Barcelona, Spain

From Ibiza we caught a flight to Barcelona.  Here we met my cousin Tash.

We made our way to our new hostel, and again, were not impressed with it.  It was well under equipped for the 40 odd beds it had there.

That afternoon Kirsty and I decided to go and check out the local beach there.  We somehow ended up at the nude-gay part of the beach.  That was a bit of an eye opener!  We didn't partake and soon left the beach.  That evening Tash and I went for a walk and saw the La Pedrera.

The next day we did a walking tour of the old gothic city.  It was an interesting tour, with these tours you tend to learn about things you would not have otherwise known, doing the same walk on your own.  Our tour guide was an Australian who had been living in Spain for years.  After our walking tour we went up the San Sebastia tower and caught the cable car to Mount Montjuic.

The next day other Kiwi friends of our arrived at our hostel.  It was a fluke that we happened to be in the same city at the same time, and even in the same hostel!!  Small world.  It was nice to catch up with Ese in particular, because she went from New Zealand to Europe to do some sight seeing, and then from Europe to Canada where she will live to do her post grad in Vancouver.  I probably wont see her again for a while! (but then its an excuse to visit Canada sometime soon!).  That afternoon we wandered around Las Ramblas and the El Ravel (areas of Barcelona).

The next day we went to check out the Sagrada Familia.  We didn't realise that the line would be so long, it curled right around the block - waiting time was around 3 hours.  I wish we had known, we would have booked online otherwise (that way you don't have to wait in line with the others).  So we unfortunately had to give that a miss, and instead went to the Parc Guell instead.  This is one of Gaudi's projects also, it is a park. The park was way up a hill, with hundreds of steps.  Luckily there was an escalator!  It was far too hot to be walking up that many stairs! (even then, we still stopped for ice cream!).

That evening Tash, Celene and I flew to Paris.  Kirsty has already been to Paris, so she went to Geneva in Switzerland for the week instead.

Ibiza, Spain

From Madrid we stopped over in Valencia for a night, and then Brigid headed back to the UK and Kirsty Celene and I caught the ferry to Ibiza.

We arrived at Ibiza in the evening.  The first thing I noticed was that there were heaps of Brits everywhere.  Not the most attractive girls in the world with their orange spray tans and fake lashes.  They wore their little bikinis everywhere - togs togs undies much??  I guess in New Zealand we are a conservative bunch.  I wouldn't be seen dead doing or looking like that!  The island is filled with billboards selling beauty treatments and advertising the many parties happening at clubs around the island.

We caught the bus to our hotel and then headed to the beach for a few quiet drinks (you can drink in public in Spain).  We were staying at one of the quieter beaches, it was quite nice sitting there under the moonlight.

The next day we sunbathed at the beach and then that evening got ready for our big clubbing experience on the island - we were going to a gig called Creme at a club called Privilege.  This is one of the biggest clubs in the world, with a capacity of 10,000 people.  We had a few drinks at the hotel then headed there on the disco bus at midnight (which turned out to be just another regular bus, what a disappointment).  They had a number of big acts on that night - the type that NZ would get excited over months in advance.  They have big acts on this island on every night of the week.  We had a great night, and slept most of the next day. lol.

Our last day in Ibiza we spent over in Formentera.  We caught the ferry over and then decided to walk to the beach from there.  Turns out it was ages away, and we ended up having to walk in the heat for well over an hour.  When we finally got there, we had a drink (bliss!) and then lay on the beach and had a swim.  The water was blue and clear, it was so beautiful on that island, I wished we had more time there.  I hope to return there one day.

The next morning we caught an early flight to Barcelona.

Madrid

From Granada we headed to Madrid on the bus.  One of the girls Brigid was having a hard time.  She knocked over one of the beer bottles the night before and accidentally smashed it on the ground.  She cleaned it up, but managed to get glass in her foot in the process.  Then she kicked the bed leg during the night when it was dark, and hurt her toe (a week later she got it checked out, turns out it was broken).  Then during our travels the next day she managed to get a splinter in her hand.  And finally on the metro as we were making our way to our apartment in Madrid, she got pick pocketed and lost 20 euro.

When we arrived at our apartment, we were not impressed.  It was over 30 degrees, we were hot, and there was no air conditioning, not even a fan.  The place was very very small, the internet did not work properly.  The washing machine didn't work, and neither did the TV.  I called the owner and complained about the washing machine - he came and gave us a key to another apartment down the hall so we could use that washing machine.  And with the TV he came with a new decoder.  He did not look nor attempt to try and fix either - he knew they were not working and probably though we would not complain.  He said he would find us a fan - and then conveniently did not return.

The next day we caught the train to check out Toledo - an old medieval village in Spain. It is a UNESCO world heritage site as well.  That evening we went on a pub crawl in Madrid.  It was a Monday night so there was no pub crawl, so instead we just wandered around the bars and made our own pub crawl.

The next day was a slow one, we slept in and then in the late afternoon -when it got a bit cooler, we did a bit of shopping.

From Madrid we headed to Valencia as a stopover en route to Ibiza.

Granada, Spain

From Algeciras we caught a 5 hour bus to Granada.  This was quite a pleasant ride as we drove along the coast past Marbella and Malaga.  This had some beautiful beaches, I definitely want to return there one day.

