Barcelona

Apparently known for the “Elephant Man”, an old dude who walks around naked every day and has a tattooed speedo on his ass and elephant ears on the front.  I didn’t see him but some of the girls did and apparently he lives up to the name.  People actually asked me why I didn’t bother trying to find him, “Hmm, let’s think about this kids.
These may be the only 3 days I’m ever in Barcelona and you think I’m going to go on a scavenger hunt for a giant penis… that’s a D-  in time management”

  Aside from the freak of nature, “And good on him” there was tons of things to do, see and try such as Paella and Tapas.  The first night we all went out for tapas and my fiance almost found herself in a double engagement to a creepy old Spanish street pedlar until Kate delivered the most vicious stiff arm I’ve ever seen.  Day 2 I took a free walking tour around La Rambla and got to see some of Gaudi’s work including his first piece when he was still a student.  It was a light post, “It’s sounds boring but was kind of kewl for that time… I guess.”  Then we saw a building just down the street from our hostel, which was his first professional work as an adult.   The other great part about this tour was that you get a free drink with it. 

That night was scheduled for the long awaited Spanish cooking class I’d signed up for.  But after finding out that we didn’t actually get to cook and seeing that they had over booked it by close to double a few of us dropped out and went for the pub crawl instead.  We did still go out for Paella, which was a massive meal that 5 of us couldn’t finish, and it was only a 3 person serving.  We did the pub crawl which was a fun night but didn’t compare to Munich.  I did however have my shirt ripped off more times than I could keep track of as Linda taught the girls how to rip domes off in one motion… and then came the practice, which by the end I was left with a big scratch down my chest and the girls had picked up a new trick to undressing a guy even quicker.  After that they felt the need to volunteer me to clean whip cream off the birthday girl, “We know how this is done… funny thing is the pub crawl leader calls this a drinking game, but I didn’t get jack shit.”  But this was my bachelor gift from the girls so I did it with a smile.  Oh yeah, this was the night I got engaged. 

Day 3 I did some shopping with the girls and finally hit the beach where Lauren and I met back up with Pete & Michelle, “Congrats you two.”  That night I went for a walk on my own to do some photography and people were shocked that I would walk around La Rambla with my camera since it’s the #1 area in Europe for pit-pockets, “If someone can get a 4 lb camera off my neck without me noticing then they deserve it; and no one is going to be ballsy enough to straight up mug me when there’s that many people, including police around.  People make such a big deal about it when it’s pretty simple; if you’re an idiot you’re going to get had, if you’re smart and take with you only the bare essentials, keep it in you’re front pocket with your hand in your pocket and just being aware of your surroundings you’ll be alright.”  Sorry, started on a bit of a tangent there, but seriously just be smart.

While there I also learned some really interesting things about Barcelona.  For the 94 Olympics the sand was imported from Egypt, palm trees from Hawaii and because of the Olympics it’s become such a hot spot for tourism, there’s useless knowledge for when you play Trivial Pursuit next.  AND NOW THE JOURNEY CONTINUES…. To Madrid.