Bravo barcelona

Bravo barcelona

Well we almost didn’t make the flight. The day was long as it started out with a 7am call in for the Sheila marketing meeting and me trekking to Fremont to get my hair done and then calling into product review, reviewing tv scripts and email. I didn’t anticipate that it would take 5 hours for the process to be done. I don’t love it, but I don’t hate it. Sadly the damaged aspects of my hair makes myself hair thicker for whatever few strands I have left. I am trying to focus on the positive. we had to leave at 4 pm, but it took an extra 15 min for me to pack. Traffics on 92 and getting off on Hillsdale was like a parking lot. B was so mad. He kept on saying that we were going to miss the flight and that if we missed it that he wasn’t going. So mad, and so negative - it was all quite upsetting. The boys were all ready to go at foster city and we made good time to the airport. Strangely enough the computers were down so no one could get their boarding pass or even board on the plane for over an hour. We pretty much just sat by the ticketing booth waiting for the computers to be fixed. The boys were very well behaved at the airport and on the flight. They gorged on tv/movies and slept. The movie selection wasn’t great considering the fact that I usually use these long flights to catch up on over a years worth of movies...but there was nothing great.

We arrived to the airbnb and the apartment suited us well - it was exactly as it was listed. Clean, newish, spacious for our family. We started things off by going to get dinner and it was our first luxe guide restaurant. From here on out, I will always get a luxe guide for our travels and trust their recommendations. It was spot on for all our pit stops for food and drink. The first place we went to was a huge space, like a fancy food court with several options...and we started things off right by going to a tapas joint. It was our first experience with razor clams and other tapas which did not disappoint. After dinner we also headed to the mall to go their grocery store downstairs, it was a good way to orient ourselves with the city and get situated in our apartment.

I still can’t believe all that we did in that short period of tie. 10+ museums, everything from the maritime museum, Egyptian museum, Picasso Museu, contemporary art museum, chocolate museum, Jamon experience, Parc Güell, casa Pedrera, Casa Milá, Miro museum, the science Museum, the aquarium, etc. We also went to a castle, where I nursed Austin sitting on a cannon, rode the hop on hop off bus tour, rode a cable car, and we also went toe the FCB Museum. My favorites included watching the Spanish guitar and flamenco dancing at the beautiful Palau de la musica, walking around Barri gotic, eating jamon, the boys loving all the food, ordering another bone marrow, Dylan wanting to try “a little bit of everything” and all the boys being such great travelers. I have to admit that I was a little nervous traveling without another set of adult hands around, but everything was great. The weather was perfect, just a slight drizzle the last day, and there wasn’t any sense of revolutionary danger.... Just a few minor do-overs, like not buying the Barcelona Passes for the boys, realizing that they also had children’s audio tours, not getting the closing tie right for the big national art museum in the park, buying the non-Spanish guitar CD from the guy who was playing Spanish guitar in the old quarter, and missing the closing time for the big department store the night of Black Friday, when I snuck out and bought 2 seaters from COS, but that’s about it. I found it odd how many people in Barcelona smoke - young, old, men and women all smoke, and still don’t know why they have those funny shaped toilets that lend themelves to nasty skid marks.

I bought a few souvenirs, and got a head start with gifts for Xmas, fcb shirt and bottle opener for Ian, bracelet for Isabella, small pencil case, bookmark and chocolates for Sofia, but my favorite was the print of darth vador using his light saber to click jamon. I ended up getting a super soft cream sweater, a grey sweater, blue short sleeve sweater, a blue canvas bag, pink button down shirt and 3 bracelets. I usually always get a bag/piece of jewelry when I travel. I bought a compass for Dylan for Xmas and Evan a fancy storm trooper and airplane shirts. The boys were really into souvenirs. In fact I think they wanted to go to use us just to get a souvenir, but at least Dylan was really into the audio tours. Of all the audio tours the one at Sagrada Familia was probably the least impressive, although the church was pretty spectacular. I really liked the tour at Casa Milá with the augmented reality through the phone. That was pretty cool.

The food was delicious. I ate my face off, thoroughly enjoyed myself for lunch and dinner (breakfast was mainly at our Airbnb and I consider it a win that I only gained less than 2 lbs on that trip. That’s another reason why I love going on vacation. I feel like you can really enjoy the food and culture and you do so walking that it nets out to be pretty even from the weight perspective. It was such a high going on that trip...certainly filled with many happy memories as I closed out that decade. I really love traveling with all my boys. I hope when they grow up they appreciate how hard we work to make these trips happen for our family.

Random memories:
-off-roading with the key fit caddy stroller down the hill to get to lunch
-watching Wonder Woman and last man on earth TV series on the flight. Starving on the loooooong flight home.
-Dylan playing with Austin, chasing him around on the floor at our appt
-Evan losing his water bottle and me finding it at the science museum
-the game of thrones exhibit at the maritime museum that we did not go to
-Eating ramen in Barcelona (the only restaurant we had to wait for a table)
-cost 10 caco beans for a rabbit or prostitute. 100 for a slave.
-Dylan eating foie gras for thanksgiving
-still losing a lot of hair and having scalp issues