BIRTHDAY SURPRISE TO BARCELONA!

han long
Nov 12, 2016
3 min read

A week before the flight out to Barcelona I had celebrated my birthday by having the most amazing meal at Gordon Ramsay Union Street Cafe. Spending time with the person you love, a fancy little meal and maybe one or two presents would've been just fine but nope! my boyfriend surprised me with flights to Barcelona! and I was in disbelief following quickly by "omg it's next week", "how's the weather?", "what do I pack?"

So we're driving through Barcelona and I can already see the difference! Oh how I wish London had wide and clean streets with palm trees embedded on every side! Once we dropped off our luggage, we were hoping to dine at Xiringuito Escriba but it was really busy at the time so we reserved a spot for 7pm.

Making use of our time, we headed to the beach - Platja del Bogatell, with our shoes and socks off walking hand in hand together. People were playing beach sports, walking their dogs, flying kites, just having a good time. We spent around 2 hours on this beach before it got cold and then decided to explore more of the area. Walking pass yachts and palm trees we decided to go to Parc de la Ciutadella. We stumbled across the most majestic architect I have ever seen it looked like something out of Game of Thrones! As it was getting late we decided to head back to the hotel, wash up and get dressed into something a little bit more fancy and head to Xiringuito Escriba. I picked Valencian-style Paella and the boyfriend picked a delicious grilled sirloin steak with chips (he wouldn't stop telling me how good it was throughout this entire holiday)

The following day we had a schedule and I made sure we stuck to it, Can Dende was a perfect little brunch spot before going into town. We got to the walking strip just before Arco de Triunfo de Barcelona, making sure to take in what was in front of us. We rented bikes and this was fun - I haven't ridden one in over 10 years, so getting back on one was a bit tricky at first but once I got the hang of it, no one was stopping me and I mean NO ONE. My boyfriend swears to never let me on one again.

After a few hours of this and taking lots of pictures, we headed to Basilica of Santa Maria del Mar. Once we started climbing those stairs (extremely long) and we got to the very top, it was honestly so breathtaking and it was worth every little stitch I had. Afterwards, we were feeling a little peckish and luckily Bubó (which was also on the list) was literally opposite the church. They had lovely coffee and cakes which gave us a little pick me up. We then stumbled across Barcelona Cathedral and this was so pretty, there were musicians and stalls selling trinkets and jewellery etc. I was just in awe of the atmosphere. It was such a jam-packed day that when we got back to the hotel we had a nap and contemplated whether to go to Shoko for our last meal, but we ended up going and sort of regretted it, the paella was lovely and so was the ambience but other than that service wasn't great and it was a bit pricey. We should've gone back to Xiringuito Escriba.

The last day was an easy day we took a cab into town and walked around, not forgetting to buy myself a bracelet and then visited La Sagrada Familia. I think I prefer the older version rather than the modernised side of the church. We had enough time to also make our way to Camp Nou also known as the Barcelona football stadium, where my boyfriend thoroughly enjoyed himself.

Barcelona had exceeded my expectations. I definitely would come back to visit a few of the same spots but definitely including Park Güell, Casa Batllo and Tibidabo!!! It's a shame I didn't come across these three places in time.