Bonjour! When we last wrote, a kid sketchily biffed in front of us. Since then, much crazier and sketchier things have happened. Later that same day, however, was quite lovely. After blogging, we went to another one of Gaudi's creations, Casa Batllo, which was very hallucinogenic and cool. Afterwards, we went to an amusement park. Before the trip we were like "Hey, let’s just go to all the cool amusement parks in Europe and plan our trip around them. How sick would that be? What do you think Mom and Dad?"
Well, they weren't as into it but we still really wanted to hit the parks wherever we could find them (excluding EuroDisney cause that's just pointless when you live in L.A., no?) Thus, our decision to make the trip to Tibidabo (also featured in Vicky Cristina Barcelona!) which is a century old amusement park that sits atop a hill in front of a huge church with fabulous views, especially from the cute multi-colored 50s ferris wheel. While there, we went on multiple rides, including "El Huracan" which Monica called a death trap. It was the most intense ride ever so we departed a little more appreciative of our lives and the ground. That night, we went to dinner at a lovely restaurant that Gaudi also designed called Casa Calvet, where we had the best wine of our lives and obviously engaged in wonderful conversation.
Our last day in Barcelona was a bittersweet one, filled with more exciting activities. Obviously, we had to hit the aquarium before we left, so we did and we were very delighted by the Finding Nemo exhibit, where Nemo, Dori, Flo, and all the other fish in the movie are all in one tank. We got really excited when we saw it...so did all the 5 year olds. Later, we decided to indulge in some light shopping at TopShop, our favorite new store which could be described as H & M's cooler older sister. After, we had our final dinner at a Tapas Bar called Cerveseria Catalunya (which was another adventure in terms of finding a seat but we succeeded after hovering over an English couple who were intimidated by us so they left....or so we'd like to think.) And so ends our visit to Barcelona....or does it?
The next morning we woke up extra early to catch our train to Nice, but oh wait...the French trains decided to go on strike that day...for only one day. So we had no way of getting to Nice through train and were therefore delegated to the bus station. After this day, we were not huge bus fans…to say the least. Let us explain. We went to the bus station at 9 in the morning, but there were no seats left for the 9:30 train so we had to wait until 3 in the afternoon for the 11-hour bus ride to Nice....ouch. To kill the time, we went to a nearby cafe, where we stayed at for literally four hours reading. Finally, we got on our bus and were thankful that we had at least found another means of transportation. Two hours later on the French border, we were detained. They stopped the bus to check all of our passports and since the French police thought some people were sketchy, they had us get all of our stuff down from the bus and executed a full on drug search through our luggage. Also, for some reason they were quite suspicious of us (as in the Alba sisters, specifically) and thought we had entered the country illegally because we didn't have some stamps on our passports, which according to us you don't need. So they kept a handful of us outside the bus and we ended up being the only ones of our bunch to get back on the bus; the rest were sent back...super sketchhh!
A million random stops later, as well as awkward cafeteria breaks, we arrived in Nice at 2 in the morning. But they kind of just dumped us on the side of the street, not at a legit bus station and you see Nice is very desolate at 2 in the morning. (Unlike Barcelona, which is bumpin all night long.) We then called a taxi that drove us to our hostel and found our room after running into some sketchy characters in the hallway. Sketch was definitely the key word of the day. We then summarily passed out.
The next day was far more successful. Unable to see the beauty of the city the previous night, we were quite pleased by the quaint beach town. We decided to take a break from so much sightseeing to lay out on the beach, but only after we had an interesting breakfast where our waiter read our auras and signs...he actually said some eerily correct things. Anyway, then we tanned and read at the beach (Mo: “What is the What” by Dave Eggers; Lo: “”Renegade: The Making of a President by Richard Wolffe). That night we figured we were due for another outing, so we did some research on hotspots in Nice. We read a great description about a place entitled Blue Boy Enterprise. We decided to walk there, got a bit sketched out, realized that once we got in the taxi it was only a street away, then found out it was closed, got back in the taxi, taxi driver then told us it was in actuality a gay bar and we laughed a lot. He then redirected us to a less desolate part of town where we were pretty sure we ventured into a private karaoke party...needless, to say we did not participate. We promised to attempt a more successful outing the next night.
The following day we decided to take the 20 minute train ride from Nice to Cannes, where we took a cute train cinema tour about the international festival hosted annually there. That night we returned to Nice to have dinner and go out to the most popular bar, Wayne's. Wayne's turned out to be super touristy, but we still enjoyed ourselves and the DJ's funny remarks in the middle of each song.
We left Nice the next morning for Monaco, which is where we are now at and it is beautiful! The train ride was easy for the most part, besides the fact that our bags have somehow become impregnated and therefore are harder to haul up and down train station stairs. Regardless, we arrived in Monaco and were so amazed by the beauty of the tiny principality. Today, we visited the palace, as well as the oceanographic aquarium (what can we say? we love that stuff) before heading to the Monte Carlo casino for a quick visit to see where they filmed Casino Royale, the James Bond movie. It's pretty tight. We may or may not have also tried our hand at some gambling. Nothing too serious. Just a few slots and we ended up winning money! And tomorrow, we are headed to Italy, where more fun and adventure will surely occur.
Je t'aime fellow bloggers! Au revoirrrr!
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