After a short trip to Stanstead airport (we were surprised at how close it is, we'll be taking a lot more short holidays via Ryan Air now that we know!) we checked in and got our boarding cards. One of the ways Ryan Air cuts costs to afford it such cheap fares is that the boarding passes are just laminated cards that they take back at the gate. There's no assigned seats, they're just first come first serve. Which is actually kind of nice, you can choose your spot so long as you have a good place in line. So we were able to sit in an exit row to afford us more leg room.

We read magazines together on the flight, Sean always likes an excuse to pore over the tabloids with me, on principle he refuses to buy them for himself :) The trip was only 2 hours, so it went by quickly, and then next thing we knew we were descending into Girona! We had a majestic view over the Pryenees mountains as we came in. It's always stunning to me how large the mountain ranges in Europe are, when I first saw the Alps I was struck dumb at the vastness of them.

Upon landing, we went through an incredibly lax Customs area, picked up our bags and then got our rental car from Hertz. Sean figured we'd want a small vehicle to navigate through the tiny streets (good thinking on his part, as it turned out) so we got an Opel Corsa. Our itinerary said Fiat Punto, and I was looking forward to saying PUUUUUUNTO a lot in a Spanish accent, but the little Corsa was quite satisfactory :)

As we tooled out of the aeropuerto, we realized we'd forgotten to look for a change office inside and were wholly without Euros. So we followed signs to the nearest town and began looking for an ATM. It didn't help that it was sunday morning so everything was closed, we had no idea what ATMs might be called in Spanish, nor the names of any local bancos. Finally after much fruitless searching, I went into a gas station and asked. My Spanish is quite poor, so this entailed basically a game of charades with what useful words I could dredge up (dinero, carte, machina) and the attendant attempting to give me directions by waving his arms and trying to determine which hands the English words "left" and "right" corresponded to. Amazingly enough, this resulted in us finding the town square which had many bancos indeed!

So with our pockets full of Euros, we headed into Girona proper to see what it was all about. It's really quite a nice small city, though we were unable to find our way over to the old walled fortress area to have a look round there. After several journeys around the downtown area attempting to do just that, we decided instead to set out for Lloret de Mar to find our hotel.

It was far closer than we'd expected, just 2 exits up the tollroad and then 12 km over the mountains. As we came into the town, we were impressed at how lovely the beach was and also at what a festive place Lloret de Mar appeared to be. There were open air fun parks, souvenir stalls, arcades, and discos everywhere! We drove into the heart of the city, as our hotel was listed as being at 55 Centre de Vila. We learned though, that the address was not so helpful as that just means 55 "center of town". That area is a densely crowded maze of mainly pedestrian streets and one way alleys, so we quickly became frustrated at the number of circles we were driving in and feeling totally lost as to the whereabouts of our hotel. On our gaxillionth cruise up the strip, Sean saw a sign on the roof of a hotel with the name our our hotel, and an arrow pointing up the block. We thought we'd come to the end of our journey, however the block it was pointing up did not allow cars. We drove around trying to get at it from a different angle, and simply succeeded in getting more lost. At last we just parked in a public lot and decided to try it on foot.

That didn't work out so well either! We wandered around for ages, up and down hills, even asked in another hotel, but I guess they were bitter and gave us totally wrong directions. Sean was getting more and more stressed out and feeling responsible for our plight, and I was getting weak from hunger and blister-footed, so we were quite the crabby pair! On our next pass past the lot where we were parked, I stopped to change shoes and pep talk myself into a better attitude. Both things helped immensely.

Finally, we walked up a street we'd surely walked up at least once before, and Sean saw the discreet sign on the front of a building bearing the name we'd been so desperately looking for. Way too inconspicuous for a hotel! But we were immesely pleased to find that it was a beautiful place (we'd seen some real piles on our wanderings) and the staff was incredibly kind and helpful. They sent a bellboy with us to walk back to our vehicle and guide us into the hotel parking lot, which we would have never ever found in a million years (matter of fact it took us several more trips until we were able to drive straight to it!) and got us all comfortably settled with great expedience.

After we figured out how to switch on the electricity (it requires a room key, so you can't leave things running while you are out! Very efficient!) we had a lovely rest and relax in the air conditioning before putting on our sun clothes and heading out to eat some mexican food on a patio by the beach.

