Lewis and I were both pretty content to just hang out in Barcelona and not do a lot. We had obviously been before on contiki and had already seen all the main touristy stuff. And we hadn't really had any downtime since the trip started so I think we were both looking forward to relaxing a bit.

Day 1 we rose early after a quiet night and hit the beach. Was pretty relaxing. Barca's main beach is alright, sandy with a hint of a wave. We decided to exert ourselves by going for a run, which wasn't easy, but it felt good after. We headed back to the apartment after lunch. I went for a bit of a walk up La Rambla later in the afternoon to take some happy snaps. Lewis cooked up another storm; our room was starting to reek of garlic. We went out that night to a few places. None that were any good unfortunately, but worth experimenting in any case.

The next day we gave up the morning to sleep in. Hit the beach again in the arvo. Lewis, again, whipped up some spag bol, then we had some friends come over for drinks. Plan was to have a few pre's before heading out but that didn't happen. Things escalated and we never made it out, which was pretty funny..

The next day we checked out of our garlic scented apartment and moved back down the street to the hostel and for our first taste of the dorm experience. Funny how two financially deprived backpackers make their first use of the cost-efficient dorm room a mere 50-odd days into their trip. I slept all day. Wasn't feeling too crash hot. Lewis did similar. I think it was 2 minute noodles for dinner that night. Then back to bed. A bit of a wasted day really.

Wanting to make up for it, I hired a bike the next morning and took to the streets with no real planned destination. Just rode around really and got lost over and over again. Saw most of the city and got a mad workout at the same time. Definitely a more productive day than the last. Lewis cooked spaghetti that night (4th time in 5 days), this one was his best yet though. I had 3 plates.

The next day I got a bike again, but didn't really get to see much. It wasn't a great day; in fact it was comfortably the worst I've had. Mistakes were made and lessons have been learnt, hopefully. On the positive I caught Gaudi's Sagrada Familia Temple on the way home, which I had seen before but it's pretty amazing. When I got back to the Hostel, Lewis had checked out and relocated to a rather lush hotel down the street. I too packed my bags because I was leaving for San Sebastian in the morning!

Another day filled with more costly mistakes. My bus to San Seb left at 7am .. I woke up at 7:30.

Every other bus leaving that day was sold out. So it was off to the train station (10 Euro). The only train scheduled to leave that day with availability, was a 3:40 pm train and surprise surprise the only tickets they had left were first class (82 Euro). Not only did I pay an extra 92 euro to get there, I wasted a day in a train station instead of spending it in San Sebastian. I was not having a good run..

I got to San Seb at about 9 o clock, met up with some friends (Foxy, Zoe & Cheree) and checked in around 10. Our hostel was in a pretty good location, about a 2 minute walk to the beach, 10 minutes to the old town and where all the night life was, or was supposed to be.

We didn't get out till pretty late that night. We went to a tapas bar around midnight. My first real tapas experience. It was pretty nice, but with the size of my stomach, it can serve to be a pretty expensive experience as well. After that we went to a few pubs but they weren't overly impressive. You got the impression that San Seb wasn't crazy on partying too late. We went home, via a few detours, when everywhere had shut up shop.

The next day I woke up and went straight to the beach for pretty much the entire day. The surfing beach in San Seb was beautiful. Easily the best beach in Europe. Probably one of my favourites anywhere in the world. 5-6 foot waves, normal sand, perfect weather, and an awesome sunset. It was the best beach day I've had in a long long time..

We went out to this all-you-can-eat wok place for dinner. I ate the place down it was a great feed. After that we went back to our dorm and played some drinking games which were pretty fun. We gave 'the old town' another crack and unfortunately it was pretty similar to the night before. Even the one club they had on the beach was pretty much empty. The nights what you make it though and we made it pretty fun. There were a few funny stories to recap the next day.

The next morning I went for a solo walk into the city and up and around the coastline to the beaches in the 'old town', and then I went to the internet cafe to make some plans for the next part of my trip. That was followed by another beach session. Waves weren't as good as the day before but it was still good fun. We hung around till about 9pm when the sun dropped. I think we had all given up on the potential of the cities nightlife, plus a few had early departures the next day so we just headed out for some Italian and called it a night.

I had an afternoon bus back to Barcelona so I decided to make the most of my morning by paying the beach a final visit. I ran up and down it for a while, had a swim then went to get some breakfast and kill some time before the bus left. The bus was hell. Maybe it's because I was used to all the first class trains I had been catching over the past couple of weeks. I eventually got back into barca just before midnight where I checked back into the hostel, only to check out 7 hours later.

Today we are going to Ibiza! On the ferry right now. Its going 2km/hr. Lewis is sulking over the devastation of losing 220 euro that fell out of his pocket on the way to the ferry this morning. I've never seen him more cheerful.

To be continued...