Hola, Barcelona! ¿Como Estas?

We arrived in Barcelona with beautiful clouds, beautiful temperatures, and beautiful men.  The trip went well, without issue, except for the very crammed seating on our flight, from LA, with a coffee stop in Amsterdam, before heading to Barcelona.  For $162 more per ticket, we could have purchased 6 more inches of space, which, by the way, was probably what the seats used to be before they took the space away then decided they could up-sell it and make some money.  And so I dealt with it, legs numb and my body turning on the viewing screen with every turn of my body.  Excedrin PM and a few glasses of wine did help.

Thanks to advice from our hotel, Hotel Axel,  once on the ground, we took the Air Bus which saved about 20E in cab fare, why not!  And... we had entertainment when we got an earful from some Brit and his friend who was sitting behind us. Piece of cake and we got our first feel of the city.

A view from Sky Bar at Hotel Axel

It has been easy to get around even though neither of us are fluent in Catalan (or Spanish ) for that matter. It's not stopping us.  However, we quickly realized a few things we forgot to check about our visit. Tipping! 

How much do you tip the sexy bartender?  How much do you tip the very conscientious waiter who made us feel very comfortable?  Boy have we been "trained" in the US.  For those who want to know, there is no protocol for tipping in Barcelona. Some restaurants add 7% to the bill, while others add 7% and more is, at least accepted, if not expected. And it's not necessary to tip in bars. Ooops!  OK - Like I said, beautiful men. Further research identified, No tip, no tip, a euro or two, a euro or two, no, yes… OK you get the picture.  No tips in a bar.  To be sure, tipping is not the way of life here in Barcelona. 

When seats were available at the bar, Colin asked the bartender if he would give us some chips that he had been setting at the bar for the other patrons. Instead, we got a meat and cheese platter with pieces of baguette. Hmm and Yum!  We were getting hungry.  Certainly you should pay or at least tip for that, right?  No! (Remember now that this is 8:00PM ( 11:00 AM PST) and local dinner is not even beginning to be served until 9:00PM at the earliest) 

After a cocktail or two, we found a very charming little restaurant while walking around and a few items on the menu caught our eye. No shortage of those here, either. Our friendly waiter sat us and quickly explained the menu. We started with a wonderful caramelized goat cheese salad and this, oh-so, crusty toasted bread with tomato and olive oil.   I had the Bacalao with White Beans and Colin had Cuttle Fish with Shrimp and Mushrooms. A wonderful (and inexpensive) Rioja pared beautifully with the dinner. All, simple and absolutely delicious. Maybe it was the vacation talking or we were just hungry, but we loved the food and the pace of the dinner.

After dinner, with a little more strolling we discovered some alley-ways where we had no idea what we would find, but there were people.  Turns out, looking at the small "hole-in-the-wall restaurants, it was a middle eastern area near the University. An area we are sure to explore more in the days to come and probably get some great Kabab or Schwarma.  This is certainly going to be a great trip with some great sites, sounds, and food. But for now, we are heading back to our hotel to sleep. We are exhausted.