Afterwards, we walked around a bit enjoying the sunshine and the fun ambiance of Lloret. I threatened to get all liquored up and ride the mechanical bull, but instead we went to Farggi for some incredibly delicious ice cream. I got crema Catalan flavour, and Sean had vanilla with fresh blackberries, and white chocolate. Mmmmm! You'd think that would be enough food for one afternoon, but our way back Sean wanted to go by the Supermercat for water and on the way, we passed by the Granja de Layla which is an outdoor cafe specializing in strawberries. We were totally unable to resist the displays, so Sean had a big slice of strawberry tart while I got a massive goblet of fresh strawberries in real whipped cream.

We wanted to get into Barcelona before 9 so we could go to La Paloma which is a 99 year old "palace of dance" frequented by elderly couples who have been coming there to tango and salsa since their youth as well as young people who enjoy both and stay later into the night when the music changes over to more modern dance sounds. Supposedly it is stunning inside and is a "must see" in the city. It's only open thursday through sunday, and sundays it closes at 9:30 so this was our only chance.

However once we got out on the coastal road to Barcelona, it became apparent we weren't going to make it. The traffic was backed up and sluggish as far as we could see. When we got into Blaines we decided it wasn't worth spending our first night in Espana sitting in traffic, and chose to turn around and head for Tossa de Mar on the other side of Lloret.

Tossa de Mar is a smaller and more quiet town than Lloret, and we were totally charmed by it. When we go back, we think we'd like to try staying there. Lloret de Mar is really fun, but we're not so much into the crazy wild party scene it fosters. We did pretty well at getting on the Spanish schedule of sleeping until 10, having a light breakfast and a late lunch (although never did manage to get the hang of lunching BEFORE 4:30 when everything closes for siesta) and then eating dinner around 10 pm. But even with that, we just weren't up to going to a club that opens at midnight and staying out for hours afterwards.

In Tossa we spent a lot of time wandering through the amazing Vila Vella, the 12th century fortress-like "old city" portion of town, admiring the amazing views of the ocean it afforded, and taking photos. After reading the posted menus of the many many cafes and restaurants, we chose one and sat down for dinner. It was delicious! We found Spanish food (or at least food from the Cataluna region) to be quite salty, but without a lot of other spices involved. Our meals came with wonderful crusty bread rolls, Sean had a yummy steak in roquefort sauce, and I had chargrilled asparagus and garlic fried shrimp. Learnt that fried shrimp are not breaded in Spain, unless specified on the menu!

We also noticed that we eat way too fast to be European. The couple sitting next to us had just started dessert when we were seated, and they were still there when we left! I think the fact that we don't drink wine may have something to do with this. That and we both just shovel food in like eating machines when we're hungry and it's good :)

Speaking of the couple next to us, while Sean and I were waiting to be served, he said "Hey Lily, you have a little..." and pointed to his chest like to say I had something on my shirt. I looked down and saw that I had a little bug crawling on me. Just a tiny one, nothing scary, but I was slightly startled and quickly plucked it off and flung it to the side. Right towards the table next to us. And the woman saw the whole thing! Boy was I embarrassed. Americans have a bad enough reputation abroad and here I am throwing bugs at these nice Spaniards!

We were going to skip dessert and maybe have some back in Lloret, but they brought the dessert menu without asking and I wanted to try the crema Catalan since I had read that it is a specialty of the region. Turns out it's just the same as creme brulee, maybe a bit less heavy/eggy. Still, creme brulee is one of my favourite desserts, so I wasn't complaining any!

Oooh we were stuffed after that. We had a slow leisurely ramble through the cobbled streets of Tossa, just doing a little window shopping and enjoying the sea air and each other. Took a few pictures from the beach of the Vila Vella all lit up, and then headed back over the mountain to Lloret and pretty much collapsed into bed. We'd been up since 3 am and it was after midnight. We were beat!

I woke up around 9:30 and decided to let Sean sleep, since I knew he'd been tossing and turning some through the night and probably needed more rest. I lay quietly next to him and read until about 10:45 when he started to stir. We were sorry to have missed the breakfast buffet, but decided to just head out to Barcelona post-haste and worry about eating when we arrived.

We hit the road and were glad to find far less traffic! We did soon determine though that we had taken the long route, and the tollroad would have been far more expedient. We decided to stick to the coastal road though, if only to enjoy the views and take our time passing through the towns and seeing what they were like. I enjoyed trying to learn new vocabulary words off the billboards and signs, and if I couldn't decipher them, I'd make something up to make Sean laugh.

