As previously reported, I am going to tell you about my trip to Barcelona with my school in October 2006. It's quite lengthy, so here goes...
We left school at about 9pm, as the flight from Terminal 1 at Heathrow left at about 7:30am the following morning. The roads were dead quiet, and we had no hold-ups at all. Even two service station stops that lasted about 45 minutes each didn't hold us up much at all. We arrived at Heathrow at about 3:30am. There was one problem, though. Check-in opened at 5am. Which meant there were 95 teenagers and ten members of staff sitting around in the check-in area of Terminal 1, surrounded by bags, waiting for 90 minutes until check-in opened. Eventually, the desks opened, and we were swiftly checked in by the British Airways staff (I actually have quite a bit of respect for BA, despite the fact that I've only ever flown with them when I went to Barcelona), before making it through security (which there was virtually none of - quite surprising, when you consider that there were heightened security measures at the time, including no liquids on flights at all, apart from anything you bought airside; and also, at that point, there were still BA flights to New York from Terminal 1 before everything got shifted around when terminal 5 opened) and finally getting through to the shopping section. Not really that much there, apart from a LAMBORGHINI! Yes, there was a Lamborghini in Terminal 1. Eventually, we all made it to the gate. One of the teachers almost didn't make it (and it was my 'group leader'!) because of some ticket problem, and he only just made it to the gate. Our group had to be looked after by another of the members of staff until our group leader got to the gate. I have to confess, though, that I might not have made it to the gate - I kept dropping my passport, which had my ticket and all my documentation in it! Thankfully, I didn't lose any of it, but why I never put it in my bag, I'll never know. Breakfast on a plane - what fun! All I'd had since leaving Cornwall was a large Fanta at Reading East Services and probably a couple random bars of chocolate. It wasn't that bad, but I've definitely had weirder breakfasts in my lifetime, such as doughnuts (it's very hard to find something easy to eat when you're in a Hilton hotel in London that has been provided for you free of charge! That's another story, by the way). I know this might sound a bit weird, but I never actually knew we were coming in to land at El Prat Airport (yes, that IS the name of Barcelona's main airport - I'm not trying to be rude!) until the wheels touched the runway. I have never felt anything more unusual in my life!
We left school at about 9pm, as the flight from Terminal 1 at Heathrow left at about 7:30am the following morning. The roads were dead quiet, and we had no hold-ups at all. Even two service station stops that lasted about 45 minutes each didn't hold us up much at all. We arrived at Heathrow at about 3:30am. There was one problem, though. Check-in opened at 5am. Which meant there were 95 teenagers and ten members of staff sitting around in the check-in area of Terminal 1, surrounded by bags, waiting for 90 minutes until check-in opened. Eventually, the desks opened, and we were swiftly checked in by the British Airways staff (I actually have quite a bit of respect for BA, despite the fact that I've only ever flown with them when I went to Barcelona), before making it through security (which there was virtually none of - quite surprising, when you consider that there were heightened security measures at the time, including no liquids on flights at all, apart from anything you bought airside; and also, at that point, there were still BA flights to New York from Terminal 1 before everything got shifted around when terminal 5 opened) and finally getting through to the shopping section. Not really that much there, apart from a LAMBORGHINI! Yes, there was a Lamborghini in Terminal 1. Eventually, we all made it to the gate. One of the teachers almost didn't make it (and it was my 'group leader'!) because of some ticket problem, and he only just made it to the gate. Our group had to be looked after by another of the members of staff until our group leader got to the gate. I have to confess, though, that I might not have made it to the gate - I kept dropping my passport, which had my ticket and all my documentation in it! Thankfully, I didn't lose any of it, but why I never put it in my bag, I'll never know. Breakfast on a plane - what fun! All I'd had since leaving Cornwall was a large Fanta at Reading East Services and probably a couple random bars of chocolate. It wasn't that bad, but I've definitely had weirder breakfasts in my lifetime, such as doughnuts (it's very hard to find something easy to eat when you're in a Hilton hotel in London that has been provided for you free of charge! That's another story, by the way). I know this might sound a bit weird, but I never actually knew we were coming in to land at El Prat Airport (yes, that IS the name of Barcelona's main airport - I'm not trying to be rude!) until the wheels touched the runway. I have never felt anything more unusual in my life!
