Tuesday 2nd November 2010 (1)

Emma’s visit was eagerly awaited and we couldn’t wait to pick her up from the airport! Having the hire car made this much easier. As it was Chris and Carols last day we all had dinner in the restaurant on the campsite. The food was good, especially the skewered meats, which are hung on the skewer over your plate, but when they say “Chicken with prunes and pine nuts” they mean just that, no veg or potatoes! Had to order some extra chips!

Sarah and I teamed up for the petanque and maintained the winning streak, we developed the knack of saving the game at the last moment by knocking Lynn or Emma’s boules out of the way! Great fun!

We took Emma into Barcelona and up to see the Sagrada familia where she showed off deciphering the meaning of the towers and architecture, very impressive! We then made our way to the Quadrat d’Or (Golden Square), where in amongst all the modern buildings are some of the city’s best examples of Modernista buildings, all wavey lines and mosaic decoration. It also led us to the city’s Las Ramlas (pedestrian high street to you and me) which housed lots of very expensive designer shops! As you can imagine our progress slowed considerably!! Sarah & Em treated us to lunch at a tapas bar, where we entered into the Spanish ethos of long lunches over good food, wine and of course company. Two bottles of wine and numerous tapas we emerged feeling relaxed and ready for more sightseeing! P.S. Lynn made friends with a young spanish man whilst in the restaurant, you just can't take her anywhere! LOL (I'm going to pay for this addition!)
We continued along the Ramlas before heading towards the old town, where we found a street market and lots of interesting shops down the alleyways. Sarah was determined to find her favourite shop so far, its called “Happy Pills” and looks just like a hospital dispensary! But instead of pills you buy sweets, which you can put in hospital style containers and fix appropriate or in some cases inappropriate labels! After much wandering around in circles (my fault!) we eventually found it. Emma was so excited by the various sweets she was squashing into the bottles she’d chosen, she kept dropping the sweets onto the floor!

The next day was spent relaxing around the camp in the sun, followed by dinner in the restaurant. We discovered that they’re very generous with their measures! Saturday came all too quick and after a great morning finishing our Petanque tournament (Sarah and I were victorious), we had Paella for lunch and then it was time to take Em to the airport. The time went far too quickly but it was great seeing her and we consoled ourselves by saying it’s not long to Christmas!