Eventually we came into the city of Barcelona. Wow, is it big and crowded! We were glad to have a small car, the streets are tiny and choc-a-block with cars and taxis and scooters whizzing this way and that. The map we had only covered the central part of the city, so we were pretty lost at first trying to determine where we were headed. Almost as soon as we got into the city proper, we passed La Sagrada Familia, Gaudi's great unfinished cathedral that is the world's most visited construction site. It is truly a breathtaking structure, and amazing to believe that only 8 of the planned 18 towers are completed. Sean wasn't able to really get a look at it as he was focused on not getting into an accident, but we agreed to definitely go back and see it later on.

Eventually I managed to navigate us down to the waterfront and Las Ramblas which is where we'd wanted to start our exploring. We saw the Monument a Colom first, the massive tower that is a tribute to Christopher Columbus. It's pretty amusing, Sevilla purports he was buried there (he's not), Barcelona claims he was born there (he wasn't), and here he is on top of a pillar, pointing heroically ... in the wrong direction.

His index finger is proudly aimed at the brave new world of Libya :)

We set out up Las Ramblas, the pedestrian center of Barcelona, somewhat akin to the French Quarter in New Orleans with sidewalk cafes, street performers, artists, and masses of tourists. Our hunger was reaching a growling pitch at this point, so being the Ugly Americans^tm, we hotfooted it into Dunkin Donuts for a six pack to sustain us until lunch.

We strolled up towards the Placa Catalunya, the main hub of Barcelona, stopping along the way to look at the artwork and goods for sale. The only blot on my day was the pet stalls, it really upset me to see baby ducks squished together in a cage in the hot sun, baby chipmunks for sale, cages overflowing with tiny bunnies, etc... The thing that really broke me though were the 2 baby emu in a cage that was hardly big enough for them to stand in. It reminded me of Bob the emu at Sara's, who probably started out just like that, in a little cage at a pet shop, bought by some jacka$$ and shoved into a teeny dark room and left in his own waste for 14 years. It brought tears to my eyes to see those poor babies, I had to walk away because I felt so helpless.

I will say that on our whole trip, I saw no stray dogs, and only 5 cats who all looked well fed enough that they could have been outdoor pets rather than strays. So it wasn't like in Mexico where my heart aches for the poor skinny dogs and cats I see roaming the streets everywhere. Many people have pet dogs and apparently care for them very well. All the dogs I saw looked quite sleek and pampered.

Anyhow, once we got to Placa Catalunya, and saw the massive El Corte Ingles department store (whose ads Meg Ryan models for) we swung back around and dove into El Raval, the artsy bohemian hipster neighbourhood, for shopping and meandering and also to see the outide of Palau Guell, the home that Gaudi built for his friend and sponsor. Eventually we wove our way back out onto Las Ramblas and then crossed over into the Bari Gotic which has more upscale shops as well as the massive Cathedral de la Santa Creu. Finally, we decided to look for lunch, so we walked down to the waterfront and crossed the bridge into Port Vell, which houses a huge entertainment complex including an IMAX, a 12 screen cine, the aquarium, and Maremagnum, a mall that is also a nightclub.

This is when we learned that if we want lunch, we should get it before 4 pm or we'll find most places are closed! We managed to find one tapas bar that was open until 4:30 and it was a good thing or we'd have been forced to resort to McDonalds.

As we walked back across the bridge, we debated pressing on to Parc Guell, but decided we were far too tired and would rather head back to Lloret de Mar for the evening and return to take on our chosen triumvirate of Gaudi works on tuesday. Then we spent a long long LONG time trying to find our way out of the city.

Took the tollroad back and were amazed at how quickly we made it home to Lloret. It's about a 25 minute trip and considering the amount of money we saved by staying on the beach and not in the city itself, it was an excellent choice all around. Go Sean!

We set out to have italian food for dinner, but instead wound up at an intriguing looking Mexican place. Our pretty waitress wore a flowing white mexican dress and a tooled leather holster, a fashion combination I liked! I think that was probably my favourite meal of the trip, I had chile grilled chicken fajitas with jalapenos and cheese.

One thing we noticed is that (thankfully) almost all restaurants have very thick menus because they print it over and over again, once in Spanish, once in French, once in German, once in English, and often in Russian, or Swedish, or Norwegian, or Dutch. Naturally all this translating results in some errors. At this particular restaurant, they kept referring to "slithers" of onions or jalapenos in dishes. Little things like this amuse me.

