Winter Break in Spain

Winter Break

  Winter break was my first chance to get out of France and travel to someplace new. I went with Brian Doheny and Cristian Aguirre to Spain and it was epic. We left Friday the 22nd for Madrid. Upon arrival we couldn't find Cristian's friend that was supposed to meet us at the airport and letting us stay at his place. We didn't have phones to get in touch with him nor could we pick up wifi so we were stuck. We ended up getting rescued when we asked a Canadian girl if we could borrow her phone and she was a lifesaver. She also showed us how the metro worked in Madrid and it goes to show that Canadians are the nicest people every. We ended up getting in touch with Cristian's friend and made it to his apartment where we stayed until  Sunday the 24th. In Madrid we toured the city some, ate tapas, and went out every night. One night we went to a gigantic nightclub called Kapital that had 7 floors, each with different music. We stayed out most nights until 6-7am then slept to 5pm and did it all over again. I can't imagine studying in Spain, no one seems to ever go to class. We left Sunday and flew to Barcelona. We weren't able to find anywhere to stay for Sunday and Monday night so we stayed with Brian's roommates who had booked an apartment there for the week. They were super nice and let us crash on the couches. There ended up being a huge mobile phone conference so that was the random reason we couldn't find a single place to stay. We did visit the Prado Museum which was fantastic and the Bank of Spain which looked like a palace.

  Barcelona was definitely my favorite city out of the two. It was on the coast, the weather was great for the most part, and there was a ton of places to go and things to see. We did a ton of sightseeing there but also did some going out as well. We took the cable car up to see Montjuic Castle, visited the Gaudi Cathedral and Gaudi's apartment building he designed. Such cool stuff. Tuesday we moved into the apartment we had set up. It was so awesome to finally have our own place. One night we met up with one of Cristian's friends (one of the guys we stayed with in Madrid) who was going to a big party for his study abroad called Erasmus. We tagged along with him and managed to get into the party, it was awesome. They had rented a velodrome outside of the city and set up a ton of tents for dancing and stuff. Great time. Other nights we spent making friends and hanging out. We ate at one place that was fantastic: a small hole in the wall called Bo Da Be. They were pretty much epic wraps that were gigantic. They were kind of like burritos except not Mexican. They had tons of fresh veggies to choose from to put in it with different kinds of sauces like Tzatziki and hot sauce. One of the best things I've had during my time in Europe! Sunday came and we had to take an 8 hour bus ride back to Aix... wasn't fun but made it without any problems. Starting Friday night though I started getting sick which ended up staying around and caused me to miss class for a week. Overall,  winter break was an awesome experience.