy only because I said there were so many topless ladies, but we spent the time looking at all the different TYPES of people on the beach.) The walks were the most relaxing part to me because you hear the ocean. When you lay on the beach you hear "massagheys, massagheys" and "soda, fresca, beer, aqua" over and over again. I felt like I was at a baseball game with people constantly screaming "coldbeer, coldbeer". The weather could not have been better though. The sun was warm, but there was a cool breeze. We packed sandwiches with the stuff we had bought for dinner the night before for lunch along with the fruit and nuts we took from breakfast. ("borrowed" not stolen of course!)

I heard music when we were laying on the beach and decided I wanted to go explore. The girls and Kyle 2.0 went with me to follow the music. We turn onto a street and see a parade! There is a HUGE HUGE parade in Barcelona right next to the beach for the holiday. (we are still not sure what the holiday is for..) There are drummers and trombones, trumpets, and others. There are also people dancing and in costume. The parade in many streets wide and they dont go in a straight route. There are even fireworks at the end of random streets. There is so much culture at the parades. Everyone in the parade, and many people on the sides are dancing and of course we joined right in! The whole group ended up watching parts of the parade before trying to find dinner.

For dinner I ordered pizza (in spanish) and wine (surprise?) with Tyler and Kyle. The lady at the stand only spoke spanish.. which is new experience for me. Me gusta uno "points finger" y vino "points again" gracis. On the group's walk back to the metro (which is finally fixed and means we can take the same metro all the way home, and it will only take 30 minutes, instead of having to take a metro-bus-metro again) I needed to use the restroom. Tyler and I both needed to but of course there is no restroom to be found. Not even one you can pay for! Do Eurpeans never have to pee? We finally went into an office max like place. I asked for a bathroom (in spanish) and bought a pen (also in spanish). The guy thankfully let me use the restroom, but of course I walked by the public one and used the employees only restroom- not knowing this until he told me when I got out. oops.

Tyler and I did not see the group when we got out and so we took the metro by ourselves back. That sounded alot easier than what really happened. We went down to the metro to realize that we didnt know which one exactly was the one we wanted. We then went back upstairs and found the one we came out of (that we have been using) and took that down. We then had to read 2 signs to figure out where to go. After our 30 minute ride we exited "Universitat Automa" which is our university. Funny thing: you are supposed to exit BEFORE that exit for the hotel. We walk around lost in the dark for probably 40 minutes because the maps are confusing and I am terrible and visualizing them. We somehow made it back. (clearly)

Tomorrow is the first day of school. I am waking up in 6.5ish hours to walk and do yoga with the girls. I am off to bed since it doesn't seem possible to get a normal nights rest here :) When in Spain right? Adios amigo y familia! (impressive.. I know!)