Although it was monday night, Lloret was hopping,and every other block someone was trying to entice us in to their nightclub or discotheque. We just wanted some ice cream! The place we had gone before was closed, so we meandered in an out of the little streets looking for an open granja. Finally we found one, Sean had strawberries with ice cream while I had the best flan I have ever tasted, topped with whipped cream and chocolate. They even stuck a little paper bunny on a stick into it. How did they know?!

So with our tummies stuffed full of dessert, we waddled back to the room for the night and collapsed yet again. Woke up just in time for our breakfast buffet though! I do love breakfast. I also love the fact that Spain is a nation with a sweet tooth. In addition to the packet of sugar, they give you a square of chocolate on the saucer with your coffee to melt into it. Delicious. And since I much prefer dark chocolate to milk, I adore the Spanish! Swiss and German chocolates leave me cold, milk chococlate is just too sweet to me. I like that bitter edge.

Speaking of, at the place we went to use the internet, they sold these little almost shot glass sized cups of a rich dark hot chocolate that totally rocked my socks. Sean got in the habit of just handing me a 50 cent piece as soon as we walked in.

So, tuesday, fueled up on chocolate coffee, we lit out for Barcelona again, this time taking the tollroad the whole way. Also, with a comprehensive map. This made things ever so much easier! We decided to park at Parc Guell and then walk down the hill to La Sagrada Familia and Casa Mila, have lunch, and then take the metro back to the park and our car. I do so love having a plan, and it worked out just right.

Parc Guell is completely awesome, there just aren't even words so you'll have to wait for my photos. I have now sat on the longest park bench in the world, which also happens to be a beautiful serpentine creation covered with pretty coloured shiny mosaic tiles and with a downhill view of Barcelona right out to the water. Just breathtaking. We walked all over the vast park grounds, admiring the Gaudi designed houses and sculptures, not to mention the amazing view from the higher levels.

We decided to go down to see the other two sites while we still felt full of energy, instead of seeing every corner of the huge park. And by the time we made it all the way down the hill and through the winding lanes of the Gracia neighbourhood, we were glad! We went to La Sagrada Familia first, which was packed with people so we decided just to walk around the outside and marvel. There's not much inside anyhow, it really is pretty much still just a shell. I understand the furor over Subirachs' cubist Passion on the west side, it really doesn't fit with the rest of the building's original style. Again, overall it just a dazzling structure, and mind-boggling to think that someone had to carve all these beautiful details by hand.

We wanted to eat lunch at this incredible sounding local family restaurant, but logistically speaking, it made far more sense to go to Casa Mila first. Once again we forgot that everything closes for siesta.

We walked down Calle Mallorca to find Casa Mila, and here I was determined to take the tour. I was fascinated by this apartment complex when I first studied it in college and was dying to see the inside and go up to the roof terrace, see the incredible sculptures that became signatures of Gaudi's work. It was every bit as beautiful as I'd hoped, and as I'd heard, the sandstone of the sculptures really has been weathered as soft and smooth as skin over the years. I couldn't stop petting them. The example apartment itself was a revelation, I guess I'd expected the spaces to be smaller but it was really quite a spacious home. We've been trying to see how much an actual apartment in the building costs but we haven't had any luck. Quite a hefty fee, I'm certain!

The attic has been converted into an audiovisual museum of Gaudi's work, which afforded us the opportunity to see the inside of some of the other buildings we hadn't visited, and to read more history about them.

After all that, we were quite ready for lunch, and our feet and legs were pretty much shot. We limped the 7 or 8 blocks to the restaurant we'd hoped to lunch at, only to find that it had just closed. We then shuffled around the area desperately looking for somewhere that looked good and open, and ended up just having fast food pasta. At that point, we didn't care as long as it was filling, and it was actually pretty tasty for fast food.

I'll spare you the drama of our trying to buy metro tickets. Suffice it to say that if you want 2 tickets, only have a 50 euro note and US credit cards, good luck to you! There's only machines, no live vendors, and not much in the way of explanation as far as why it won't take your money. Eventually we got exact change and managed to get on the train. It let us off at the base of the hill Parc Guell is on, so our shaking legs had quite a way to carry us still! We were so happy when we found a long chain of escalators going up. However, after the first one we noticed they were all stopped! Infuriating. That is until I walked close to the bottom of one of them on my way to the staircase and it turned on! Amazingly energy efficient, those Euros, the escalators up the hill work like automatic doors. Never seen that before. It entertained me immensely.

