My Trip to Barcelona: Views and the City

Hey everyone! Some of you may be wondering where I have been. From March 12 to April 2, I was living in Barcelona, Spain with a wonderful host family. I went to school there for two weeks, and traveled around Costa Brava and Spain for a week. My next few posts will be talking about the trip because it was the best experience I have ever had.

This post will show some pictures from the sights I visited in Barcelona.

On my first day, March 13, I arrived in Barcelona around 10 in the morning. My host family picked me up from the airport after a seven hour flight. Myself and five other girls from my school went on this exchange program to Spain, and we stayed with the six girls who came to my school last fall. After a quick trip to drop off my things at the house, my host family took me to a path to a mountain that overlooked the whole entire city of Barcelona. The path is called the Carretera de les Aigües and people jog, walk, and ride motorcycles and cars up this path to see the city.

On my first day, Ana (my host sister) and I also went to a market in Barcelona, but I have no pictures of it. I saw so many markets in Barcelona, so there will surely be more pictures of them. After taking a two hour "siesta" or nap (I only slept for 2.5 hours on the plane), Ana's friends came over and all of them took me around to see Barcelona at night. We walked past La Pedrera, Plaza Catalunya, and so many other places. I can't think of anything that would have been better because I got to meet many people the night before my first day of classes at their school. I came to Spain to improve my Spanish, but many people there speak English so talking and communicating wasn't a problem at all.

Ana, Duna, and I in front of a founta in Plaza Catalunya on my first night.

La Pedrera at night.

My first day of school in Barcelona wasn't as scary as I thought it would be. I didn't have to do any work in the classes except for listening. The school has about 3,000 students and it's co-ed, which is probably the exact opposite of my school which is 700 students, but all girls. My first day I had castellano (spanish class), empressa (business class- I had this class twice a day), economica (economics), and audio visual class. After school, Ana and I went to a senior citizen home for community service.

The third day at the school, the Spanish teacher took all six girls from my school around Sarria, which is a neighborhood in Barcelona where the school is located. We walked around the area, and would stop at buildings to talk about the importance, and we went into markets and offices.

In my first week, all of the exchange students from America (almost thirty people, but different schools) went on a excursion to a mountain called Montserrat. This mountain is about forty miles away from Barcelona. Since this will be a series about my trip to Barcelona, I have another post to talk about the day there. But the plateau where I went was above the clouds.

Park Güell is a park that contains the art of the architect Guadi. The park that contains his work is free after six o'clock, but since I went in the day I went to the part that was free all day long. This park also has an amazing view of Barcelona.

Later on that day, March 23, all of us went to the beach of Barcelona, called La Barceloneta, which is on the opposite side of the city from the park I was previously at.

I think I am going to post about six posts about my trip to Barcelona. This was the best way to make a comeback post from not blogging in about a month. I tried to live in the moment while in Spain, so I stayed off my blog for a bit. Now I am back, and oh how I missed writing!  Stay tuned this month for the rest of the posts about my trip. 

                                                                           xx
                                                               Christina Madeleine