Last day in Madrid...

Today is my last day in Madrid (and of the trip). I'd heard around the hostel that it was a public holiday today, but didn't really think about it... public holidays are when you get a day off work to go shopping, right? When I wandered out of the hostel at 11:30am, I discovered my error - everything was closed, and I mean everything except a couple of souvenir stores, McDonalds and Starbucks. At around 12, a huge parade started, with lots of priests and people in what I'm guessing are traditional costumes. It was very strange.

I'm hoping there will be more things open this afternoon. Yesterday I visited El Retiro, the local park. When I think "park", I think green grass and trees, but apparently Europe in general doesn't agree with me - their parks have mostly been dirt roads with small grassy areas fenced off. Go figure. The park was pretty cool though, and I saw a statue of the devil, who didn't look very happy. Poor guy.

Tomorrow it's off to the airport for my flights. I'm very excited :) Today I will need to pick up a couple of books for the flight, as I've run out... apart from that, very little to do except mope about all of the awesome clothes here that I can't afford to bring back to Australia due to weight restrictions. Oh, and I need to buy Starbucks entire stock of stroopwaffles too. Hopefully they will make it through quarantine.

Madrid, at long last...

Barcelona train station is staffed entirely by the only five people in the whole city who don't speak English. Noticing that there was no platform number for my supplement-paid super-high-speed-tilt-train to Madrid, I tried to enquire in my limited Spanish of the information person where the train left from, before giving up and asking if she spoke English (a tirade of Spanish in return was taken as a no). She pointed me to someone else, and 40 minutes and four different staff later, I was still none the wiser. Eventually I found some American tourists to follow, who overcame the language barrier by just TALKING LOUDER. They hopped on a bus, so I did too... and two buses and two hours of American whining about first class bus seats later we finally climbed onto the super-high-speed-tilt-train.

At the start of my backpacking journey, I would read up on the plane/train about where I was going - how I should get to the hostel, what the different areas of the city were, how the public transport system worked and what kind of ticket I should buy, a few phrases. Now the seasoned backpacker, I jumped off the train without even the address of the hostel I was going to. I knew the hostel was called Los Amigos Sol, and there was a Sol station on the metro map, so I just headed there. Navigating ticket machines is now a breeze, even when English translation means changing the words "por favore" to "please" and leaving the ticket names as "1 viaje" and something random that I think meant zones. I happened upon the hostel in the street next to the metro station when I was just about to get out the Lonely Planet and find an internet cafe. Backpacking? Too easy.

Madrid is a very chilled city - I haven't done anything since I got here except shop and wander around. I think I could live here, if it wasn't for the bane of every tourist's existence, siesta. The shops are open from 10am until around 2pm, when everything that isn't a souvenir store pulls down the roller door and closes up until 4:30pm, when they open again briefly until around 7:30. It reminds me of Saturday afternoons in Brisbane, when someone would realise at 5:30pm that the supermarket closed in half an hour. Of course, being a fully-fledged Sydneysyder now, I can't understand why anything would close before 10pm, unless it´s Gladesville Coles, and let's not talk about that.

The problem with siesta is that I hate mornings, so I´ve been cruising out of bed at a leisurely 10 or 11am, having a lazy breakfast, and heading out... but of course, this would leave with me an hour or two before everything closes, rendering the afternoon, my prime time of day for Doing Stuff™, effectively useless. Not that there´s much to do in Madrid it seems - a few art galleries, a palace and a garden with a statue of the devil.

Yesterday evening I followed a roommate to a pub, where we watched the Real Madrid vs Olympikos game while being chatted up by a random Venezuelan chef who presented us with a red rose each as well as a number of free drinks, and invitations to visit his restaurant for dinner, and to stay on his couch whenever we happened to be next in Spain. Seriously, I was just trying to watch the football...

Barcelona is a cool city...

