It was the first week of class in Manchester and I am excited about it.

What made me so excited was not the course but...

The number of days off during the whole semester.

I am not joking as I really hate studying for assignments and exams until the point where I was curious about the person who created them. I mean who likes assignments and exams every week? They are like a nicer version of zombies that eat our brains away. But please do not hate me, Mr.or Mrs. or Miss Jane Doe that created the concept of assignments and exams. I still want to have a good night sleep everyday and haunting me will be a bad idea.

Anyway, it never went through my mind that I will be visiting countries like Spain. I always thought that I will be visiting some of the must-go countries like France or Germany. But I guess fate do really exist. I had one week of holiday during my semester in Manchester and I was planning ahead where should I go. Before that, I am not a girl that go to a destination and click the check-in button in Facebook or Instagram so that I can show the world that I been there before. I like to plan my trips ahead and made them as a stress-free trip so that I will not be in a rush to every attractions.

Barcelona is located in Spain and it is the capital as well as the largest city of Catalonia. The city is famous for its art and architecture. Famous landmarks such as Sagrada Familia church and other architectural buildings that designed by Antoni Gaudi were just pure amazing and full of awesomeness. From what I saw in every architectural design of Antoni Gaudi, it was as if he is still alive and living in every single landmarks that he built. It will be very creepy if I saw him in person but it was more likely his souls were attached to every single design that he made (This is a good kind of creepy)

Before the week of departure to Barcelona, there were news articles everywhere about how the people in Catalonia was yearning for independence and it created a lot of chaos as well. Both families from my friend and I tried to warn us everyday about it and even tried to stop us from going into Barcelona as they were afraid of our safety. I had some friends who were participating student exchange program there and they said that it was not as bad as what they said in the news but we do need to take extra precaution when we walked on the street. The day of departure has arrived and both of us were excited and nervous at the same time. When we reached Barcelona at around 11p.m., I was surprised to see that the locals in the city of Barcelona were still very active and just singing their hearts out with their friends as well as chanting some Spanish words happily.

For 5 days I was travelling around there and it was the safest 5 days throughout my entire trip. There were police forces and army trucks all around the city . I can hear the people singing their independence song in the subway using their own portable radio. Almost the entire city of locals will bring their national flag along with them and some of the heart-core locals wore them like a SUPERMAN cape. It was more likely a happy occasion than an occasion for them to create chaos. I still remember that my friend had one flag with her and I borrowed it to join in the happiness that they were cheering about. At first, I thought that the locals will give you some sort of discrimination like a dead stare since we are Asians that is obviously none of our business. The locals that saw us ended up cheering with us and laughed together with us which made us feel like we were a part of this happy occasion.

It was a great experience throughout my Barcelona trip and it was something that I can prove people wrong about their so-called violence.Or maybe it was just my luck in not witnessing their fights.

A few important tips from me before you plan your trip to Barcelona :
1) Please take care of your belongings, like put in more effort in protecting your wallet and electronic devices. There are tons of pickpockets there and some of them work in groups that will distract you so that it will be easier to take your belongings away. I know that no where is really safe in this world but they are pretty smart in every way in order to make a living. But thank God! I did not get pick-pocketed but my friends who stayed there got her mobile phone and power-bank stolen without her knowing about it.
2) There are con men or women dressing in white trying to extort your money. They will first approach to you and try hugging or kissing you on the cheek. If you let them do that to you, well... Good luck running away from them because they will keep on following you and annoyed you until you give them the amount of money that THEY WANT. Yeap..you did not see wrong at all. If you think that a few pennies can shoo them away, well think again!

So yeah.. Be careful with all these tricks and have fun in Barcelona which I did!

How to get there?

It's obvious.. Even if I knew how to swim, I will not risk my life to swim across the North Atlantic Ocean. I still want to live my life and not get eaten by any non-existence sea creatures.

By plane : I used Ryanair airline company as it was the cheapest shown on Skyscanner. I just love using the Skyscanner app because it is so convenient and easy. All you need to do is just type out where and when you want to go, choose the option of either one way or return ticket and the number of pax that you want to book for.The app can search for over 100 airline companies all around the world and you can choose which one is the best for you. I always choose the cheapest airline because I want to budget myself before any trip so that I can spend more in other necessary places. My air ticket cost around 40 Pounds for one way. As for the comfort of the whole journey, it felt like travelling by AirAsia budget airline. Nothing really special about it except for the fact that it was cheap.

Purchasing plane tickets is like buying train tickets. The earlier you bought your tickets, the cheaper your ticket can be. So be sure that you plan your date properly and do not hesitate when you saw the price of the tickets. If not, the price of the airline tickets will increase unconditionally. It felt like they can sense your desperateness in buying a cheap airline ticket. Do check the Spanish calendar as well for their festive season because the price of the airline ticket will increase within seconds.

Accommodation

There are tons of accommodation choices for you to choose, depending on how much you willing to pay. As for me, I chose the service of Airbnb since I have been a fan of their service despite the unfortunate experience I had with them ( check out my Airbnb post!) My friend and I stayed in a private room with a couple located in Carrer de la Marina which is about 25 mins from Bogatell beach. The apartment was so comfortable and the night view at the balcony is just spot on. We can see the night view of the beach and the magnificent Sagrada Familia from afar. Every night, we will go to the balcony of the apartment after dinner and popped a can of local beer, chatting our hearts away. The couple that stayed with us were friendly and kind which were something that we were very grateful of throughout the entire trip. No to mention, the cleanliness of the house and the room were spotless. There were also strong flower fragrance fluttering around the entire house which made our mind relaxed.

My rating for this accommodation? 11 out of 10.

Fun facts : Try finding accommodation near the metro station of any public transportation to ease your movement. In order to know which accommodation is suitable for you, you should check the reviews of the guests besides focusing on location , price and facilities.

For great rates of hotel and hostel (based on my observation) : https://www.booking.com or https://www.hostelworld.com/

Or just use Airbnb which is just fine.

Public transportation

There are basic public transportation around the Barcelona such as public buses, subways and trains. There are various transportation cards offered, starting from single tickets to unlimited travel cards in Barcelona. A lot of thoughts went through my mind when I was deciding to buy the unlimited travel cards or the T-10 tickets. It is obvious that the unlimited travel cards have more benefits than the other one but most of the attractions that I wanted to go were near to each other and plus T-10 tickets are way cheaper than the unlimited travel cards.

Examples of T-10 tickets and travel cards

So basically T-10 tickets are multi person travel card that allows only 10 journeys to be made. For example, if you are travelling with two person, you need to insert 2 tickets to be chopped at the machine per journey. This means that you will only left with 8 tickets and you need to repurchase the same exact same card after finishing the 10 tickets. You can share the T-10 with a maximum of 4 person including you but remember this, T-10 is not allowed to be used for airport transfer. You can either buy airport bus transfer ticket or train ticket to the city of Barcelona. There are a total of 6 different zones for the ticketing of public transportation so be aware of where you want to go during your trip so that you will not end up in buying the wrong tickets.

Ticket machine that can be found in subway station

I know it is confusing but you will get used to it after a few days like me.

Below are the prices of different types of tickets or travel cards.

• Price for a single ticket : 2.20 Euros / 4.60 Euros for airport only
• Price for T-10: 10.20 Euros per zone
• Price for Barcelona Travel Cards ( 2 days ) : 15 Euros

You may compare and calculate to see which one is more worth it ,depending on your travel itinerary.

For more information on public transportation in Barcelona , please go to https://www.tmb.cat/en/barcelona/fares-metro-bus.

Food

There are a lot of amazing food that we ate during our trip in Barcelona. Here are my top 4 recommendations of food in Barcelona.

i) Paella
It's Spain and you will be the biggest joke in the world if you did not try paella in Spain. Hands down, this is the best Paella I ever tasted in my life. It was as if I stepped into the dream world of Paella. Before I explain more about the Paella, be sure to get ready a piece of tissue to wipe away your dripping saliva and your wallet as well. This is because the restaurant that I went is not a cheap restaurant but honey let me tell you this...

It is worth every single penny.

For the paella, you need to order a maximum of 2 portion for the same flavour. My friend and I decided to try the seafood Paella and it was just banged on! When they served the Paella to you, they will first explain the dish to you and mix it up after the nod of your head. The Paella is full of seafood goodness as they gave the portion of seafood generously. The seafood was very fresh and the texture of the rice is just right, not too mushy and not too hard for Paella dish. I would highly recommend you to try this restaurant when you visit Barcelona.

Elche ( 15 mins walk from Montjuic castle)

Total bill : 42 Euros included a bottle of still water and some taxes

ii) Churros
Just imagine one hot steamy fried churros dipped in rich chocolate sauce and melt in your mouth instantly... That is what I get when I visited this churros cafe in Barcelona. I waited outside of the shop before the start of their second opening hours of the day. It was worth the wait because I got to eat freshly fried churros and it was the bomb! The rich chocolate sauce is a bit bitter as they used dark chocolate for the sauce. Therefore, the combination of sweet cinnamon-sugar coated churros and the bitterness of the chocolate sauce is just perfect, like the song Perfect by Ed Sheeran (Fav song ever!) My friend and I also ordered the Crema Catalana which is a famous dessert in Barcelona. It is like a Spain version of Creme Brulee except that it has a little bit of ginger taste and has a richer texture to it. So if you are craving for desserts other than Gelato, do visit this amazing cafe because it will blow your mind off with the goodness of everything.

Granja La Pallaresa (Be aware of the opening hours!)

Total bill : 14 Euros included tax

iii) Spanish tapas
Tapas is like small bites in Spain and there are a lot of varieties of it from something with smoked ham to cottage cheese with spinach. There is a famous tapas bar located inside La Boquiera market and it is always full of people. The menu was entirely in Spanish so we had to Google Translate them one by one as we are dummies for Spanish language. After a while, I decided to just go with the flow and see what they have in their open kitchen, I noticed there are a lot of people ordering the chickpeas dish and the octopus dish was calling me to eat it the entire time. Therefore, I ended up ordering the fresh grilled octopus and chickpeas dish,along with 2 glasses of beer. My favourite was the grilled octopus as they preserved the freshness of the octopus by lightly seasoned them with salt and red chili pepper powder. This goes very well with a chilled glass of beer. The chickpeas dish is delicious as it had strong flavours in it and surprisingly, it balanced off well with the octopus dish and a glass of beer.

Pinotxo Bar @ La Boquiera Market (Be there by 8a.m. if possible to beat the queue)

Tips when you visit this bar: The final bill will depends on the number of people sitting at the bar. When the dishes arrived, I sat down on one of the stools at the bar while my friend is standing beside me. When the lady beside me went off, my friend quickly sat down in which they charged double for each of the dish we ordered. So for example, if one of the dish cost 6 Euros, it will doubled up to 12 Euros due to the space taken by two person. It's a bit tricky since they did not explained that in English but we did not mind that because the food tasted so good.

Total bill : 26 Euros.

iv) Some random cheap and affordable meal that I stumbled upon
This restaurant was highly recommended with thumbs up by the couple that we stayed together with. We tried the restaurant two days after we arrived for breakfast. They have a variety selection of food from breakfast to lunch and dinner. I ordered the baguette sandwich which was a mistake because I totally forgot that baguette sandwiches in overseas are rock-hard. I told my friend that we should tried to dine in here for dinner. We went there the night before we left because we were tired and wanted to rest early. We ordered a portion of mussels, beef & bacon burger as well as steak & fries. The winner of the night was the mussels because the portion of the mussels were so generous and it was like a feast of mussels. The beef patty of my burger was not dry and it came with a huge serving of fries as well. The steak that my friend ordered is average and the thickness of the steak is thinner than we expected. While we were sitting there, I noticed that the owner of the restaurant did not look like a local as they looked like Asians (it's pretty easy to notice an Asian). When my friend and I were done with the meal, we heard the owner spoke Chinese to their children and we were excited about it. We started talking in Chinese and asked about how and why they opened the restaurant there. It appeared that they had some living issues back in China and wanted a better life for their family .Hence, they moved to Barcelona for job opportunities and did not regret about it. I recommended this restaurant not just because of the food, but also to show everyone that this is just a simple restaurant that is currently earning a better life for the family.

Total bill : 30 Euros included drinks.

Attractions

Montjuïc Castle : It is an ancient military fortress which is located on top of the hill. You can hiked up to the castle like I did to check out the amazing view of Barcelona. Just remember to dressed comfortably and wear appropriate hiking shoes because man... you do not want to hike up a hill with a dress. ( Lesson learned..)

Sagrada Familia : A place that is highly recommended by me. This church gave you chills from the outside and the inside. I will recommend you to buy the entrance ticket online so that you can skip the long queue there as well. Make sure that you make time for this attraction because I spent about 2 hours inside the church and this is one place that you will not regret for the rest of your life.
Fun fact : Sagrada Familia is taking 200 years to be constructed by modern technology and it took longer period than the great Pyramid of Giza in Eypyt.

Pretty cool huh?

One of the major works of Gaudi and it is a public park for the locals. It is located on Carmel Hill in Barcelona. Don't worry.. There is public bus available there and drop you off in front of the park. There are a lot of special architecture in the park and sadly , some of the monuments were on renovation and you need to pay for the entrance fees as well which is not worth it for me.

Casa Batlo : One of the amazing building designed by Antoni Gaudi. It is located in the city centre of Barcelona. I did not went inside as the price of entrance fees is not worth it, based on the reviews of attendees that visited there before.

Casa Mila : One of the masterpieces by Gaudi which is also located in the city centre. This building is 4 mins away by foot from Casa Batlo. It is known as La Pedrera which means the stone quarry due to its odd rough hewn appearance. It is also a modernist building as well but like Casa Batlo, I did not went inside the building ,based on the reviews of attendees that visited there before.

La Rambla : this is basically the heart of Barcelona. It is located in the old quarter of Barcelona, called Gothic Quarter. Everyone that went to Barcelona before will know La Rambla because it has 5 separate avenues that filled with restaurants and souvenir shops. There are also a lot of art and entertainment performance as well. The famous Mercado de la Bouqueria is located inside La Rambla and it is just filled with amazing local cuisines. There are fresh oysters available to be eaten there and fresh juices that quench your thirst throughout your shopping in La Rambla.

Various types of candies and nuts as well as a small plate of fresh oysters.

Mercado de la Bouqueria

I started off my first destination of the week with nervousness but ended up with happiness and gratefulness due to the friendliness of the people in Barcelona.

2 fun facts of my Barcelona trip :

• Total spending for this trip is about 150.30 Euros excluding daily spending on meals.
• Sagrada Familia is my favourite attraction and will always be the representative of my love towards Barcelona, of course in terms of art and architecture.

Want to find out where is my top 1 destination throughout the trip?

Well...You just need to wait for it..

Chapter 4 of Aly's travel book coming soon.

Stay tuned and do not be shy in asking me anything about your trip to Barcelona.

Bye for now and Cheers!