After seeing my family for a week in Alicante, we started our own travels together by starting my spring break off to Mallorca. The festivities were still going on all night from Semana Santa, and an early morning Air Berlin flight had us jetting over to the largest of the Balearic Islands. This trip we were meeting up with my longtime friend Michael, but with a lack of coordination on my behalf the very beginning of the trip was to be an adventure in itself. The only preliminary plans that Michael and I made were that my family was going and he had bought a flight into Mallorca to be arriving just before us. A long story short, I was pacing the baggage terminal for 20 minutes as Michael had been sitting outside the terminal for 2 hours, starting to abstract a plan B since he hadn’t seen us yet. Fortunately, one of my brothers spotted him sitting with his duffel and a liter of orange juice waiting for us, and we were on our way.
After picking up our Audi rental car, we drove not too far to the south side of the near Palma de Mallorca to our hotel, Hotel Balear. We moved our luggage in despite the misty rain, and walked over to the beach to spot some windsurfers and stand-up paddleboarders. The activity on the water was quite enjoyable from our beachfront restaurant where we ate some paella, fish, and calamari. Later that day, we relaxed and planned the rest of the afternoon, which deemed to be one of my favorite parts of the trip.
We drove a few miles out of the town but had to stop at a local travel agency where we
picked up some maps, which routed us through Campos and Santanyí, ending up at Cala
Santanyí and Es Pontas. The rock formation is probably one of the most famous deep water
solo routes in the World. If you are not familiar with climbing, a deep water solo is
when someone rock climbs with no harness and if they fall, they simply splash in the
water below. Chris Sharma, one of the world’s best climbers, is known for completing
this extrememly difficult route. It was Amazing seeing this natural beauty on the movie
King Lines, and breathtaking to
see it in person, especially when the sun was creating majestical colors over
the Mediterranean. After Es Pontas we headed to a private Beach in Cala Santanyí
for some photos and a wonderful sunset.
The next day we drove to our hotel, La Dorada, on the north side of the island. We explored through winding roads that were barely the width of two cars and also dominate to tons of cyclists. The roads had flimsy guardrails also, and stretching beyond most of them were thousand foot drops into theMediterranean. We ended up at Cap Formentor, the Northern most point on Mallorca and also explored Camí de Cala Figuera, a rocky beach with with the bluest water I have ever seen in my life. My brother enjoyed a swim then we drove back to our hotel where we ate some jamón sandwiches, drank some homemade sangria, and I endulged in some pool Zorbing for the evening. Mallorca was an absolute blast, and the one thing that stook out the most was the amount of bikers and Germans on the island! It seems as if what Florida is to the United States, Mallorca seems to be the vacation spot for Germany.
All five of us took an early afternoon flight back to Spain’s mainland, this time stopping in Barcelona. It was my first hostel experience at Hostal Agua Alegre, where we took up the biggest room on the top floor. We got situated then planned what we wanted to see during our stay and on the first day walk down Las Ramblas, to the Port, and back up through the Gothic Quarter. Along the way we ran into one of my friends Rosie who was studying abroad with me in Alicante, and ended up eating a big tapas dinner with both of our families that night! After the Gothic Quarter we went to the Cathedral of Barcelona for Easter or Semana Santa and said some prayers. We also walked to some works of Antoni Gaudi, Casa Batlló, Casa Milà, and over to La Sagrada Familia. We spent much time in the Sagrada Familia park in awe of the cathedral that is still currently being built and so intricate in detail. Our day ended by taking some more photos at el Torre Agbar, after a much needed rest was taken with some jugo de tamarindo.
The next day we spent most of the afternoon wandering Gaudi’s Park Güell, featuring much
mosaic work and religious symbolism. We saw Rosie and her family again here, and also
met up with another one of my longtime friends Sean, who is studying abroad in Holland
like Michael! After seeing many of the main highlights of the huge park, we grabbed some
lunch and took the metro back
to our hostel. Towards the evening my brothers and I geared up to go to the FC Barcelona
soccer match against Getafe, and my friends tagged along as well to scalp some tickets.
It was amazing sitting about 10 rows up behind the net in Camp Nou, one of the biggest
stadiums in the world, watching one of the best teams in the world play! Barcelona won
4-0 on two goals by Alexis, and one a piece by Messi and Sergio. It was amazing seeing
one of the best footballers in the world in Messi play, and especially play in Camp Nou!
The two Spanish stops in Mallorca and Barcelona were all that was in store for my
family’s vacation, and it was an amazing two weeks. The next morning we all went to the
airport where they flew home, and I embarked on the rest of my spring break.
Sitting in the Barcelona airport was really the first time abroad that I had been completely alone traveling, and I was curious to see how I’d fair off. My next destination was off to Rome to meet up for a group trip over to Croatia. From Barcelona to Italy it was about a two hour flight and I sat next to two very nice Spanish women who I rode the train with all the way to Termini station. This helped because I was nervous being alone for the first time. Then I checked into The Beehive, which was my first hostel experience alone, and did some much needed laundry. After, I met up with my friend Natalie from my study abroad program for dinner and had my first Italian pizza and wine, spinach and mushroom or also known as garden rocket. We took the metro over to catch the Coliseum by night which made for a very sketchy metro ride, and the train cars were covered in graffiti!
The next morning I met up with Natalie again and Rosie and we went to Vatican City to St.
Peter’s Basilica, the Vatican Museum, and Sistine Chapel. It was amazing being at one of
the most holy places in the world, where the Pope resides. After we grabbed the best
gelato in town at Old Harbor and I went back for the night so I could meet up at the
train station for my next stop on spring
break, Croatia!
