From Barcelona to Salzburg

Caroline and Fio picked me up at the Barcelona train station, just as planned and promised.  We had a great late-afternoon/early-evening and an even better night.  We ate dinner at L'orgosmic -- a restaurant that, sadly, is going out of business soon.  It wasn't "best meal of the trip" status, and certainly didn't compare to Organic is Orgasmic, but it was good nonetheless.  The water spoke only Spanish and not a bit of English.  When he realized we were 3 American girls, he seemed a little stressed.  But when he realized I could speak Spanish with him, he gave me my meal and water free of charge!  (Maybe that's why they're going out of business...?)

Between that and miraculously being able to exercise my one semester's worth of French with some Belgium guys we met just across the street form our hostel, I was feelin' pretty good!

Oh, and -- we had the creepiest hostel experience that ended up taking a surprisingly great turn.  We were staying in an 8-bed room that turned out to be a co-ed room.  There was a middle-aged man staying in our room with us that had a bit of a staring problem.  But when we realized he was laying on his lower bunk, angling his head and contorting his body in such a way so as to see up the skirt of our friend Fio, we bolted from the room and asked the manager if we could be placed elsewhere -- anywhere.  To our surprise and delight, we were moved to a private cabana, just the 3 of us girls.  It was just about the best way that hostel horror story could have ended...

The good vibes came to a screeching halt on Monday, though -- one of the longest days of my life that involved 11 hours of brutal travel.  It wouldn't have been so bad had we not gone to bed at 2:00 and woken up at 6:00... Our journey home to Salzburg consisted of: walk to the metro, metro to the bus station, bus to the airport, fly to Linz, bus to the Linz train station, train ride to Salzburg, bus ride to I.K.  I almost keeled over about 1,000 times.  

I really did have a good time in Spain but there is a reason I am living in Austria; I just can't imagine being anywhere else.  I find myself wishing there were more hours in a day and more days in a month, because our time here is passing way too quickly.  I'm already working on a plan to stay beyond this semester.  

All of that, aside, though, the month of March is shaping up to be a really good one.  I am giddy with excitement.

Quote of the day: "I'm going to kiss the ground the moment we get to Salzburg." -- an empty promise I made in a moment of delirium during our day of endless travel