Getting Closer to Barca!

(Gail) Its' just a little more than a month before we leave for Barcelona and London! Actually it's London first and then Barca, since the soccer schedule finally came out and we'll be seeing FCB play on Sept 22 or 23 (actual game date TBD). But at least we finally know that our trip will start in London and then go on to Barcelona, so now we were at last able to find some places to stay.

Barcelona Apartment

Ally was in charge of finding our lodging, and used a website called AirBnB to locate apartments that are available for rent. We wanted to try the apartment option so we'd be able to make our own breakfasts at least while traveling.

She found lots of options in Barcelona, so all we had to do was figure out what part of the city we wanted to stay in. We picked a place that's a 10 minute walk from the beach, and located on the major transit lines to get everywhere else. It seems like quite a find with 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms (though I reserve judgement until we actually see the place). There's also a little balcony. We're renting from a lady named Gloria.

London Apartment

It was a bit bigger challenge to find a place in London, as those in our price range were quite a ways out of town. But with persistence, Ally managed to find a place in South Kensington, which is where she lived during her year abroad. It's a very nice neighborhood and pretty central to all we'd want to do. We put in our reservation request, and then noticed the flat was on the fourth floor with no elevator - 77 stairs up.  Uh...no.

Forunately we were able to get out of that and she found another place in Earls Court...just one tube stop further from the S. Kensington location...and we got that. We'll have to make due with just one bathroom here, but I'm sure we'll survive. We're renting from a dude named Paul.

Camp Nou

With lodging nailed down, the next challenge was actually getting the soccer tickets. Though the schedule was out, the tickets didn't go on sale for several more days. Jorge was up in the middle of night trying to order them online, and finally managed to get us 3 seats together. Did I mention those seats were in the 400 level? Though by the looks of the size of the stadium, there may be even more levels. The game is at the iconic Camp Nou, which seats close to 100,000. For soccer fans, seeing a game at the Camp Nou is like a religious pilgrimmage to the Holy Land. Gotta admit I'm pretty excited about it!