We came out on the far side of the park from our car, which was okay as we enjoyed the stroll back through, watching the sky change colours over the sea. What a really beautiful city.

On the drive back to Lloret, I studied our guidebook as Sean had left it to me to choose our romantic restaurant. I kept threatening to choose the Disaster Cafe, where you can survive a 7.8 earthquake! Encounter strange beings of spy on why from underground!¹ Become acquainted with the devastating effects of an underground storm! And should you...survive, enjoy a delicious meal!. However in the end I chose El Trull which was very highly rated, and on the mountain between Lloret and Tossa de Mar. When we got to the hotel, I asked the lovely concierge about it and she said it was fantastico and made us a reservation for 10.

Then, at long last, I unwrapped the Sexy New Dress! I actually got ready in the bathroom, hair, make-up, dress, shoes and all so Sean got the full effect all at once. He was very impressed. He kept telling me how pretty I looked, for the next 20 minutes. He said it took him that long to drink it all in, there was so much to look at. What a charmer :)

We drove out to El Trull, which looked really wonderful in its peaceful garden setting, and the giant dessert tray by the door increased my expectations. We started with a tray of assorted cheeses, fruits, and nuts, and aside from one horrible mold-riddled wedge and a glob of feta which I hate, it was all quite tasty.

I ordered grilled shrimp from Blaines which are a local specialty. I pictured a nice kebab of grilled prawns, mmm mmm! Sean ordered lobster vermicelli, picturing chunks of lobster meat tossed in thin spaghetti in a nice white sauce.

We were in for a surprise.

Sean's vermicelli was broken into small pieces and cooked paella style, i.e. fried up in a big iron pan, with pieces of lobster still in the shell on top. He was somewhat taken aback when it arrived, since he is not a big fan of digging around inside crustaceans for his dinner. But he couldn't match my stunned expression when my plate arrived filled with massive pink creatures whose legs and feelers and eyes and heads and all were still attached! I love shrimp, but the most of them I've ever had on my plate were the shells and legs that are attached to boiled shrimp. Sean explained how to pull the heads off, and the brown brainy goo that glopped out onto my fingers was not really appetizing. Nor was the vaguely salty fishy smell of the shells wafting up into my nose.

Basically I headed and shelled them all as fast as I could manage, cut off all traces of the brown goo, and moved the edible parts on to my bread plate so I could put the rest on the side table to be removed as quickly as possible. Sean was meanwhile being made very uneasy by the way the lobster head on one side of his dish was eyeing him, and his vermicelli was quite greasy from the frying, and not sitting so well.

Needless to say, our entrees left something to be desired.

We figured we'd best settle our tummies with dessert, and that was truly the high point of the meal! I had fresh baked profiteroles bathed in hot dark chocolate and cream. Sean got a cream and apple tart topped with homemade vanilla ice cream. We were most pleased with that portion of our meal.

A fancy restaurant is all very nice, but sometimes Red Lobster would have been just fine too :)

The next day we tried to shop for souvenirs before departing to Girona, but at the first shop we chose to buy something in, the owner charged us 1450.00 euros as opposed to 14.50. Then we stood there for about 45 mintues while she tried to credit it back to our card. When she finally got it sorted, we were ready to leave with our (surely after all the trouble) complimentary 14.50 worth of gifts and she asked for payment in cash. It was one of those moments where you're stunned into doing as you're asked and then 30 seconds later realize what the correct action would have been (walking out empty handed as opposed to paying for 2 items we weren't even all that jazzed up about to begin with). We were somewhat embittered that our last chance to shop and enjoy Lloret was spent like that. And I was mad I didn't get the bull tank top I was after. But, no llorando over spilt leche and all :)

In Girona we returned the rental car, and once again we somehow hit siesta at the lunch counter in the airport, so it was cheese sandwiches from the take-away fridge for us. I appreciated how they buttered the cheese for me.

Onto the plane and 2 hours later, we were back in rainy olde England, and naturally, we promptly headed the wrong way on the M11 :) We made it home at last and if you actually read all this, I commend you for your perseverance and thank you for your interest.

Pictures are here

¹Yeah, we don't know what it means either.