Tuesday 6 April 2010

End of Barcelona, Nice, Monaco, and the first two days of Venice

I know, I know. It's been too long since the last real post. Nice was an internet black hole. But I'm in Venice now, in a fairly nice hotel. At least it's really nice compared to the last month of hostels. No excuses.

The first set of pics are from the end of Barcelona. Tandem biking and all. The last couple of pics are from the craziest (and I think most fun) night of the trip to date. I had an eight thirty in the morning train, so I figured I'd spend the night in the train station. Unfortunately, the train station closed at 12:30. A few other backpackers were in the same situation, so we all ended up camping out in a park close to the train station. One of us had wine, another bread and cheese, one had a hot plate and pasta, and I had salami and nutella. A veritable feast.

The next pictures are from Nice, France and Monaco, which is just a thirty minute train ride away. Nice was cool, but a mediocre time for me. My hostel was harsh. Monaco was really pretty, and made me really want a yacht.

The last ones are from Venice. Venice has been really pretty. I made a friend in Lisbon last week, and we decided to meet up here and share a hotel room. This is my first adventure in relative privacy and hot showers in some time. The room's a little more expensive than the hostels, but that just means cheaper booze.

Pictures commence...............now

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Tandem biking is just as weird in Barcelona as it is in the states

Lots of sculpture all over the city. All over the continent actually.
Eating tapas and drinking wine like the mature adults we are

Mercat de la BoquerĂ­a. This was really cool. An open air market that you can buy all kinds of groceries. We went to buy lunch before we went to the beach. Places like this make me wish that I had a kitchen here, and also that I could cook.

Barcelona's answer to Paris. The Arc de Triomf. Not quite as big.
Barcelona's awesome architecture is pretty much all done by a gentlemen named Gaudi. And it's really awesome stuff. This first one is a church called the Familia Sagrada that he started in 1882. They estimate that it will be done in the next 30 to 80 years.
These are from a giant park of his.
View of Barcelona from the top of the park at sunset.
The people I slept outside with. Those walls give the illusion of privacy or safety. We had little of
But we made it out ok.
Saying goodbye to Barcelona. View from the train station.
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And then the train took me to Nice. Not directly, that would be too easy.


The beaches in Nice are made of rocks.
And the people from love. Awwww
From Nice was the day trip to Monaco.

The Monte Carlo Casino.
Where I lost five Euro. Another no-picture-place.

This is where boat-envy became a real problem.
The start of the Monaco Grand Prix
Goodbye Monaco!
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Three train stops later, and I am in the beautiful and historic city of Venezia, Italia.

St. Marks Basilica
Doge's Palace
St. George slaying the dragon
Another pretty church in Europe. Who knew?
The streets here are made of water!

This whole city's like one big postcard.
Spent the next day hoping to a couple of the different islands of Venice. The first one we went to was Murano, where lots of fancy glass comes from. Then we went to Cemeteria, cause we thought it might be a pretty park. It was a cemetery. A pretty cemetery sure, but a cemetery nonetheless.

Getting to Morano. Water buses are cool. Like regular buses, but on water!
One of many glass sculpture on Morano.
Scenery is similar to the main island, but a lot quieter. Walking here was so peaceful. It was a decent sized city, but so quiet. Hours into it I realized it's the lack of cars. No engines, no loud stereos, horns or angry drivers. So nice.
And the cemetery. Flowers everywhere. Our theory was that they got all prettied up for Easter.
And that's right up until last night. Today we're going to try to go to the Guggenheim, one of the pretty islands with the beaches, and maybe inside the Basilica.

Tonight and tomorrow I travel to Cologne, Germany to visit Andy, an exchange student that lived with me and my mom in Jersey when I was ten, which was also the last time I've seen him. It's going to be a trip to see him again. I'm told the cathedral in his city is magnificent, and way too big for one picture to handle. We'll see.

From there I think I'll try to go to Berlin or Sweden, to visit another exchange student we had. Except he lives all up in Sweden and I'm running out of time. Again, we'll see.

And that's what I'm up to.

Ciao babes!


-Matt

3 comments:

  1. That looks like sooooo much fun!

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  2. venice is awesome. i too loved the lack of cars. if you make it to the accademia they have da vinci's vitruvian man.

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  3. Didn't make it there. There was a cool exhibit of his inventions though, and that was cool.

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