This post is long overdue and has been sitting in drafts since February, but better late than never! Below is a list of our favorite places to eat and drink and the sights that enjoyed most.

Delights

There's a whole world of small shops and cafes, but here are the select few that we frequented.

• Cafés El Magnifico was our favorite coffee shop in Barcelona. There is very limited seating, but the service and the people that work at this beautiful shop, that has been in business for 100 years were over the top. And, their coffee selection and presentation was one of the best we had all year.
• Casa Gispert is a century's-old character-filled dry goods store that had so many goodies. We mostly bought carnaroli rice for risotto (using this rice for risotto will change your life), sundried tomatoes, and dried apricots. But they have a huge selection of biscuits, pastes, sauces, etc. It's the perfect place to pick up a snack or a gift.
• Vila Viniteca. We bought almost all of our wine, cheese, and meat here. Go here, buy a bottle of Rioja, some chorizo and manchego cheese and walk over to the Parc de la Ciutadella for the perfect picnic you have the perfect picnic.
• Hofmann Pastry Shop is a tourist hot-spot. I'm sure it's listed in some Barcelona restaurant guide book. But that did not stop me from visiting this delicious bakery for their almond or mascarpone croissant a couple times per week. Seriously. This is place serves the best croissants I've ever had.

Eating

The meal schedule is a bit different in Barcelona than Americans are used to. Catalonia doesn’t care about breakfast. I found most people got by on a small breakfast—a croissant and a coffee. The biggest meal is lunch between 1 and 4 and then during the dinner hours 8 to 11, they eat a bit lighter. There are four types of meals that we enjoyed in Barcelona that are helpful to be aware of and on the lookout for.

1. Tapas — Your likely familiar with this format, which usually consists of a series of small plates. In Barcelona, the tapas menus almost always included squid or anchovies, bread with fresh crushed tomato rubbed on it, tortilla, patatas bravas, and cheese and cured meats. You can enjoy this any time of day, almost anywhere. I highly recommend the tortilla and want to note that it's not like a mexican tortilla, but is instead like a dense omelette that contains the simplest of ingredients, potatoes and eggs. It's delish.
2. El Menu — This is usually a special menu that restaurants offer around "lunch-time" It's a preset menu for only about 12 euro and includes a starter, main course, dessert, wine or beer, and coffee. It’s best enjoyed on a plaza or patio. You must enjoy this. Relax and make it a two or three-hour meal.
3. Pintxos — Pinchos / Pintxos consist of slices of baguette topped with almost anything, from fish to cheese and fruit to sausage. They are essentially small-bites and often served for 1 or 2 euro each. They are held together by a toothpick and you pay for each toothpick left on your plate. It’s so fun. This delightful food is actually from Basque Country, not Catalonia. But, nonetheless, you’ll see them all over the place. However, in Barcelona there is a street lined with Pintxos places, Carrer Blai. Go there and drop into a few different places for two or three Pinxtos.
4. Paella — This is usually huge and served for at least two people. The Catalonian version is a red paella, which sometimes surprises people who are used to the standard yellow paella. The red is a result of the heavy use of tomatoes. It's great and best enjoyed in a restaurant near the sea.

Here are some top recommendations for places to eat:

• Tapas and Cava at Xampanyet. This place will be packed no matter what time you go. Simply make your way up to the bar, order a cava and wait for your table. Or, if it's really busy, just enjoy some tapas at the bar.
• Dinner of tapas at Cal Pep. Visitors to Cal Pep are served at the bar and the cooks decide which dishes you get, depending on the preferences you share with them when you're seated. It's fun and delicious.
• Drinks and dinner at El Nacional. This is a huge space with four different restaurants, a central bar, and a gelato stand. It's an excellent spot for a drink at the bar and people watching or dinner.
• Paella on the beach at Xiringuito Escriba
• Pintxos on Blai Street

Sights & Experiences

These are some of our favorite experiences that we had in Barcelona.

• Sagrada Familia. Here's a post about our experience.
• Basilica of Santa Maria del Mar
• Cava tours and tastings in Sant Sadurni d'Anoia. Here's a post about our experience.
• Take the Cable Car to Montjuic
• Cook and Taste Cooking Class
• Train, Hike, and Lunch at Can Borrell. Here's a post that describes our experience at Can Borrell.
• Hike to Montserrat and tour the church
• CCM
• Parc de la Ciudad
• Picasso Museum
• Parc Guell

And, honestly, our favorite hours were spent just wandering around the city, mostly in El Born and the Gothic Quarter. There is always a celebration or festival happening, so you're likely to stumble into something wonderful.

After six weeks spent in Edinburgh, we moved on to Dublin, Ireland. It seems we got lucky—the weather was lovely, which is something you rarely hear about Ireland. After the heavy skies of Scotland, the sunny disposition of Dublin was just what I needed.  

As our friend, Tara Calihman put it, Dublin is a big, little city. You can walk across the entirety of the capital in 30-minutes, if there aren’t crowds, which is rare because the city’s population is rapidly growing.  

Actually, Dublin is the fastest growing city in Europe…it just keeps dublin and dublin.

Ba-dum-bum.

(I fell for this joke and am endlessly amused by it.)

But seriously—it’s growing. With tech companies, like Google and Facebook, taking root on the shores of the River Liffy in the “Innovation District” there are a lot of young, opportunistic professionals.  With the youthful, growing population, there is a lively service scene with tons of bars and restaurants, packed to the brim with people.

