When in Barcelona...

Saturday, November 6th
Barcelona!!

Yesterday we met up with Kelsey, Amie and my (Erin)'s freshman year roommate, who is studying abroad in Barcelona. She showed us around town and brought us to the Park Guell and the Sagrada Familia, both of which are designed by Gaudi. Gaudi is a famous architect/artist who has many significant works in Barcelona. Kelsey described Barcelona as "Gaudi's playground." While exploring the city we had a number of strange occurances:

1) At the top of the Park Guell we met up with Kelsey's friend, Miriam, from her program and Miriam was with her friend Tim (who is studying in London). Tim happens to be from Bowdoin and Amie and I both know him very well. So that was cool.

2). While talking to Tim we dropped the word "Bowdoin" several times and a girl next to us asked where we were from. Turns out she is from Falmouth, Maine and recognized me from cross country running in high school. She also knew McKayla's cousins who live in Falmouth.

3). After leaving the Park we walked down a random road and walked right by my next door neighbors, the Skapinskys. WEIRD. Annie, who is McKayla and my age, is studying in Barcelona and her family is out visiting her. We exchanged hugs as it was nice to see familar faces.

4). After dinner (we ate at a delicious groumet-chef-in-training restuarant, it was yummy and cheap! called the 15 nights) we went out to a bar where Tim saw friends from his high school.

5). After we left the bar we were walking down the road and we ran into a fellow Bowdoin student, Mac, who is sutdying in Copenhagen. I also saw him again this morning when I was out running along the water.

6). Another one of Kelsey's friends from her program then met up with us. His name is Sam and he brought with him some friends who were studying in Athens. One of them, Matt, was from Cumberland and knows some of our Bowdoin and Hamilton friends from Cumberland. Another of them, Greg, was from New Jersey and dated Christina Pindar, a Bowdoin stduent who Amie is rooming with this spring.

7). Kelsey then ran into a friend from high school who was visiting from Madrid.

IT'S A SMALL WORLD AFTER ALL!!!  We love having friends...

oh also, Barcelona is a very beautiful city.  It's clean, classy, and colorful; it's real nice.  More modern than other major European cities.  The people are friendly (although pick-pocketing is a major poblem here... McKayla got her ID and 7 euro stollen yesterday, could have been much worse...).  The weather has been incredible too, real hot and sunny!

Gittin our tan on

Hi everyone! We are currently in beautiful Barcelona.  Here's our post for yesterday:

Wednesday, November 3rd

Hola, Erin here. Our mini beach vacation is treating us nicely. We started our day with one of the best buffet breakfasts we've had so far; fresh fruit, cereals, yogurt, breads, cooked meats, fried eggs, muffins, little donuts, even sugar wafers (my favorite! but I don't usually eat them for breakfast...) Afterwards, we walked along the beach and through town to a nearby track to do our workout. At first I was dispointed when it appeared that a track club, comprised of men, women, and children of all ages, was meeting at the same time that we showed up; I don't like to workout when people are staring at me the whole time. In fact, I'm quite tired of being stared at on this trip; I really can't wait to be a normal citizen again. I want to be able to walk into the grocery without my bike shoes on, I want a proper area to cook my dinner, and I want to rid myself of the feeling that someone is going to scold me everytime I try to sit down. Anyways, I was pleasantly surprised to realize our presence on the track was completely normal. Everyone else wore similar clothing and did their own workouts that were just as weird as ours. It was a very refreshing feeling. More refreshing, however, was our dip in the Mediteranean Sea after the workout. It felt like it was 85 degrees in the sun on the track (although it was cooler in town). The sand here is redder and much coarser than the sand in Maine; as much as I wanted to walk across the beach in my bare feet, the sand was so rough that I only lasted the walk down to the water and back, about 100 yards (and my feet are still much smoother on the bottom now than they were before). The water was cold, it felt like the Atlantic in the summertime.