Yesterday I visited the Sagrada Famillia, which was strange but cool... one side looks like a bunch of melted candles, and the other side looks cool and cube-y. There's even a bassoon-playing angel. The inside was cool too, despite the construction zone... and there were some really cool models of how Gaudi architect-ed (is there a proper word for this?) another building using string to create an inverted building. I found it interesting that he used plaster models rather than diagrams, to help him visualise better... kinda like using paper and programmatic prototypes rather than wireframes? :P

Today I went to Parc Guell and saw the not-as-giant-as-previously-advertised lizardy iguana thingy, which is apparently actually a dragon. The whole place was a bit random, although I did like the mosaics everywhere :)

I have been trying to practice my Spanish, but when I say something in Spanish to someone, they reply in English. I'll continue to delude myself into thinking that they're just trying to be nice and speak to me in my language, rather than my pronunciation and command of the language being completely laughable :P

Tomorrow I leave for Madrid, the last stop on my tour. I am booked into a hostel that was supposedly "designed by an experienced backpacker as her ideal hostel". I would now consider myself an experienced backpacker, so my quick list of things the hostel should include would be: comfortable beds, reading lights, in-room lockers for packs, hooks or rails for hanging towels or coats, a powerpoint for each bed, a large common area with room for eating as well as chatting, a decent kitchen with multiple sinks and a full complement of cutlery, crockery and cooking implements, laundry facilities, internet facilities, beer on tap, 24 hour hostel access without having to press a buzzer or hand a key in, a nearby train/metro and supermarket. And not full of 18 year old like-totally girls. Not that I'm picky :P

Right now, there are a bunch of very loud and very tonedeaf Scottish football supporters in the pub under this internet cafe who have been singing for the last half hour about Glasgow... so I'm leaving for somewhere a little quieter.

Now in Barcelona...

I did actually make it to the Temple of Poseidon in Greece. I missed a bus due to the quality directions given by the bus people - "over behind the trees" isn't really great when there are around 300 trees around in every direction. I caught the one an hour later, where I sat for 2 hours hoping that the bus driver wasn't new to this job, because he was coming precariously close to the edge of the road, which was a sheer cliff to the ocean. The temple itself was beautiful (photos to follow), and I had a Greek salad for lunch overlooking the ocean before heading back.

Yesterday I got up really early to ensure that I definitely wouldn't miss my flight to Barcelona - I did not want to be stuck in Greece. Two flights and some duty free chocolate later, I was in Barcelona, attempting to push my way through some serious pedestrian traffic with a full pack on my back. I couldn't believe how many people there were on the main street - it was like Show Holiday at the Ekka, but it went on and on... totally crazy. After knocking on the wrong door for 10 minutes (the "hostel" sign had a yellow arrow painted on it on a white background - practically invisible), I finally found my hostel, and dumped my pack, which apparently now weighs 15kg - it weighed 8kg when I left Stockholm.

Barcelona is a pretty cool city - looks like a good place to go clothes shopping. It's great jeans and t-shirt weather and the people seem really friendly. I wandered around the main tourists street, where every second shop is full of souvenirs - weird looking iguanas in mosaic (I am sure I will figure out what this means soon - probably something to do with Gaudi?), the usual "Good girls to go heaven, bad girls go to Barcelona" shirts, postcards and thousands of Barca FC shirts. It was still packed on the main street at 8pm and I was exhausted and not willing to change to Spanish timetable (midnight dinner, no way), so I gave up and had KFC. I am a reluctant mayonaise convert - it tastes so good on chips! (Damn crazy Dutch people.)

This morning I woke up at 10:45am - 11 hours sleep, I must have been tired. I found a leaflet for city tours on a Segway, which looked awesome... but costs €70, so I'll have to give it a miss :( Someday I will get to ride a Segway.

It's now 1:30pm and I don't really feel like doing anything. I should go for a walk and visit La Sagrada Familla I suppose, so I can at least say Í've done something today apart from laundry. I need to plan where I'm going next and reserve train seats too I guess.

