Barcelona, A continuación

The next day we woke up and decided to walk down Diagonal, a street that bisects the gridded Eixample at a diagonal angle to a huge open air market we had heard about. Diagonal is an extremely wide street that is perfect for taking a stroll! We walked down it for a long way and stopped at an older smaller cathredal and went inside. It was very quiet inside and the design was how you would expect a church to be. We continued to the market which was very far away. It was huge and there were tons of people there. They had everything you could possible want there. A lot of it was old junk though. We saw a stack of old play stations for sale and other antequated electronic gear. We decided to leave rather than get lost in the jumble of people.
After that we walked back up the street to head to the beach. We stopped to sit on a bench and a girl walked by and when she head us talking in English, she stopped and struck up a conversation with us. She was an american studying in Valencia who was in Barcelona for the weekend. She's from Georgia and decided to pal around with us for the day. We had lunch at a good priced Chinese food restaurant. Cant beat the menú del día for €8.50 where you get an appetizer, two full plates of food, desert, and drink. Then we walked down to the arc de trimof and past it to a wide boulevard that led to a nice park. There where a lot of people relaxing in the park taking in the sun. We then walked towards the ocean but got side tracked into the ciutat vella. This place was really cool. the Small streets and alleyways and an authentic gothic cathredal! we took tons of pictures before we finally walked to the port.
Again, tons of people everywhere and tons of boats here too. We decided to rent bikes and ride around the area to explore it faster. We rode up to the ocean where we all stopped and got off. Brett, Adam, and I rolled up pants and took off our shoes to go put our feet in the water. It was really really cold and I was def not expecting that. Just as we finally coordinated for a group picture, a big wave ame and splashed us. We then continued riding along the paseo until the end by the hospital and new port rebuild for the olympics. After taking some pictures we returned the bike and started walking down a street back to Las Ramblas. We saw a big statue of a man pointing and tried to take bets as to who it was. Everyone was saying Christopher Columbus, but I couldn't imagine why he would be pointing to the mediterranean rather than the new world. turns out I was wrong because everyone else had already read about the statue.
We got to La Ramblas and while walking up it we stopped to see a group of guys do gymnastics tricks. The pulled three volunteers from the audience and lined them up. One of the guys then did a flip over them! It was very impressive! Brett and Kat (the girl) went to find a market and and Adam and I went to find a store we thought we saw the day before. Turns out we had no idea where we were and went to Corte Inglés instead. We got back to our hostal to rest, eat, and change clothes and while there we met our roomates. there were two French girls, who were cousins, from Brittany there. they asked us If we wanted to go out with them later and we said sure since we were planning on going out later anyway.
the next few hours were spent trying to have conversation in slowly enunciated English while learning some French phrases. It was really fun trying to talk. During this our other roomates, three guys who live in Valencia arrived and joined our conversation. I was able to speak spanish with them and I managed to carry myself very well I thought. Once it got late enough we went and got on the metro which was full of young people doing the same as us. We got to the club and got in line and you could tell the area was popular with young people. There where old guys walking around trying to sell beer to people in line, but when the cop cars drove by they would hide because they were immigrants and street vending is illegal. the club was huge and jam packed with people. There were multiple rooms all playing techno music. We all started to dance and had fun.
The next day we woke up and checked out. We carried our bags to the bus station and locked them in a locker. We had a few hours before the bus came so we decided to walk around. We walked through the barrio gotico some more and saw some acrobat guys putting on a show for families. We watched for a while and were impressed with their skills. We continued walked and found the famous Palau de la musica. This is a famous opera house which is covered in cerramic tiles. We saw as much of the lobby as we could before we left. We walked right back into the plaza with the main gothic cathredal we had saw on the first day.
The plaza was PACKED! people were everywhere and looking up the street there were some poeple dressed in different colors for some type of religious festival. They were beating drums and jumping around to maintain their energy. Im not sure what the celebration was for but it seemed tradititional. On the other side of the plaza, there was a stage set up and some type of tap dancing group was performing. We decided to use this time to go into the cathredal. This cathredal permitted us to take pictures, but we couldnt go in very far because services were going on. (it was sunday after all) this one reminded me of Toledo because of all the gold and craftsmanship visible in the altars and chapels and such. We left ate and relaxed in the placa catalunya for a bit before finally heading back to the bus stop.
The bus for the ride home was much less crowded and I got a seat to myself which was awesome. It was a bit nicer and had tv's to play a movie. I slelpt for a long time and relaxed for the rest of it. We got home just in time to take the last metro home. 2 1/2 days in Barcelona and I felt like I saw a great deal of things. It was extremely fun and I am definitely looking forward to going back in the summer. I can't wait to the city when its really warm and the trees are in bloom!