Adiós Barcelona!

Hóla my fellow adventurer, Adiós from Barcelona!

Well my fellow adventurer it looks like the time has come for me to say goodbye to Barcelona! Since arriving on January 16th (at night), so really since exploring the city starting on January 17th, I have seen so much, I can't believe my time here is already finished!

But not to worry, as I previously mentioned in my 'Hóla from Barcelona' post, my little vacation away from Scotland is not over yet, for I am leaving Spain but headed to another country where I will spend the rest of my week/weekend!

My time here in Spain has been quite the whirlwind journey! Since arriving, on Saturday the 17th I visited Casa de les Punxes and Casa Milá, on Sunday the 18th I visited the La Sagrada Familia and Font Magica de Montjuic, on Monday the 19th I visited Casa Batlló and ate at a street market, and on Friday the 20th I visited Park Güell (the photo above was taken of me sitting on the colorful wall located inside the park)! To say the least, I pretty much visited all there is to possibly see tourist wise in the city!

Now if I am being completely honest with you my fellow adventurer, upon arrival to Barcelona I had this idea in my head that the city would aesthetically embody many of the historical Mediterranean cultural architectural aspects that I have either seen in movies (such as the Cheetah Girls), envisioned in my own mind through songs (such as Barcelona by Ed Sheeran), or see through google images, all creating this vivid exotic city landscape in my head. Don't get me wrong, Barcelona is BEAUTIFUL, I greatly enjoyed my time in the city, exploring all the houses/ historical landmarks there was to see, BUT I will admit that upon arrival my brain suffered a bit of a meltdown due to the fact that in person the city was not what I had pictured it in my mind to be. However, please don't get me wrong, I had the best time exploring and an even better time taking lots of photos, I just feel the need to say out loud that perhaps my 'Hollywood', 'romanticized', 'google image' ideal

reconstruction/expectations of Barcelona were not as accurate as I had expected.

With that being said and off my chest, I don't want you to get the idea that Barcelona is still not beautiful, because it is! Perhaps a good way to describe the city is to say it is Spain's equivalent city to New York back in the States.

Every morning after having breakfast at my hotel, I would immediately walk outside onto one of the main shopping streets, filled with souvenir stands, fresh food markets and LOTS of Gelato (I may have had one or two cups during my stay... hehe!

Just like in New York City, in Barcelona there is a high-end shopping district that has every designer name a girl could ever dream of affording such as Burberry, Valentino, Coach and Louis Viton! But now what would a high-end shopping district be if it didn’t have a fancy MacDonald’s tucked in between the Mandarin Oriental Hotel and

Tiffany’s! One thing's for sure, where ever you go, no matter the country, you can always almost bet on finding a Starbucks or McDonalds to complete the scenery!

As I would walk down the street, I constantly found myself looking at the buildings (of course checking for cars before I crossed intersections), but more so I was looking up at the balcony’s, terraces and apartments that seemed to go on for ages like green vinery above the busy pedestrian sidewalks!

Can you imagine living in one of those apartments right above the shopping district streets! Can you image how expensive it must be for people to live smack dab in the middle of the city or even how small the interior must be on the inside!

Sometimes as I walk I like to image what the local people’s lives may be like, I like to make up names for dogs I see, create whole family scenarios as couples walk by and even pretend to ‘house hunt’ as I take photos of the scenery around me! Hey, a girl, can only dream! Perhaps I watch too much HGTV, but aside from traveling I have always had a passion for interior design and real-estate, so while

walking around Barcelona I often pretended I was on ‘House Hunters International’, it was fun and exciting!

Looking back on the past few days, I can confidently say I had a great time in Barcelona and hope to return to Spain again someday! Filled with lots of adventure, colors, food and friends, I know I will always remember my stay here in the Mediterranean! So as I make my way to the airport, ready to depart for my next trip, I will leave you with this final thought my fellow adventurer, keeping my next destination a secret for now, guess you will just have to wait and see where the next winds of the Mediterranean take me; should you ever find yourself in Spain, one of my greatest wishes for you is to find your way to Barcelona, experience all of the monuments I visited, dance in front of the ‘magic fountain’, eat some gelato and take in all the stunning views, perhaps even eat a paella dish or two!

Until next time…

Cheers,

Meghan Chayka