Beachside in Barcelona (May 6th)
Success! FINALLY, the weather turns bad on my travel day! Now it has to be nice when i get into Barcelona.
I left Marseille this afternoon and took the 6 hour train to Barcelona. Hope the good weather continues.
I woke up a bit late this morning, about 10 past 10. The cleaning lady was coming to our room next but I needed to shower still. She didn't speak English though so we played a nice game of charades before a frenchmen finally helped translate that I had simply woken up late but would be out of my room very soon. She said something that apparently meant "Ok."
After my shower, I ran down a bus headed for the city. It's weird riding buses now. I drove one for so long and you can't help but critique how each busdriver drives. This ride was a little choppy, but overal not too bad.
I eventually caught my train and I was on my way to Barcelona.
In order to travel by train in France you need to get a reservation for a seat. It's a minimal cost of about 3 euro and though it confused Scott and I at first, it really isn't a bad system. You have to pay, but you gaurantee yourself a seat and the trains are pretty nice...and FAST! They have what is called the TGV, which roughly translates to REALLY F-IN' FAST! They run around 300 miles per hour or something ridiculous and it gets you to your destination pretty quickly.
But with your reservation you can hopefully try to sneak a free day out of your Eurail pass. When the ticket taker comes by you show them your reservation ticket and they punch that, but oftentimes they don't check your Eurail pass like they should. Unfortunately, I had to show it to one guy, after already making it past two other ticket checkers, so I had to use a travel day. I had already planned on using it though, so nothing was lost.
The train ride was...you guessed it...beautiful. We hugged the Mediteranean the entire way and you could see the Pyrenees mountains in the distance...truly an amazing train ride once again.
When I got to Barcelona, I tried to find a map without any luck. I hastily took a picture of the google map website with the location of the hostel marked on it, but there was no point of reference I noticed. A Swiss girl named Virginia noticed I was trying to find a hostel, same as her, so she and I set out into the night to find it together.
It turns out that the hostel was quite close to the train station. We found our way and we found the hostel is RIGHT across the street from the sea! Awesome! Looking forward to spending some time in the sun tomorrow.
Luckily they had room in the hostel for her and we both got placed in the same room. There we met two American girls named Cynthia and Kim, which was great because they both spoke my language! We chatted for quite some time and now I am here....ACTUALLY typing my blog out about TODAY! Amazing!
But I forgot my camera cord so I can't post it now...but nevertheless I finished a blog on the day it happened!
I left Marseille this afternoon and took the 6 hour train to Barcelona. Hope the good weather continues.
I woke up a bit late this morning, about 10 past 10. The cleaning lady was coming to our room next but I needed to shower still. She didn't speak English though so we played a nice game of charades before a frenchmen finally helped translate that I had simply woken up late but would be out of my room very soon. She said something that apparently meant "Ok."
After my shower, I ran down a bus headed for the city. It's weird riding buses now. I drove one for so long and you can't help but critique how each busdriver drives. This ride was a little choppy, but overal not too bad.
I eventually caught my train and I was on my way to Barcelona.
In order to travel by train in France you need to get a reservation for a seat. It's a minimal cost of about 3 euro and though it confused Scott and I at first, it really isn't a bad system. You have to pay, but you gaurantee yourself a seat and the trains are pretty nice...and FAST! They have what is called the TGV, which roughly translates to REALLY F-IN' FAST! They run around 300 miles per hour or something ridiculous and it gets you to your destination pretty quickly.
But with your reservation you can hopefully try to sneak a free day out of your Eurail pass. When the ticket taker comes by you show them your reservation ticket and they punch that, but oftentimes they don't check your Eurail pass like they should. Unfortunately, I had to show it to one guy, after already making it past two other ticket checkers, so I had to use a travel day. I had already planned on using it though, so nothing was lost.
The train ride was...you guessed it...beautiful. We hugged the Mediteranean the entire way and you could see the Pyrenees mountains in the distance...truly an amazing train ride once again.
When I got to Barcelona, I tried to find a map without any luck. I hastily took a picture of the google map website with the location of the hostel marked on it, but there was no point of reference I noticed. A Swiss girl named Virginia noticed I was trying to find a hostel, same as her, so she and I set out into the night to find it together.
It turns out that the hostel was quite close to the train station. We found our way and we found the hostel is RIGHT across the street from the sea! Awesome! Looking forward to spending some time in the sun tomorrow.
Luckily they had room in the hostel for her and we both got placed in the same room. There we met two American girls named Cynthia and Kim, which was great because they both spoke my language! We chatted for quite some time and now I am here....ACTUALLY typing my blog out about TODAY! Amazing!
But I forgot my camera cord so I can't post it now...but nevertheless I finished a blog on the day it happened!
posted by jordan @ 7:20 PM
1 Comments
1 Comments:
Wow, the scenery is spectacular. I'm amazed that they would have a hostle right on the beach. I'm glad you're meeting people to share your experiences with, makes it more fun I'm sure.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home