We had a long break in the afternoon where we sat outside and read our books and journaled. I have a lot of trouble on days like these where I feel like I have nothing to do. I'm realizing how much I need/crave the feeling of accomplishing something everyday, be that doing my schoolwork, completing a long ride, learning something new, or simply getting my laundry and chores done. I thrive off of the feeling that I've done something productive or meaningful (sometimes I can convince myself that rest and relaxation are what I need to do that day, but not when I'm feeling refreshed). So I found myself wondering all afternoon, what am I doing here? If I could do anything right now what would I do? McKayla and I ended up going out for a short bike ride out on the winding, hilly road we rode in on yesterday. The ride reminded me why I want to be bike touring in Spain right now. Besides the perfect weather, we had view of the sea on one side and the mountains and cliffs on the other. Since we were riding without panniers we were able to fly up and down the hills, I felt really strong. Plus Amie lent me her iPod so I had a whole new selection of music to enjoy. I feel remotivated for our ride to Barcelona tomorrow. Amie and my freshman year roommate and good friend, Kelsey, is studying in Barcelona right now and we are excited to meet up with her. I hope she can show us around the city, she's already given us many helpful tips about the cities we've been to in Spain thus far.

This evening we cooked up a hearty veggie soup and veggie burgers on the beach under the setting sun. So many people stared at us...

We may have found paradise (Girona to Lloret de Mar - 52km)

Tuesday, November 2

Quote of the day: "I would not waste my life in friction when it could be turned into momentum…I began to feel that myself plus the bicycle equaled myself plus the world, upon whose spinning wheel we must all earn to ride, or fall into the sluiceways of oblivion and despair. That which made me succeed with the bicycle was precisely what had gained me a measure of success in life -- it was the hardihood of spirit that led me to begin, the persistence of will that held me to my task, and the patience that was willing to begin again when the last stroke had failed. And so I found high moral uses in the bicycle and can commend it as a teacher without pulpit or creed." --- Frances E. Willard, How I Learned To Ride The Bicycle, 1895

Hi all, It's McKayla checking in. I've finally fully recovered from my sick spell, just in time to take full advantage of this unbelievably perfect weather here on the Spanish coast. This afternoon we reached the touristy beach town of Lloret de Mar where we checked in at a resortesque hotel complete with pool, hot tub, sauna, ocean views from our balcony, and a free buffet breakfast. We can't believe it's cheaper than most hostels (only 17 euro/person). I'm not sure if we actually found "nirvana on wheels" in Girona (check out NYT article, http://travel.nytimes.com/2005/06/12/travel/12girona.html?_r=1), but I'm certain we've found a little slice of paradise here in sunny Lloret.

Fresh, smooth pavement lined the roads from Girona to the coast. We cruised through two minor mountain passes on a winding, lightly trafficked route. We all agreed this was one of the all around best roads we've cycled on so far. I can understand why so many pro cyclists, including Lance Armstrong and Tyler Hamilton, live and train in Girona during the off season.The warm Mediterranean air has certainly made riding even more enjoyable. I still can't believe I was biking beside snow patches just last week.

I've loved noticing the slight changes in scenery as we've been slowly moving south - new mountains, rocks, trees, birds, architecture, not to mention the larger changes in language and culture. It's challenging completing even simple tasks, like paying for food at a grocery store, when I can hardly speak a word of Spanish (I'm so thankful Amie is practically fluent). I'm now beginning to better appreciate the amount of French I can speak. In France, I was often frustrated that I couldn't convey everything I wanted, but now I'm realizing that I really could accomplish quite a bit using only my mediocre French. I think I'll have to start being more creative, using other means of communication, to get my point across these last few weeks in Spain.

This afternoon we finally got back into routine by doing a pool deck abs workout...our favorite :) We went swimming in the chilly pool, but quickly opted for the warmer indoor hot tub (which was disappointingly more of a warm tub). The sauna was too packed, so we decided to just take showers back in our room...I know, we have it so rough. We cooked a scrumptiously satisfying one pot meal full of veggies, beans, corn, and veggie burger. I'm not sure what you would call it, besides mush, but we all thought it was "the best thing ever." I guess we don't have very high standards.