I kinda got lost a bit when I was trying to find the luggage reclaim belt, but I managed to find it. (I think it was something to do with different airline codes used in Spain, but oh well...) Eventually, we boarded the coaches to head to the hotel. I mush have been really tired - I almost fell asleep on numerous occasions! Pretty much as soon as we arrived at the hotel, we dumped our bags into some security room and headed upstairs for lunch. Well, when I say lunch, I mean a full-on pig-out! It was, essentially, help yourself to as much as you like. Which is what everybody did, basically. We were then given our room numbers and the door cards, so we dumped our luggage in our rooms. But then what to do? What is there to do in a hotel in Spain? Hmmm...I wonder...Oh yeah - swimming. The hotel had three pools: a 'fun' outdoor one that had a bar (which wasn't in use when we were there); a 'standard' outdoor one; and an indoor one. The outdoor ones were too cold for my liking, so I spent most of my time in the indoor one. I was rather stupid and forgot to bring any footwear down to the pool with me. Cue me trying to walk back up to my room with wet feet and trying to explain that I was English to some random Spanish guy, before quickly walking back to the pools. Not a good idea, looking back on it. The food for dinner was pretty much the same as for lunch. I can't actually remember what we did for the rest of the day, but I do think I remember trying to watch a Pirates of the Caribbean movie that had been dubbed in Spanish, and trying to lip-read - very difficult...Oh yeah, I remember what we did now - we went out to look for water, because the water in the hotels wasn't (apparently) all that nice. There was a shop near the hotel that sold a huge 8L bottle of mineral water for €1.20. Water was sold in the hotel, but it was €1.50 for a 1L bottle. I didn't actually buy any, but I thought 'Blimey - that's a bargain! €1.20 for 8L of water - not as cheap as tap water, but oh well...'
Breakfast the next day was set out in pretty much the same way as lunch and dinner were the previous day, with juice and hot drinks on tap. Mmm...The orange juice there was so fantastic, I don't think I will ever taste anything like it for a long time. We then boarded the coaches to head to the world-famous Nou Camp Stadium, home of FC Barcelona since 1957. Really, there's only one word that I can use to describe it: huge. It holds a maximum of 98,787 people, and was the scene of one of the most dramatic Champions League finals in history (1999, when Manchester United scored two goals in injury time to beat Bayern Munich 2-1). We even went into the changing rooms and got into the press gallery! There was a museum there as well, which was alright, but a bit boring. That said, though, I did get my photo taken with the Champion's League trophy. (I'm pretty sure it was a replica, as it was slightly dented in places. €10 that cost me - not bad.) Then it was back onto the coaches to find somewhere for lunch. We had lunch in some park that was on a hill to the south of the city centre. I have a hunch that it was Parc Montjuïc, which hosted the Spanish Grand Prix on four occasions between 1969 and 1975, the last one ending in the deaths of at least four spectators. Fantastic views, although I never took any photos while we were in Montjuïc - I wish I did, though! (The hotel were providing packed lunches for us, but they forgot the vegetarian ones. Somehow, I didn't get one, despite the fact that I'm not a vegetarian!) Then down into the city itself to walk along Barcelona's most famous shopping street, Las Ramblas (English: 'The Rambles'). Loads of shops selling loads of stuff (there were even a few sex shops, but I didn't go in any of them) at fairly good prices, with street entertainers as well. (Apparently, the street entertainers can act as a distraction for visitors, so that pickpockets can nick money and stuff. And, to avoid money being nicked, some of the girls stuffed it down their bras! Clever idea! I mean, I would have done that, but I'm a guy, and I don't wear a bra.) We probably spent a good hour and a half to two hours wandering in and out of the shops (quite a few sold cheap leather handbags, and I have my suspicions that they were fake designer goods) before boarding the coaches and going to the Sagrada Familia (English: Sacred Family), Barcelona's famous cathedral, which was designed by Antoni Gaudi, but not finished. In fact, it's not going to be finished until at least 2026! We didn't go inside it because we had to get back to the hotel to a) go swimming in the pool and b) eat. Mmmm...food...
Woke up the next morning and had breakfast as normal. Sport and shopping was, again, the general theme of the day, but it was different to the previous day - and a LOT noisier. We first visited the Circuit de Catalunya, which was alright, but nothing all that special. We did get to go up onto the podium, though, :) The good thing about it was that we got to go into areas that most people don't go to. We visited the media room and the TV control room, before walking under the track (yes, you heard me, we walked under the track) and climbed up some steps into the main pit straight grandstand. The views were pretty good, actually, We could see the whole of the main straight up to turn 1, then straight ahead of us was turn 9, with turns 12, 13 and 14 (it's been changed slightly since I went there) to our right. I mentioned that it was noisy, but that's because they had a Formula BMW school event thingy on at the same time. And believe me, it was VERY loud! After all that had finished, we got back on the coaches in the paddock and went back under the track at turn 9 to head off to La Roca shopping village for lunch and, erm, shopping. I didn't buy that much there again this time around - only some chocolate (which I promptly ate :D) and can of Coke. Yes, I am very sad, there's no need to remind me of that! We then went back to the hotel to go swimming again, before we went upstairs for dinner. Mmm...food...Following dinner, we went downstairs to some random room, where we spent the remainder of the evening playing all sorts of random games, one of which was throwing beanbags into a bucket. Odd...
