Autumn in Europe 2014 ~ Day 2: Barcelona & Valencia, Spain

Morning stroll in Barcelona ❤

Day 2 of being in Europe in Spain! I was so excited to see more of what Spain had to offer. 😀 We were still in Barcelona on the second day but proceeded towards Valencia by end’s day.

Breakfast included lots of cured ham and meats, croissants to sandwich it all together (croissant sandwiches are the BEST), and sweets!

We started off the day with a continental breakfast in the hotel and then we marched off to the beautiful food marketplace called La Boqueria. Here, I was blown away with how beautiful, fresh, and amazing all the food looked. It was a marketplace where you could buy fresh fruits, meat, bread, vegetables, seafood, ready-to-eat-food, cheese, and lots of candied fruits and candy in general. It was amazing. It was a sight for sore eyes and I couldn’t take mine off everything that I was seeing. The colours, smells, and sights was truly something that you had to experience for yourself. Even though I snapped pictures like crazy every step I walked and at everything I saw, it still doesn’t do justice to this amazing marketplace. It was clean and orderly. Every merchant made sure their products were placed properly and beautifully. It was unlike any other marketplace that I’ve been to!

After the tour bus dropped us off, we walked a short distance to where La Boqueria was. I LOVED this stroll!

La Boqueria food market that’s well known in Barcelona

We got to sample two types of jamón, aged 20 and 30 years, courtesy of the tour guide!

Tourists and citizens alike visiting this food market

Beauty!

Lots of sweets displayed brilliantly

There’s something that’s so European about these displays that I love!

Fresh seafood!

There is no free washroom at the market. Thus, I experienced my first time “paying” to use the restroom. They not only have a turnstile for you to enter the washroom by payment, but they also have a change machine!

After being unable to resist the beautiful food that had there, I bought a small snack; a skewer of chocolate-covered strawberries and bananas. It was simple but the fruit was so fresh and sweet and the chocolate was rich. Yum! ^_^

Food galore!

We continued strolling along the Spainish streets after that and I spent some time taking pictures with my mom in the area where there were pigeons and a water fountain. The weather was simply perfect and I couldn’t get enough of being in Spain.

Everyone was leisurely strolling and enjoying themselves in the public park

My legs look super long in this picture haha

Line of motorcycles

We ate lunch at a restaurant called Restaurant-Bar Zi Zhu Lin

Soon after that, we had lunch at a Chinese restaurant (again). A lot of the dishes resembled authentic Chinese fare that even I don’t normally eat while in Markham. For example, they had some potato-like strands and vegetables that were very different from the Chinese vegetables we usually eat. Perhaps this was because we were in Europe too and the vegetation is different.

After our lunch, we rode on the bus to the next city in our itinerary — Valencia! I found it amusing that “Valencia” is actually one of the filters in instagram (social media enthusiast here) and I just had to take a shot of the landscape as we were entering Valencia and using the filter on it. You can see the shot I took here.

One of the views that I captured on our way to Valencia

The trip was long so we made a pit stop where I took some pictures of what I saw there. In Spain, they have jamon-flavoured chips! They also have big lollipops and since it was Halloween, they naturally had a lot of candy on display as well. 😛

They have instant paella to sell and also uniquely flavoured Pringles! — cheese & onion, jamón, paprika

We got to our next destination just as the sun was about to set. Thus, I got some nice day-night photos of the Arts & Science building. It looked spectacular here; all the buildings look so futuristic and it’s a great place to snap a lot of photos — which I did.

These structures and shapes are so neat!

So scenic!

The last stop we made before we headed to our hotel for the night was at a church with a beautiful fountain in front of it. We also stopped for ice cream on the way! It was light waffles that sandwiched between different flavors of ice cream.