We stayed in an area called Rathmines, which is on the edge of Dublin proper. It’s full of vintage stores and restaurants and right next to a canal that lines the city, where many people make their commute, and I ran almost every morning, past the offices of WeWork and ZenDesk. In the afternoons the pubs along the canal are overflowing with people, enjoying an after-work pint.

I’m not sure if you’ve heard but the Irish like to drink.  

Our place in Dublin was insanely small. The city is expensive so when we went to book our AirBnB, the place we could afford was a shoebox. (It’s since been purchased by a development company to be renovated and sold for all of the employees of the new tech companies in town. Sound familiar, Boulderites?) The lack of space tested our sanity and our relationship, so we spent a lot of time outside of the apartment.

There was a lovely cafe that we visited quite often, Grove Road. If you’re in the area, I recommend it. We also frequented a local bar called Blackbird that was right down the street from us a few times. It had a great vibe. There was always a big fire going, stacks of games, and lots of tall red candles burning on every table.

We visited many of the common sites:

• The Library at Trinity College
• Dublin Castle
• Chester Beatty Library
• The River Liffy
• Ha’Penny bridge
• Dublin Flea Market
• Phoenix Park

It was recommended to me, by a local, to visit the EPIC museum, but we didn’t get the chance to go on a tour. We did walk through it and if you’re in Dublin, I think it would be a great place to spend a rainy afternoon.

While in Barcelona, I met a couple who were from Dublin and they shared a whole list of their favorite places. If you’re making a visit, check out the list!

While Dublin was charming, the best part of our time in Ireland was staying with our friends Tara and Adam Calihman, in a little seaside town outside of Dublin called, Greystones.  

Greystones is charming AF. Its main street features quaint restaurants and cafes along the sea. The highlight is a restaurant called The Happy Pear. It’s like Boulder shipped a restaurant across The Atlantic. A quirky two-story space, featuring a natural products store on one side, selling organic remedies, granola, fruit, etc., and on the other side, a cafe where you can buy heaping plates of vegan food to be paired with your flat white.  

The restaurant is owned by two brothers. As hot hippies, they are the leaders of the health and wellness community in Greystones, hosting a daily dip in the sea every morning to greet the sun. They can be seen all over town, slinging granola, making coffee, or doing handstands.  It was the most amusing local-celebrity experience I’ve had.  

The night we arrived to Greystones, Jonathan was the special guest at the Wicklow County Innovation Meetup, run by our friend Adam. Jonathan presented to roughly ten people, in the lovely local library, about game design. After the presentation, we continued the conversation across the street at a local pub over pints.  

After many drinks, we decided we needed some food, so we made a trip to the nearby Chipper. What an experience. Chippers are Fish & Chip shops that can be found all over Ireland and in Northern Ireland. They serve all things fried from chicken nuggets to fried mars bars. They are a national treasure. If you watch the show Derry Girls on Netflix, you will get a sense of how special Chippers are.

The evening was a perfect kick off to our stay in Greystones. Over the next ten days we cooked with the Calihman’s, went on runs along the water and cliffs, took a dip in the freezing Irish Sea to find out how long we could handle the cold, played games, rode the double decker bus into Dublin to work at our coworking space enjoying the most scenic of views.

One weekend, we spent a day at the farmers market and in the gardens at Kilruddery, a garden estate in Wicklow county. It all felt very Irish.

We also had the pleasure of going to a couple of Tara’s stand up shows to find out if the Irish get American humor. They do! Tara slayed.

One of the unexpected benefits of staying with the Calihman's was simply the time spent in a home with a family that had daily rituals. Traveling from place to place, staying in AirBnBs has been great, but I didn’t realize how much I was missing the security and comfort of the daily routine.  We’ve been hustling through the year to get as much as we can out of each place we visit and have struggled to establish a solid routine. There’s a constant undercurrent of anxiety. When we’re working, I worry that we should be exploring, and when we’re exploring, I feel like I should be working. We needed more padding in our lives.

After our visit to Ireland, we reassessed our plans for the rest of the year and decided to slow down. This led us to our decision to spend two months, instead of five or six weeks in Stockholm.  A full two months has offered us space and released the pressure to rush to gobble the city up, but instead just live and work and then have the room to spend our time on weekends visiting sites.  This decision has been one of the best decisions we’ve made all year.  

Thanks to Adam and Tara, the best of hosts, for opening your home and making us feel like part of your family. If you are friends with these fabulous people, I highly recommend making a visit to Greystones. Dublin is great, but you can’t beat the towns on the Irish Sea. We cherish the time we spent there and can’t wait to visit again.  

Nearly every day, Jonathan and I look around at our surroundings, in appreciation and awe of this stunning and diverse city. We've been here for six weeks now and we are absolutely in love.

For one thing, Stockholm is an incredibly international city. The population is 1.6 million, a third of which is foreign-born. Often, when people think of Sweden they picture tall blonds. I imagine that assumption is accurate in some areas of Sweden, but in Stockholm there’s a large variety of people, backgrounds, nationalities, and languages. It creates such a sense of possibility.

New and old buildings work together to create a charming cityscape with art around every corner, for instance the subway is the longest art exhibit in the world.

Medieval buildings sit next to modern ones. