A Week in Spain.
After a week cruising the Mediterranean Sea, Garrett and I had planned to rent a car and drive the French Rivera!
Once the time actually came we decided otherwise! We had already stopped in Cannes on our cruise and felt like we had seen the French Rivera. We decided to cancel our rental car, head straight to the train station in Barcelona, and find a random city to head to. We thought it would be super easy and there’s would be tons of availability. We were very wrong! Haha but there was a couple seats on the next train to Madrid so we went for it!
Madrid
Garrett and I absolutely loved Madrid. We are so glad we ended up there! We used Hotel Tonight for all our hotel bookings. we stayed at a place called “Dear Hotel” we loved it! Good size rooms, private balcony, and an epic rooftop pool! Once we checked in we headed to an Italian Spanish restaurant. So yummy! I had sangria before in the U.S. and wasn’t very fond of it. Garrett told me I had to try sangria in Spain. He convinced me and I did. It was SO good! Whether I had a little too much is up for you to decide!
Later that day we were in a pub and the guys sitting next to us asked if we were going to the Real Madrid game that night. We had no idea there was a game, but it happened to be their opening night and tickets were still available! We headed to Santiago Bernabeu (Real Madrid’s stadium) and bought our tickets! We hung out the rest of the day and waited for game time! Soccer games in Europe are such an amazing experience! We had such a blast!
As we were exploring the next day, we found Mercado De San Miguel. It’s basically like a grand central market. Lots of little food vendors. It was so nice, clean, and modern. We loved it. We ate our faces off in there and then right outside found a cereal restaurant and dug into some lucky charms just for a little taste of home. When we finished up our cereal we saw some electric scooters and walked over to them to check them out. We figured out that Madrid had Lime scooters through the whole city. Lime scooters are electric scooters you can unlock with your phone and ride around as long as you want and leave them wherever you want. I am not kidding one of our rides was 2 hours long! We ventured through the city for miles, randomly deciding when to turn left or right. Garrett and I love these scooters, especially when we are in a city we’ve never been to before! Try these scooters out, they are so much fun and super affordable (couple bucks per ride).
After exploring Madrid all day, Garrett found a casino and we played blackjack for hours! How could we not though, they offered us as much free food as you wanted! We got back to our hotel pretty late that night. The next day we were headed to a new city! Garrett and I still talk about our time in Madrid, we had the best time together.
Valencia
While in Madrid we looked at cities we can head to by train and found Valencia. I didn’t even know the city of Valencia existed, but I am so glad this was one of our stops. We were in Valencia for two nights. Our hotel was awesome! Again, thanks to hotel tonight. We had some awesome food/juice places right across the street. We used the juice bar a few times because we were feeling a little under the weather at one point.
The whole city seemed like a movie set. All the buildings were beautiful. Valencia is right on the water. We were staying probably 5 minutes from the beach. We were able to find a little shop that rented electric scooters. The only problem was that we couldn’t just leave them anywhere because they would probably get stolen. We rented them for two hours and just explored none stop. Again we had a blast! But being able to drop them off and pick up whenever/wherever you want is the best way to go.
The following day Garrett wanted to golf. He found a course and we took an Uber! He picked a beautiful course right on the beach. I rode in the cart and didn’t play just like I’ve done many times. He got to play with some Scottish guys that were tons of fun. He had a great time.
While eating out in Valencia a waiter told us about a beach club we should check out. We decided to go there after our golf adventure. It was a beautiful beach club right on the water with an awesome pool. When we arrived we were trying to figure out how much the cover was and how much the chairs or beds were. Everything was free. The entry and the seating. Score! That would never be the case here at home! We relaxed on a day bed free of charge. We were headed back to Barcelona the next morning!
Barcelona
By the time we made it back to Barcelona we were pretty beat. We had been away from home for two weeks. Garrett and I love to travel, but we also love the comfort of our own home. We enjoyed our time in Barcelona. We were able to check out the famous Sagrada Famalia. To be honest, we thought it was really creepy haha but still beautiful and creative nonetheless. We took it slow in Barcelona. Everyone in Spain eats dinner super late. We would go out to dinner around 10pm and the restaurants were empty! We were already pushing our bed time pretty hard, but we did our best to do what the Spanish do. One of our days in Barcelona Garrett decided to grab us and Uber, I asked where we were going and he said it was a surprise. I ended up taking a little cat nap in the Uber, Garrett always stays alert and awake so I feel safe falling asleep. When we arrived we were at Camp Nou. AH! I was so excited! My dad is a huge FC Barcelona fan so I have gotten to know some of the players and watched a few games. I’ve always wanted to go to a Barcelona game at Camp Nou, unfortunately there was no home games while we were there, but we were able to tour the museum and stadium. It was amazing! As soccer players growing up, Camp Nou is pretty much the biggest soccer stage. We couldn’t imagine being able to play in that stadium in front of 90,000+ fans!
On our last day of our trip we checked out another market (wasn’t as good as the one in Madrid), we walked through random streets, and checked out the gothic quarters. We were so ready to go home. The next day was our flight to LAX. This entire trip was one for the books and we cannot wait to go back to Europe soon…maybe with a baby? ;)
