over the span of three countries

anna and i left london on saturday (april 2) and flew to barcelona. we met paloma - our first couchsurfing host - and she was SO nice! she was hanging out with another guy from cs named miguel (from madrid) and they threw together a paella type dish. unbeknownst to me, there were three tiny and extremely hot peppers in it. i ended up with two of the three peppers on my plate and i ate both. they were really really really hot but i didnt say anything because i didnt want to be the wimpy american! after everyone was finished eating paloma and miguel told us that there were some peppers in it and they thought it was soooo funny that i ate them because you are not supposed to eat them. terrible trick to play! but it was kinda funny... we went out together that night and met up with some of paloma's friends who were very nice. we were at a pub until 3am and then paloma suggested we go to a club after that so we went to bed at 6am that night! the spaniards are loco! 

the next day (with about 4 hours of sleep to sustain us), anna and i walked to parc guell which was really cool but we didnt realized that it would be a looong walk and COMPLETELY uphill. the entire way. im not kidding. since we were lacking sleep, we were slap-happy the whole way so it was a pretty hilarious day. we saw a lot of gaudi architecture like la sagrada familia and casa batllo and everything in parc guell. for dinner, we went out with paloma and her friend carlos and carlos's couchsurfer kayla. we had tapas and it included several seafood items which is slightly unfortunate because neither anna nor i enjoy seafood. but we were good travelers and went outside of our comfort zone to try the cultural food. we had baby squid that looked exactly like you would expect a baby squid to look like except that it was on my plate instead of in the sea. i also tried codfish and mussels which is normal for most people but not to a non-seafood person. the best tasting one of the three was the squid. that doesnt mean i had seconds though. after dinner we went out salsa dancing and it was SO MUCH FUN!!! paloma is a phenomenal salsa dancer! it was fun to watch her when anna and i werent dancing.

on the following day, monday, we walked to the beach. on the way there we saw barcelonas arc de triomf and walked through a couple really cool parks. went to the beach and laid on some chairs for a while, got sunburned, then walked down la rambla and then through a famous market which had tons of fruits and veggies and nuts and meat. the meat consisted of tongue, stomach, heads of sheep with eyes in them, feet, and the nose of a cow. im sure there were a lot of other things like that but we couldnt identify them. 

i am now in marseille, france in a hostel that is 5 minute walk from the harbor. anna and i took a ferry out to the chateau d'if which is the setting for the count of monte cristo. it was built in the 16th century as a fortress of defense for the unprotected city of marseille. it was really cool and it was a beautiful day so we were happy. now we are on our way to geneva, switzerland! updates to come.