Once we arrived at Granada we had to find our hostel.  We caught a bus which took us to the main street near our hostel, but then we had to walk up the alleys ourselves.  It was all uphill and hundreds of stairs.  Poor Celene had her luggage on wheels, so that was a nightmare for her.  It was a tiring walk in the heat (again over 30 degrees there too).  Once we found our hostel we were pleasantly surprised. It was beautiful.  It had a nice sheltered outdoor area and a pool!!  We unpacked and then went for a much deserved swim.  Because we were staying quite high up, view from the hostel was amazing - the Alhambra (famous palace) was quite close too, you could see it from our hostel. Later on in the evening the hosts invited us up to the rooftop for a drink and to watch the sunset.  That was amazing.  Our hostel was located in the Albaicin.

The next day we decided to just hang out at the hostel.  We got some drinks and just chilled out in the shade all day and went swimming again.  That evening we went out to a Spanish restaurant for the infamous tapas (which are called pintxos here) and sangria.  Yummy!


The next day we went to see the famous Alhambra palace.  It was beautiful and meet my expectations that I had seem from the photos.  This palace is so popular that you have to book tickets (or que outside all day in the hot sun).  We bought tickets for a certain time, but didn't realise we had to enter a certain part of the palace (the Palacios Nazaries) at that time. We were late because we had just been wandering around the other areas, and the lady did not let us in.  She showed us where to buy new tickets.  We didn't want to have to do this, so pulled the English card - we had not been told we had to do that when we picked up our tickets, and our information booklet they gave us, was in Spanish, so we missed those important instructions.  The man who served us sympathized with us, so just issued us new tickets, free of charge.  Luckily!  The views out from the Alhambra over Granada are amazing.  We had a photo from the top tower, with our New Zealand flag with the view in the background.

That evening the hostel hosts took us all on a walking tour around Granada, we walked further up the hill and watched the sun set, then we walked around and back to our hostel.  We passed this area where squatters lived.  It was quite sad to see the conditions that they lived in.  Then we passed a bar where we all had a beer and some olives as a snack.  Then back to the hostel where they had cooked lasagne for us for dinner.  We had that with red wine.  Gracias!

The next day we caught the bus to Madrid.

Tangier, Morocco

From Seville we made our way to Algeciras where we caught a ferry over to Tangier, Morocco.  We missed the first ferry because we were waiting in the wrong boarding lounge.  It is hard when you don't speak the local language and you are relying on the locals or staff to tell you where to go.  Someone had lead us a stray.  So when we realised (which was when we tried to board the wrong ferry) then we found out where our particular ferry was departing from, and caught that.

Once we were on the ferry, we were getting looks from the locals, which were arabs, so we though we better make an effort to cover up.  Once we arrived in Tangier we were a little overwhelmed.  There were men everywhere and we didn't trust any of them.  We had been travelling all day and it was hot.  We were tired.  People were trying to help us but we were not sure who to trust, and who would take us for a ride.  We eventually found a taxi driver who spoke some english, so we got in his taxi and he took us to our hostel.  But a car couldn't take us to the door - we still had to decipher our way through the alleys.  The map didn't seem to be correct, it was a difficult task to do while being harassed by the locals in every direction trying to sell you things plus we had all our luggage.  We asked a few locals for directions and eventually found the place.  We were so relieved!

We hung aroung the hostel for a couple of hours to unwind, then in the evening went out to explore the area. Ramadan just so happened to be on while we were there, so after dusk, most people were at the mosque.  This was good for us as it made the streets a lot quieter, we were left to ourselves instead of being harassed.  However it was hard to find food, as most restaurants were closed during this period of the year.


The next day we woke up to a lovely breakfast served by the hostel.  It was traditional - feta cheese, olives, fresh fruit, bread rolls, juice and turkish pastries.  We then went out exploring again and had a look around the Kasbah - a palace.  It was nice and it was right on the coast, so the views from there were amazing.  We noticed there were more local woman out the next morning too, and we didn't get hassled by the street vendors so much, plus we knew now what to expect now, so the day was a lot nicer than the one before!

That afternoon we caught the ferry back to Algeciras where we spent a night, before heading to Granada the next day.

Seville, Spain

From Lagos we caught a 7hr bus to Seville.  It was really hot in Serville, 30+ degree temperatures all week.   We wandered around the city, and soon realised that McDonalds sold beer - so we got ourselves a nice cold beer.  Plus some Haagen Dazs Ice Cream.  Yummy!!  That evening we wandered around the village and found ourselves a shisha cafe.  That was nice and relaxing.  Then Brigid and I were not ready to go back to the hostel, so we continued out for a drink, and found a street festival happening next to the river Rio Guadalquivir.  We had a few drinks and watched the live band.  Later in the evening some local kids did some flamingo dancing.  They were all dressed up, it was really cute, and they were really go at it too!  I didnt have my camera on me unfortunately :-(

The next day we went to check out the Alcazar.  This is a huge palace that rulers of Seville have occupied from the time of the Romans.  It was very well kept and beautiful.  They had big lawns and gardens too, so we say in one of them in the shade and had some lunch.  It was nice to escape from the hot sun.  Some peacocks came up to us for some food.  There was even a baby peacock with them - something I had never seen before.

That evening we got a horse and carriage to a Flamenco show that we had booked.  This was probably the highlight of our time in Serville.  We got dressed up and thoroughly enjoyed the show - the dancers were really skilled and had beautiful Spanish dresses.  The horse and carriage was a bit of an experience - because we rode along on the road, with all the cars and traffic.  I was a bit afraid the horse might spook, but it was fine and got us there safely!

Genoa!

We're in Genoa now - yay Italy!