Wanderlusting: Barcelona Vacation – Part 1

 

It’s here!  It’s finally here!  I considered doing one long post about my week in Barcelona and surrounding cities, but ultimately decided to split it up into 3 parts.  We had some chill days, but for the most part our week was pretty packed and this would’ve been a super long post and I didn’t want to subject y’all to that.  I do want to warn you that this will be a picture heavy post, but what vacation recap isn’t?

 

We booked this trip back in March, on St. Patrick’s Day to be exact, and to say that I was looking forward to it since would be an understatement.  There was a moment shortly after Harvey when asked my step-mom if she wanted to cancel the trip, but we both decided that we needed the vacation and would still go.  I was so happy that we did because I needed the break.  The week leading up to it was one of my busiest ones, so when Sunday morning rolled around I was more than happy to be heading to Hobby Airport and off to LAX.  It might sound backwards that we went east to go west, but when you’re able to book $300 roundtrip tickets for Barcelona you don’t question it.  Even with the roundtrip flight for LA my airfare still came in well under $600, and I couldn’t pass it up.

 

 

 

 

We had a 12 hour layover in LA and I originally planned on us hanging out in the United Club for that time, but those plans changed about 2 hours into the layover.  We decided to store our luggage with a locker company and go and explore the city.  Our appetites led us to Roscoe’s, and I couldn’t complain because what a trip to LA isn’t complete without at least one trip to the waffle house.  I got the Obama and decided afterwards that it would be my go-to as long as they kept it on the menu.  We did a bit of shopping in the fashion district and headed back to the airport with plenty of time to grab sushi and cocktails before our overnight flight.

 

 

This was my first time on Level, which is a budget airline in the Iberia family, and I was pleasantly surprised.  There was plenty of in-flight entertainment, and I’d picked our seats out a few weeks prior (and paid $66/per person roundtrip) so we had plenty of leg room.  There was no one in the middle seat so I had plenty of room to stretch out on the left and right and I did just that.  I slept for at least 8 of the 11 hours we were in the air and it was lovely.

 

The time difference was quite noticeable when we touched down in Barcelona.  We’d left the west coast at 9PM on Sunday and arrived in Barcelona at 6PM on Monday.  We were wide awake so we grabbed a cab and checked into our apartment for the week before exploring the neighborhood.   We stayed at the Cosmo Apartments (aka ‘Godzilla’ to a few cab drivers in the city)  near the Barcelona Sants train station and there were a ton of restaurants and stores nearby.  We ended up being a great location, not too touristy or loud and also pretty accessible to the rest of the city.  We were able to hop in a cab and be in the Gothic quarter or in Las Ramblas in like 10 minutes.

 

 

 

The apartment itself was super cute too!  I love my step-mom, but I knew I wouldn’t want to share a single hotel room with her for the week so an apartment was high on our list of lodging.  She was actually the one who found Cosmo and after staying there I would definitely go back!  We had a 2BR/1B apartment with a full kitchen, pull out couch in the living room, gorgeous view of the city on our patio and from my room and SO MUCH STORAGE!  We had a breakfast table that we used regularly and free wifi which came in handy when I would fall asleep watching Netflix.  The staff there was so helpful and had a ton of suggestions for us, and the maintenance staff was pretty quick when it came to repairs.  They even surprised us by cleaning up the apartment before the 7-day mark!  We already decided that that’s where the family will stay the next time we go back.

 

 

 

We ended up eating dinner at a local restaurant on Monday night and quickly found out how cheap the food was in Barcelona.  Both of us had steak dinners, drinks and an adult beverages and it was like 21 euros!  We loved the food so much that we even went back the next night!  I found a beer that I loved and continued to drink that all week.  It tasted like Budweiser and reminded me of home.

 

 

 

We slept in on Tuesday and decided to leisurely take on the day.  We grabbed lunch at a restaurant across the street before heading to find a store that sold the charging cable I needed for my headphones.

 

 

 

We found a Sephora and I got matched for Fenty and even grabbed the ‘Trophy Wife’ highlighter!  They didn’t have my foundation in stock, but that’s okay because I’ll just order it online.

 

 

 

We ended up stumbling upon a mall and discovered that not only were department stores there, but there was also a grocery store!  What better time to grab weekly supplies than while browsing purses and winter clothes?  I was blown away by the grocery store.  So many fresh food options and the layout was perfect!  I’m happy we didn’t go overboard the groceries because we had to pay per grocery bag and we also had to take everything back to our apartment via a cab.  We kept it super low-key on Tuesday evening because we knew we’d hit it pretty hard the rest of the week and I was happy we did that.  We had dinner and drinks and were in bed before midnight mentally preparing for the tours that we had scheduled for the next day and I can’t wait to share those with you guys later this week!!