Dobry
Den! This weeks blog is going to be about my spring break.
On
Sunday, April 15th, at about 1:00 am, my girlfriend, Faviola Seiler,
and I landed in the airport in Barcelona, Spain. We just left Venice where we
had a class field trip. I thought it would be a good idea to save some money
and just spend the night in the airport. It was the opposite of a good idea. I
obviously haven’t learned from my mistakes here. So now we are trying to find a
place to sleep in this airport, and it seems like nothing is going to work. The
floor was disgusting so that option was out. The chairs were also really
uncomfortable no matter what position you sat in. However, the worst part was
how unbelievably cold it was. I was not expecting it to be cold in Madrid in
mid-April. I took clothes out of my suitcase just so I could stop from
shivering. Luckily, that was probably the worst part of our spring break.
Once
the sun came up, everything was so much better. I was no longer freezing, and we
also ran into our good friend, Laura Hawk, in the airport. She was also
studying abroad, but she was with a different program in Ireland.
After
saying goodbye to our friend, we went to our hostel. For the next couple of hours,
we decided to get some rest because we did not get enough sleep in the airport.
The afternoon came around we thought we deserved some time at the beach. We
packed up our towels and swim suits and headed out. Once we got to the beach,
we quickly discovered we wouldn’t need the towels we brought. The water was so
cold. I could barely stand in the shallow water on the shore for more than a
couple of minutes. We still made the best out of it by collecting sea shells
and getting some much needed sun.
The
next day we got up to switch hostels because we couldn’t book either one for
our entire stay. It was pretty nice this way though. We were close to the beach
our first day, and we would be more in town for the rest of our stay. After we
checked into our second hostel, we decided to head for the gothic quarter. It
is an older part of town that was built in the gothic period. However, we
learned that it was remodeled to look even more gothic pretty recently to
attract more tourists. While in the gothic quarter, we stopped by the Barcelona
Cathedral and a museum of the famous architect Antoni Gaudi. We spent the rest
of our time looking for food and souvenirs. That night, we went out on a pub
crawl, and we met a couple guys from Mexico. We then took a midnight stroll
along the beach to get back to our hostel.
Barcelona Cathedral
On
Tuesday, we got up early and went to the famous Park Guell. This is a park that
was designed by Antoni Gaudi as a sort of beautiful high class neighborhood.
Sadly, only one of the sixty plots were ever sold due to the fact that the area
was so far from the city of Barcelona. However, they still built the rest of
the entrances and service areas. This is why it is such a tourist attraction
now. It is a beautiful park with a lot of Gaudi’s designs, but it is public
because only a couple people live here today. Here are a few photos:
We
spent the rest of the day on an adventure. You see, I found out that Barcelona
had a certain restaurant that I had not eaten from in many weeks. Taco Bell. We
searched all across town for this restaurant. My maps app only showed one of
the three locations and the location it showed was actually a couple blocks off
of it’s target. We were not deterred. We found our wonderful Taco Bell in a
nearby shopping mall. It was arguably the best food I had in Spain. And to top
off this wonderful meal, they served beer. It was not the best beer, but it was
beer.
This adventure ended up costing us
the rest of our afternoon, but we didn’t have anything else planned for the
evening. We spent the rest of the night at the beach just sitting in the sand
watching planes come in to the airport one after the other.
Wednesday
rolled around and it was our last day in Barcelona. We got up early to get
tickets to go into Sagrada Familia. It’s a good thing we got up when we did
because the earliest ticket we could buy was for 5:00 pm. We spent the day
wandering around to see the rest of the sights and we also took a free walking
tour around some of the older places in Barcelona including where they have all
of their protests today. We even stumbled across one. After some more site-seeing,
we went back to Sagrada Familia. This is a church that was designed by Gaudi
and began construction in 1915. It is supposed to be finished in 2026. We were
lucky enough to get inside and see how beautiful it is. I have already made a
promise to go back when it is finished.
