Europe Trip: Barcelona, Spain

We took a pretty epic trip to Europe last week, made possible by my wonderful mother who took off work to come to Georgia and watch all of our kids.

On Friday we flew overnight to Barcelona, Spain.

Sleep on a plane isn't the easiest so we were pretty tired, but soaked in as much as we could that first day.

We took a bus into town from the airport and then either walked or took the metro all around town.

Barcelona has some really amazing architectural details.

We dropped our luggage off at our hotel and then wandered around the Gothic Quarter and the Espanya Plaza. 

We were warned multiple times about pickpockets, so we took precautions and tried to keep a wary eye. Luckily we didn't have any problems of that sort.

{a spot near the Cathedral of Barcelona...so pretty}

 {donuts at a place called chök, so yummy}

 {this market was so colorful}

In the afternoon we went back to the hotel for a much needed nap.

Our room had an amazing view of the city.

 I had pre-booked tickets for the Sagrada Familia (look it up, it's that cathedral you can see being built from our hotel room view above, UNESCO World Heritage site, designed by Goudì) as late as I could (7:15pm) as to be there at sunset.

Good decision as the stained glass windows were ablaze and the whole cathedral bathed in light.

The 15 minute walk from our hotel had me ogling some more pretty buildings.

This place was crazy and unlike anything else I've ever seen.

Sorry for the bajillion pictures, but I'm having trouble narrowing them down.

The next morning we loaded up and headed for our cruise ship at the port.

Getting checked in was a process because half way through security an alarm went off and they had to evacuate the whole entry terminal for a while and then the computer system was down after we all were let back in.

But we eventually got on board and settled in.

 And thus ends the beginning of the adventure....