Right after work Friday my co-worker, Thea, drove me to Manchester's airport and I ran to the RyanAir queue destined for the land of sunshine, gorgeous men and LOTS of misunderstandings.
[I need to learn another language.]
Saturday morning Dani left for a birthday celebration with his friends and was kind enough to leave his keys as I set out to hit the beach, explore the city and hopefully cross paths with Shmel. It was incredible feeling WARMTH again! Reminded me of home...
Lo and behold I DID get in touch with Antonela and her travel buddies! We met up on the beach and spent hours sunbathing and catching up. It was glorious. Then we headed off to meet up with another of their friends and grab some tapas and sangria [I know, I know- so Spanish of us].
Miami Heat vs. LA Lakers on Barca's beach... wha?
One of my favorite sights in Barca- I love all of the sailboats.
SHMEL! FINALLY! And her friends Velina and, our designated photog, Sasha.
After walking basically the whole city we managed to make our way back to Dani's, drop of his keys, get my luggage and go to their hostel near La Rambla. Oh our poor feet. We couldn't get heels on for our night out so we put on some tight skirts and bandaids-with-flats [gotta compensate somewhere...] and made our way to the Hard Rock to catch a bus to a night of Sonar at La Terrazza... only the bus never came. SO we hailed a taxi, cut lines, negotiated, and pushed our way into the little mountain city. At some point Shmel and I got on the topic of McDonalds and we could not be satiated until we got some damn food. We walked back to town and... BARCELONA. HOW can a city that has a club culture of 7am departures not have any food places open past 11 o'clock at night?!! Not even a 24 hour fast food place! Ludicrous!
We settled on stand munchies and made our way home. I got a solid two hours of sleep and got up to make my way to Reus to catch a flight home. This is where my vacation got stressful.
1) I thought my flight was at 11:30a. NOPE. Hello 10:25a! So I hailed a cab and sped to Barcelona Nord to get a bus ticket.
2) Well... Shmel's well-meaning friend was incorrect... that station doesn't sell tickets to Reus, only to Girona. So cab numero dos across the city to the other station.
3) Didn't have enough cash for the cab. Great. The first ATM I tried wouldn't accept American cards [ugh!], got the cash somewhere else, got to the station... they didn't sell Reus bus tickets either.
4) At 9a I finally found the STREET KIOSK where apparently the only tickets to this godforesaken airport are sold, bought the next ticket and WHAT?! Online it said the bus ride was supposed to be a little under an hour. This bus wouldn't arrive until 11:30, a two and a half hour ride and a good hour after I should have been leaving!!
5) I had to admit it... I had no hope of catching my flight. I called Stephen to help me look online for any other flight to Manchester and he found a flight from Girona to Manchester for 5:45p that evening. Then my top-up minutes on my phone ran out and, SURPRISE! LycaMobile doesn't exist in Barcelona. I was stranded with no ticket, no phone and quickly diminishing hope.
6) I sat on my suitcase trying to figure out what to do. I didn't have a clue where Antonela's hostel was but I did have a vague idea of where Dani was located... so I made my way across the city AGAIN by foot and sat outside of his building until someone exited and I could make my way inside.
7) Dani lent me his internet so I could go ahead and buy the other ticket one mere hour before they were going to cut off purchases and then he kindly let me lay my tired head down for a power/destress nap. By this time it was about 1pm.
8) Dani showed me where the bus station was [the one I went to first that morning] to get my Girona ticket and then we headed to an internet cafe to find a printer since RyanAir's policies are just ridiculous.
JE.SUS.CHRIST.
The one redeeming part of this mishap was the hour before my bus left. As we left the cafe there was a commotion to our left and a huge crowd was gathered. Dani explained that each neighborhood in Barca had its own little block party three nights of the summer and that was what we were witnessing. They have these competitions called 'human castles' [Catalan translation below] where they build self-erecting and self-dismantling people-towers. It was incredible to see:
After that we sat for lunch and I wanted a frappe so Dani spoke to the server to explain... this is what I received.
Haha- DIY frappe. It was almost as good as Christina's at Kyma. Almost.
Finally it was time for my bus. I thanked Dani for all of his hospitality and made it to Girona a solid two hours before my flight was called to board. The flight itself was then delayed another hour or so but I was just happy to have a plan of action. When I reached Manchester I was relieved to discover there was a train station within a 10 minute walk of the airport. I had to take the train to Manchester Picadilly and change for Macclesfield [I missed the first few... but at least with trains you can buy non exclusive tickets] and I finally made it to my apartment around 10pm.
What. A. Trip. All in all- well worth the hassle. I learned a lot of lessons. It was my first time traveling completely alone and, even though I made a ton of mistakes, and will be on the strictest budget of my life come July, I proved to myself that I can grapple and scrounge and come up with a solution in a less than enviable situation. I kept my head about me and found help where I could and, while I will be better planned next time, I will also have a new found confidence in solo trips.
Gracias Barcelona. It was lovely getting the chance to experience you once again.
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