Inside Sagrada Familia. This is to show Gaudi's use of natural lighting to make a room colorful
After
Sagrada familia, we hopped on an overnight bus and went to Madrid. We arrived
in Madrid at about 6:30 in the morning. After we got there we decided to hit
the ground running. We were only going to be in Madrid for a day so we had to
make the most of it. We stopped at all of the major sites. First we walked by
Plaza de Cibeles which was under construction and could not be viewed at the
time. We then went to the Crystal Palace which is a glass and metal structure
built in Buen Retiro Park. After this we walked to Puerta Del Sol and Plaza
Mayor. These are both famous squares that are in the heart of Madrid. A quick
walk again and we were at the Royal Palace of Madrid. This palace was originally
a fortress but was expanded over the centuries and became the capital of the
Spanish Empire. We then went to the Temple of Debod which is an Egyptian temple
that was dismantled and rebuilt in Spain.
The Crystal Palace
Royal Palace of Madrid
After
all of this site-seeing we finally visited our reason for going to Madrid. The
museum of the Americas. While I was having a lot of fun before, this was where
Faviola really wanted to go while we were in Spain. This museum talked a lot
about the Spanish discovery of the Americas and talked about the history and culture
that was across the Atlantic as well. This was Fav’s favorite place to visit
and we actually ended up getting kicked out because they were closing, and she
was taking so long. After the museum we went to the place I wanted to visit. Las
Ventas in Plaza de Toros. This is a famous bullfighting ring that was built because
Madrid needed a bigger one. While it is still used for bullfights today, the
building is also used for other events such as concerts and even tennis
matches. Sadly, we arrived to Las Ventas too late and could not get in. We were
still able to walk around it and see all of the statues dedicated to
bullfighters.
Plaza de Toros de Las Ventas
The
next morning, we headed to Paris. We landed in an airport just outside of Paris
and didn’t get into the city until one or two in the afternoon. We checked into
our hostel and went straight to the Louvre. The largest art museum in the world,
and it was free for us as students. We walked as fast as we could to see the
famous Mona Lisa painting. It was much smaller than I thought it would be. It
was also surrounded by many other paintings that I thought were much more
beautiful. But what do I know. Anyway, we then spent the rest of our time
walking around admiring the other beautiful pieces of art the museum had to
offer.
The famous Mona Lisa
Faviola and I standing in the pyramid outside of the Louvre
We then spent the rest of our night
walking to the Eiffel tower. It was dark now so the tower was lit up in a way
that made it glow. Faviola and I shared a romantic meal just a couple blocks
away from the tower. We then decided to call it a night.
The next morning, we got up and
enjoyed a French breakfast at a café. After learning that it would take a whole
day to see the Palace of Versailles, we decided to make the most of our time
and visit the rest of Paris instead. We ventured over to the Statue of Liberty.
Many bad jokes about being in New York later, we walked around and did some
souvenir shopping. After this we made our way to the Basilica of the Sacred
Heart which looks over the city of Paris. We then walked by the famous cabaret
Moulin Rouge. After this, we did a little more shopping before it started to
get dark. That night we enjoyed a romantic picnic in front of the Eiffel Tower.
We had some wine and sandwiches while the Eiffel Tower was lit up. The tower
would then sparkle every hour which was one of the most beautiful things I had
ever seen. We finished our picnic and went back to our hostel for the night.
Statue of Liberty in Paris
Moulin Rouge Cabaret
Basilica of the Sacred Heart
The Eiffel Tower Sparkling
The next morning, we woke up in a
bit of a frenzy. We discovered that we forgot to book our flight home. Sadly,
the cheapest flight we could get would cut our day shorter than we had planned.
We hurried over to Notre-Dame Cathedral and made our way inside. It was a
massive cathedral in beautiful gothic style. After this we had to hurry to the
airport so we wouldn’t miss our flight. While I had wanted to visit the famous
catacombs of Paris, I was content with the idea that I would just have to come
back to this beautiful city.
Sunday night, April 22nd, Faviola and I landed back in Prague and then hopped on a train back to
Olomouc. Spring Break was a great trip for my girlfriend and I. While we didn’t
get the chance to see everything we wanted, we still enjoyed the heck out of these
beautiful cities. Besides, I have so many reasons to come back to Europe now. I
can’t wait for my next adventure. Na Shledanou!
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