Our last day, and a beach

Today was our last day in Barcelona; we flew back to London tonight. (How did it go so FAST?) To celebrate/mourn, we headed to the beach. We decided to walk there due to #foreignbusintimidation and it was a pleasantly sweaty 25 minutes along the waterfront. Highly recommend (figuring out an alternate route).

But we did get to pass some beautiful buildings along the harbour, so that was worth it. Also we had the most terrific lunch on the way back at BlackLab - salmon poke and a philly cheesesteak, both of which hit the spot perfectly.

I love a city with a beach; it's the best of all possible worlds: food, culture, relaxation, mild nudity.

And now I'm back in London! Two days here and then it's off to the coast of Scotland for I'm sure more of the above.

Big hugs,
Esss

Yeah, we toured and stuff

OMGYOUGUYS. We left the pool today. Fuelled by the guilt of the lazy, we decided to go Culture ourselves, and we did it in the most efficient way possible: the hop-on hop-off bus. Two hours of straight Guadi fun times.

We're on a bus!

I couldn't get the whole ginormous thing in one photo so I made two pano's. So now it's both monstrous AND distorted. Like a pro do.

Also got to see many sexy gothic balconies. 

We also switched hotels today! Important to try all the pools in the city, after all.

AND GET THIS: turns out we didn’t even need to do the Gaudi tour, because our room has a terrace with THIS VIEW:

Terrific, isn’t it?? The stuff of nightmares.

And last but not least – we ate some tasty tasty food today, at both a pulperia (where I ordered the wrong octopus - pulpitos instead of Galician - and Lyndsey was not impressed) and at the food market, Mercat La Boqueria.

Not impressed at ALL.

Now we’re relaxing on the hotel’s roof terrace, enjoying the setting sun before grabbing a light dinner. Tomorrow’s plan: THE BEACH.

See you then!

Big hugs,
Esss

Barca, baby!

And we've made it! I am currently posting from this fine location:

Spot Lyndsey!

The trip here was not without its drama, though - our adventure started with an hour on the tarmac of Gatwick because of some RIDICULOUS DRONE goofing off in their airspace. They kept closing the runway and then reopening it and then closing it again. It was so thrilling it even got front page news: 

Luckily our pilot was a straight baller and tore it up when we got airborne so we only landed about fifteen minutes behind schedule. Then we head to the hotel. It's late, maybe 11 p.m., and we're sleepy but feeling good because everything is going so well. We had found the airport bus easily, caught it within a minute of leaving the terminal, and it went straight to the door of our accommodation. Everything was so seamless we were becoming paranoid. SOMETHING had to go wrong. And our suspicions were rewarded: the Universe chose that moment to step in. 

When we got to the hotel, a Remarkably Pleasant Woman at reception gave us the key to our room and a voucher for complimentary welcome champagne. Thank you, Remarkably Pleasant Woman! We are having a perfect night, and you have just made it even nicer! 

Then we get to our room. When we opened the door, we were hit by a wave of smell that could knock out an elephant. Rank backed-up wastewater exuding an odour so strong we physically recoiled. The entire room smelled like a swamp that large animals might use to defecate in. 

We called down to reception to find out WHAT ON EARTH WAS HAPPENING HERE and ARE WE BEING POISONED and a new receptionist answered. 'Oh, yes, 407 has this problem. Do you want to change rooms?' OF COURSE WE WANT TO CHANGE ROOMS WHY WOULD YOU EVEN GIVE THIS HURL SPACE TO SOMEONE OUTSIDE OF A MEANS OF PUNISHMENT?

So we switched rooms and the new one - even though it was just across the hall - was lovely, with gorgeous french doors overlooking the courtyard and the pool and - most importantly - NO IN-ROOM SEWER. We were thrilled at the upgrade. It was all going to be okay, despite the best efforts of RPW. (Still can't believe she gave us that room. We were shaking our heads all the way through our free glasses of bubbly.)

We've got quite a packed itinerary today: we're going to lounge a bit, then eat a bit, then lounge some more, and maybe go out and look at something before eating again. Barcelona is already terrific.

Big hugs,
Esss

And we're off!

TODAY'S THE DAY, YOUGUYS. Lyndsey and I are headed to Barcelona! Not until tonight, though, so I have plenty of time to put off packing and do more important things, like sit in the back garden and write this blog.

Alan made a terrific breakfast of Indian scrambled eggs this morning from our current favourite cookbook (Curry Easy by Madhur Jaffrey. Everything we've made from it so far has been gorgeous). Just LOOK at this scramble. It was honestly as good as Dishoom's akuri. Now if only we could figure out how they make those buns...

We ate outside, the only place we have room for a table.

It's been a lovely morning all around - lounging in the garden with our coffees, idly chatting, occasionally swatting flies. Good practice for the next few days, I'm sure. 

See you in Spain!

Esss

A birthday party, family, and festival fun times

Youguys, we are already having the best Saturday. The day started with a morning birthday party, which I was just thrilled by. Why don't more people have parties this time of day? It's just CIVILISED.

Us. Being civilised.

Our niece Lyndsey is due on the train any minute from Edinburgh and as soon as she gets here, we'll be taking her on a variety of exciting activities, up to and including: a trip to the post office, a visit to the green grocer, and a jaunt into Tesco Metro. Because it's important we show her how awesome London is. Continuing the theme, the plan for the evening is to hit a local beer festival (for charity, of course, otherwise we'd be at Mass) where we will enjoy some sensible shenanigans and a messy meal at an hour when the only choices will be kebabs or pizza that will jack us for days. She's gonna LOVE it.

OMG SHE JUST ARRIVED I GOTTA GO. Let the games begin!

Big hugs and lots of love,
Esss