Barcelona – Day 1
I started to blog on my trip to Phoenix for the Fiesta Bowl (way back in Jan. ‘09), funny thing is, spring ball is over now and the new football season is not too far away – and it’s still sitting in my draft box. I have this habit of starting blogs and never finishing the entry (I choose to call it writer’s block, but most people call it laziness), I think that’s why I’m on twitter so much – 140 characters is not too much and I don’t have to worry about continuity. Anyways, I figured I’d blog about my trip to Barcelona before it gets awkward (if it’s not already at or past that point?)
We got into BCN from ATL around 9am, after going through customs and running a few errands, we took the Aerobus A1 from the airport straight to Plaça de Catalunya. Being a little bit of a foodie myself, one of the awesome things about this trip is that we are all food lovers so naturally, we stopped for some tapas (with all our luggage in tow) as soon as we got to Plaça de Catalunya.
The First Bite
The first place we ate at was “Txapela”. Like one of the reviews Mian found while we were doing research for the trip said, this place is not necessarily the best place for tapas, but it is a good place to start. I really appreciated the fact that there’s ample outdoor seating so you can soak in the streets of Barcelona and while it’s not too far away from Plaça de Catalunya and Las Ramblas. One of the things I liked the most (besides a really strong Sangria) was that the tapas menu had pictures even though the wait staff didn’t speak much English. Check out some of the goodies we ate:
Txapela
Paseo Gràcia 8
08007 Barcelona, Spain
934 120 289
Rumblin’ down Ramblas
After a long day of traveling, we took it easy and just strolled down Ramblas after we finally got settled into our apartment style hotel. We were lucky enough to stay right next to the most popular market in Barcelona La Boqueria, which I’ll talk more about later. Whether you’re looking to shop or people watch, there’s no shortage of stuff to check out down the Ramblas. Check out this street performance of “Stand By Me” I caught with my blackberry:
King of the Shrimp
For dinner we went to a not-so-little seafood joint right by the beach. The restaurant that Mian found was called “El Rey de la Gamba II”, literally, The King of the Shrimp 2 (*more on 1 vs. 2 later). While we were all curious to try A LOT of seafood, it just ended up that we split up our groups where all the couples ordered for themselves and I ordered with two girls – alllllright. =)
Even though I knew that these girls could eat, there was no way for me to prepare myself for what was to come – We decided that we’d order a paella (portioned for 2 people) and then a mixed grilled seafood platter (also portioned for 2 people), and an order of razor clams (for the whole table). When the food came, I was shocked at how much food was in front of us.
While the food was moderately priced, I thought that overall it was a decent experience. The shrimp (gambas) was unbelievable, there was so much liquid inside the head that it was more like drinking soup!! There were two elements of disappointment for me: One was the razor clams – I guess it was just that we all have never had them before and wanted to try them out. If I was given that choice again today, I’d choose the baby clams over the razor clams ANY day. The other one was the paella, I made this pretty kick ass paella with homemade lobster stock that was just off the hook. At this point of the trip, it was still early, so I know that I’d have my chances to find better paella elsewhere.
El Rey de La Gamba – 2
Passeig Don Joan Borbó Comte Barcelona 46 – 48
08003 Barcelona, Spain
932 256 400
Come back tomorrow for day 2!!!
[...] This is a contiunation (part 2 of 3) of a series of posts about my trip to Barcelona in May 2009. You can see part 1 here. [...]