Barcelona January 2009 continued again

After a short nap we got ready for our walking tour of the city on our way to our welcome dinner. We were introduced by Sam to come of the greatest architecture in the world, mostly by Gaudi, possibly the greatest visual mark on Barcelona.

The combo of color and curve makes Barcelona seemingly a fairytale of a city.

(Casa Batilo, Gaudi)

The restaurant we were welcomed to Barcelona was bizarre, walking in, legs of meat were hanging everywhere, and we were led through an "old world" pub of sorts where we were seated and served Traditional Spanish Tapas and Red Wine, and quite possibly the best bottled water I've ever tasted!!! Haha! After being toasted by Alicia, we finished dinner and all headed over to the "Ice Bar" on the Mediterranean Coast.

The bar was like nothing I'd ever been to -- we paid a 10euro cover charge to get in which included our first round of drinks. They gave us coats and gloves before we went into the bar - it was entirely made of ice! The floor, the ceilings, the walls, the bar, the shelves, the stools, there was an ice sculpture inside and even the glasses were made of ice!!! It was an extremely small room, but definately neat!

(My drink at "Ice Bar-celona"!!!)

Because of jetlag and what felt to be a five mile walk to this bar, about 6 of us decided to hail a taxi cab and head back to the hotel. Let me warn you...avoid taxi's at all costs!!! Not only did our cab driver not know how to get to our hotel but when he finally found it on his GPS we felt like we were in a Jason Borne movie, driving at extremely high speeds down side streets so small we thought we wouldn't fit if another car came by, swerving in and out of traffic and expecting at any second a head on collision with anything moving or not moving in the city. Upon arrival at the hotel I wanted to drop to my knees and kiss the ground, just grateful to be back on stable ground. But hey, it made a story right?

**To be continued...**

.:*Remember there's no traveler like an EFCB traveler!*:.

Barcelona January 2009...continued

After heading through customs and getting yet another amazing stamp in my passport!! We claimed our luggage and found another CM that we didn't know had been on our flight the whole time...haha. We all had our luggage except poor Danielle, she was starring longingly and worried at the carousel hopeing to see it soon...and finally after we spent a little while fretting it finally dropped onto the belt, we all let out a sigh of relief and headed out to the exit where we were met by two very special smiling faces! Krystal, another CM was waiting there, and our AMAZING tour director, Sam!

While at the airport we eventually met up with all the CMs for the conference and the bosses: Alicia, head of CM programs; Christine, head of Marketing & Sales; and Mike, VP of EFCB. Everyone was so excited about being there and I could tell right away this trip would be incredible...

It didn't actually hit me that we were really in Spain until we pulled out of the airport and began our first city tour with Sam enroute to the hotel. On the way he pointed out some places that we would be going and some other interesting spots.

I'll admit some of Sam's words became a blur of noise in the back of my head as I gazed out the window over looking and taking in a brand new city to me.

I was immediately drawn to the architecture and fell in love with the look of the European city I found myself immersed in and once we reached the hotel Amber and I checked into our room and then headed out for some free time about the city.

We met up with Nick, Chris, Nitza and Shakayla in the lobby and decided to take advantage of Spain and head up toward Tibadabo.

Chris and Nitza are both from Puerto Rico so it was awesome to have two Spanish speakers along for the ride. Chris was GREAT! He is nearly fluent in both Spanish and English so communication was fairly easy with him -- with the exception of some American-English slang he tried to understand (which was absolutely hilarious). He was trying to explain to us a slang word he had heard, it ended up being "FUGLY" (meaning freakin' ugly) he didn't really understand it and began to add "F" to the beginning of many english words. Such as I "FLOVE" you! To Chris meaning I "freakin' love" you! haha it was absolutely hysterical! Nitza however spoke VERY little english but her personality was so bright and joyus that we were able to communicate with her almost entirely without words. She was so funny, even in a foreign language to me.

After about 15 minutes walking up hill we boarded a "funicular" which is basically a train traveling at about 5 miles per hour up to the top of Tibadabo (Barcelona's highest hill) which is practically a mountain.

At the top of Tibadabo there is an old Catholic Cathedral adjacent to a small amusement park that we found interesting, the juxtaposition of a church and a theme park was funny to us.

(Tibadabo Cathedral and Theme Park)

The rides were unfortunately shut down, due to snow -- YES SNOW!!!! I was thrilled it being the coldest winter season in Europe in years, I was able to experience the top of Barcelona in snow, what a blessing! It was beautiful!

The view from the top of Barcelona was breathtaking - pictures will never do justice to the goosebumps that ran down my spine when I thanked God for the amazing opportunity I was being given to travel to a new and incredible place on this amazing earth!

(over-looking Barcelona)

After spending some time in the cold weather we retreated into a small cafe at the top of the hill, where I got my first Spanish "chocolatte" which might I say was very delicious and very highly reccomended next time you visit Spain.

When we decided to head back down the hill, while waiting on the funicular to come back up to get us, Shakayla and I found ourselves in front of a ridiculous circus mirror doing a dance -- clearly after such a long over night flight, jet lag, and excitement mafe us quite silly as we video taped about a minute of us making fools of ourselves in front of Spainiards and other tourists. Between that and me loosing my funicular ticket to get back down let's just say we left our mark on Tibadabo!

**To be continued...**

Barcelona January 2009

EF College Break (EFCB) Campus Manager Convention this week in Barcelona, Spain! All of my life I've been dreaming of traveling anywhere and everywhere and it's finally coming true! Each morning that I wake up I am baffled and almost need to pinch myself to make sure that it's real.

Barcelona was fantastic! I was so glad to get the opportunity to experience it! Everything from the moment I stepped out and onto the bus to the hotel to the very last glance at the amazing city was wonderful!

But let me back up to the beginning...
I was traveling to Barcelona for a convention with EFCB -- the great thing I thought at first was that we only had one "meeting" day, the rest would be fun days.

When I got my confirmation that I qualified for a slot in convention I was brought to tears of excitement and the months leading up to departure were grueling with my excitement and anxiousness building everyday.

Preparing to go to Barcelona turned out to be nothing short of a nightmare. With all my responsibilities at my other job, it was extremely difficult for me to get much done - it's not that they can't live without me for a week but my extended vacation in South Carolina put me away from work for more than 3 weeks! Making it difficult to not only prep/cover my responsibilities but earn enough money to cover myself, "spending and bill wise."

So after about 4 weeks of working 40 plus hour weeks I was finally able to get on the plane and get on my way to Barcelona.

After a 6 hour flight on a crowded plane, I landed in New York for my layover. I had arrived 3 hours before departure and upon arriving at my gate there were only about 2 people sitting and waiting and neither of them looked like they belonged with EFCB -- so, I went to grab some lunch and make my last minute farewell phone calls to my friends and family before heading back to the gate.

I was supposed to be flying with a few other Campus Managers (CM) from JFK to BCN but had no idea if anyone there belonged with EFCB so I sat down and began to wait. Luckily about 5 minutes later a girl came up and asked another girl if she worked for EFCB - I looked up and responded that I did also, and we all laughed a little cause it turns out I was sitting next Jane, another CM for EFCB, thank goodness for Hazel introducing herself because we may have not known until we arrived in Spain had she not took the chance and spoke up. Eventually a few more girls showed up and we all were getting excited about the trip. Hazel, Jane, Danielle, Amber and myself loaded the plane and met Betsy and Chris on there. After a long flight we finally landed in Barcelona!!!!

**To be continued...**