Evil Italian Mosquitos...

I forgot to blog previously that in Rome I was attacked by Tiger mosquitoes... every afternoon at dusk, I would close the window, and every night at 2 or 3am when the alcoholics came in, they would open it ("Mosquitoes? What mosquitoes? We never got bitten!").

Nearly a week later, I'm still covered in these itchy itchy bites that won't go away - all over my hands, arms, ankles and neck. Someone recommended some cream that would supposedly fix it in a day, but it's obviously not working.

Note to fellow travellers: when in Rome, pack mosquito repellent.

Greece - not your ideal tourist destination...

Greece is a very difficult place to be a tourist in. There are the trivial things, like the fact that you can't read the script, there are no public toilets, and the people always sound like they're yelling at each other (and I thought Germans sounded angry...).

Food is an interesting problem. I went out for a meal last night (on my own), and ran into the issue of "how do I order this?". They have all sorts of little plates and breads, and some things that I think are main meals like moussaka... but most of them seem to have eggplant in them. After staring blankly at the menu for about 10 minutes, I gave up and ordered a greek salad and a plate of gyros chicken, but the waiter laughed at me, so I'm sure I did something wrong. It's not always easy to tell how you should order something :( At least when there are two travellers, they can be idiots together. I'm just an idiot on my own :( Mythos beer is good though!

Athens is an off-white city. The buildings look like they were all painted white about 60 years ago, and haven't been cleaned since. The streets are filthy, and every second vehicle is a motorbike that sounds like it's missing the muffler. Worse, motorbikes speed down pedestrian malls with very little consideration for pedestrians. It's a little scary.

Unfortunately, I discovered yesterday that the Bus Terminals are about 10km north of the city, not accessible by Metro and not on any of the maps - there are a couple of local buses that go near them, but local buses aren't really good for tourists, because they generally don't sign stops so you have no idea where you are. I got up early this morning to try to go to Delphi, but gave up. It was dark, and finding my way to the bus stop didn't appeal. I guess I'm not going to get to do my day trips after all.

Today I took a metro to Pireas, the port... and left again after discovering that it was just a Maccas, a lot of big ships and a few people trying to rip off tourists. I visited the Tourist Office too, and eventually got a map from the rude and unhelpful staff... but it wasn't exactly a great tourist office - nothing on the walls, no brochures and no one interested in helping. Eventually, by cross-referencing the map from the Tourist Office, the Lonely Planet and some information I got from the internet, I think I have figured out that there is a a bus from somewhere on my map to Cape Sounis (southernmost cape of the mainland), where the Temple of Poseidon is. Hopefully I can catch this bus tomorrow.

The day after I am heading for the airport to catch a plane to Barcelona for what looks to be my final country. I wanted to visit Portugal, but the Spanish and the Portuguese hate each other so much that there is only one train a day each way between Madrid and Lisbon, so it would be too tough to fit it in.

Photos from Athens...

Yesterday I went to visit the Acropolis. It was a mess. The Parthenon is covered in scaffolding, and there is rubble lying everywhere. Amusingly enough, none of the tourist signs mention that part of the reason it's so ruined is that the Greeks were using it to store gunpowder in a war and it blew up. After visiting the Acropolis, I can understand why the British won't give back the Elgin Marbles.

The six maidens on a temple next to the Parthenon... or copies of them. Five are in the Archaeological museum and one is in the British museum.

The Greeks love their rows of parallel columns...

The Temple of Hephaestos in the Ancient Agora (market place) is very photogenic, and nearly the only thing left standing.

The Temple of Olympian Zeus was really impressive. You can't really get a feeling for how tall it is from the photo I guess, but it's HUGE.

Slightly less faux-arty viewpoint of the Temple. One of the columns fell in the late 1800s (foreground) - I wonder how they stay up with just those cylindrical blocks resting on top of each other.