We arrived in Barcelona May 8th and stayed with Pilar and Joseph for a few days. Pilar met us at the train station and we took a cab to her place. I really appreciated her TLC as I was pretty bagged from the 15 or so hours of traveling! They were very hospitable - taking us out for tapas and beer the first night we were in Spain, giving us metro tokens, maps, advice on where to go, and they cooked us a great meal one night. Pilar took us to the park designed by Gaudi (Parc Güell?) which was absolutely awesome, but unfortunately we didn't have our camera with us that day. Our last night in Barcelona we (Pilar, Joseph, Pilar's sister, Tim and I) went out for seafood to a wonderful restaurant at the harborfront (I love seafood so was very happy indeed!), then we wandered around the habour. I was amazed by the nightlife - bar after bar, restaurant after restaurant - with so many people wandering about. Perhaps the night life is so intense because it is so temperate in the evenings. Pilar and I slipped into one of the bars around midnight or so and danced for a bit (I haven't done this in a long time and it was fun!) - but the night was still young since according to Pilar things don't really begin until 2 am or so. If you like to party, Barcelona would be a great place to live!

The day after we arrived, Tim and I wandered around the city, walking down La Rambla to the habour, then to Gaudi's cathedral. La Rambla is amazing - it is filled with hundreds of restaurants, shops, bars, entertainers, and people wandering/socializing/eating or just hanging out. There were some people posing as statues on La Rambla - this is a picture of one of the better ones.