Plan for Wednesday: Spend the day/night in Lloret. Do an insanity workout, go to the beach, and explore the town. We will bike to Barcelona on Thursday!

Good news: I'm posting new pictures later today. Enjoy!

Halloween and November 1st!

　
Hi friends and family (or let's be real, it's just family at this point :). This is Amie finally reporting for blog duty after a several-week hiatus. Currently we're sitting in our hostel room in Girona, Spain. How we managed to get here is actually a bit of a funny tale, but I'll start with yesterday I suppose.

We woke up in Perpignan to buffet breakfast (YES) and the best weather we've seen in a while. In fact, Perpignan has a street entirely lined with palm trees, which are a rather re-assuring change of scenery. We biked out of the city without a problem and started cruising toward Spain! For most of this ride we had one of the worst headwinds we've encountered yet, a bullying wind that seemed to get you from all sides at once. Lucky for us there wasn't really another town between Perpignan and Figueres for us to wimp out and stay in, so we battled the wind resolutely and biked on. The Pyrenees (sp? i've seen this word written in French, Spanish and Catalan recently so I forgot what English calls them) form the border between France and Spain, but we were close enough to the coast that we were really just in the foothills. We climbed gradually up and up from Perpignan until we hit the border town of Le Perthus. From there it was mostly a descent all the way into Figueres, rounding off the ride a bit over 60 km. The scenery out here is amazing - the mountains, foothills and palm trees remind me a lot of the mountainous regions of southern and central California. Also, I did notice that while the language had definitely changed, it was NOT Spanish.... Turns out we're in Cataluna (squiggle on top of the n, pronounced "catalunya"), which is still Spain but they speak Catalan here (looks like french and italianized-spanish). The buildings changed a bit too - more stucco and terra-cotta like one would expect. In Figueres there is no hostel, but we found a nice cheap hotel called Hotel Europa. Then we went on a failed laundromat mission (our situation was getting SERIOUS) - unfortunately it turned out that our laundromat didn't exist... Since it was Sunday, and the sunday before All-Saints-Day, no grocery stores were open, so we had some dinner in town and hit the sack. Overall great first impression of Spain.

Today has been a bit funnier. This morning we took a roundabout, 56 km ride from Figueres into Girona. Farmland. Stucco. Pretty clouds. Erin led us basically the whole way. I LOVE her for that, just absolutely love her. We hit Girona just after noon. We knew today was going to be rather hip-hoppin' because it's all-saints-day (Spanish Halloween I suppose, without the crappy candy and scary costumes), but it turns out Girona was HIP HIPPITY HOPPIN'. The downtown streets were teeming with Catalunan hordes perusing art and food stands. Based on our extremely technical assessment of our hostel's location (we glanced at google maps and "put it in our minds") we were pretty sure that our hostel was smack-dab in the middle of the commotion. So there we were with three loaded bikes waddling through disgruntled Spanish crowds and apologizing incriminatingly in English and cracking up, when people started telling us sentences that definitely included the words "bicicleta" "gente" and "impossible" in them. Getting the hint, we turned around, I asked a man where our hostel was, and we managed to find it via a parallel street that wasn't so chaotic. THEN WE DID OUR LAUNDRY. thank god. Currently we're having a siesta, but tonight hopefully we'll hit the town (in honor of the saints, of course). In fact, when we asked the hostel receptionist what there was to do tonight, he told us to come back 10 minutes later so he could properly inform us. We're going to assume that means there's SO much going on he wanted to get it all straight.

And that's life. I'm happy to be in Spain to use my Spanish instead of my rather pathetic French. I think we're all feeling a little burnt out on traveling and dealing with foreign...everything. I mean, we just spent Halloween without a single Reese's peanut butter cup. Then again, I saw a palm tree today, and there's no better way to give your persective a good workout than to deal with some new things. Tomorrow we're going to hit the coast and hopefully find some beautiful beaches a days ride north of Barcelona!
Much love from all of us!