We had to get up slightly earlier the next day because we had to go all the way around Barcelona to get to Salou. We only had a five minute break to go to the toilet at a service station on the way! We were to be spending the day at one of Spain's best theme parks: PortAventura. I do have a confession to make, though: I nearly lost my ticket before I'd even got into the park! It turned out that I'd put it in my pocket, not my wallet! Silly me...Anyway, we were told to get into groups of at least sig, which I did. My group started off with ten people, but went down to five, before there was only me, Laura and Kerry left (Josh and Charlie had decided to do a runner and leave us). As we were in Spain, and it was quite warm, we went onto the Rapids. We got off them looking pretty wet. Lovely...Then we had a little walk in some random horror maze (it was close to Hallowe'en), but some of us ran out of a side exit because we couldn't be bothered to get to the actual end. No, wait, it was because we couldn't find where we were supposed to go. Whether the exit we used was the right one or not, I'll never know. Stampida was next, which was a wooden rollercoaster. Wait, that's a lie, for two reasons. One is that I have my suspicions it was actually a steel coaster supported by wooden framework, and the other is that it was a racing coaster. (For those of you whon don't have a clue as to what I'm on about, then a racing coaster is when there are two tracks beside each other and the trains 'race' each other around their respective tracks.) We went on the blue one first, which was pretty good, but we then went on the red one, which we felt was better. After a couple more rides on Stampida, and some spinning rides, we left the park to go back to the coaches and get some lunch. don't worry, we went back in! As far as I can remember, we went on Stampida again, followed by one or two more spinning rides, and then one of the ultimate thrillseeker tests: Hurakan Condor. 328ft (100m) tall. 282ft freefall. Speeds of up to 60mph. One of the tallest tower drops in Europe. And I went on it! It's extremely scary, sitting up there, 100m in the air, nothing beneath your feet, waiting to drop. And then the drop. Three seconds of freefall, and then the huge relief that you're back on the ground. Best thrill ride ever, in my opinion. Next was PortAventura's then-flagship rollercoaster, Dragon Khan. Eight inversions, at up to 65mph. It has to be said that Dragon Khan is probably one of the best rollercoasters I will ever go on - we even went on it twice! We would have gone on it more times, but we couldn't really be bothered. I did get a mouse mat of me and Laura on Dragon Khan, though, which I thought was fairly reasonable at €12. This was the point that Josh and Charlie decided to do a runner and leave me with Kerry and Laura. (Not that there was anything wrong with that, apart from the fact that we were supposed to be wandering around in groups of six, and for most of the day we were in a group of five. Oops...) For some reason, Laura and Kerry decided to start singing the 'Bob the Builder' theme tune as we were queuing up for Tutuki Splash, a water ride that got us quite wet, but not as wet as Tidal Wave at Thorpe Park got me (but that's another story). After we got off Tutuki Splash, I had to go and collect my mouse mat (they couldn't print it off at the photo booth by Dragon Khan), and then everybody boarded the coaches back to the hotel. Dinner followed this, then the results of the quiz from the previous night were given out (I never mentioned that, did I? Oh well...) before heading back up to our rooms to start packing our suitcases.
Friday morning was quiet, but we had reached the end of our holiday in Spain. Breakfast was followed by loading our luggage onto the coaches and heading for the airport. Check-in was open when we got to the airport this time (as it was about 10am Spanish time), and then we were let loose in the duty-free section. Mmm...cheap food in large quantities...Then we boarded the plane to head back to Heathrow, followed by collecting our luggage and boarding the buses back to Cornwall. It was disappointing to have to leave Barcelona, as it was such a fun holiday - I would go back and do it all again if I could - but we all had a fantastic time.
Well, there it is. Sorry it took so long, but it was worth it. Oh, and sorry about the length as well! Over 2,500 words. Then again, I have written a 5,500 word essay for English before, but that's a matter for another day...
Friday morning was quiet, but we had reached the end of our holiday in Spain. Breakfast was followed by loading our luggage onto the coaches and heading for the airport. Check-in was open when we got to the airport this time (as it was about 10am Spanish time), and then we were let loose in the duty-free section. Mmm...cheap food in large quantities...Then we boarded the plane to head back to Heathrow, followed by collecting our luggage and boarding the buses back to Cornwall. It was disappointing to have to leave Barcelona, as it was such a fun holiday - I would go back and do it all again if I could - but we all had a fantastic time.
Well, there it is. Sorry it took so long, but it was worth it. Oh, and sorry about the length as well! Over 2,500 words. Then again, I have written a 5,500 word essay for English before, but that's a matter for another day...
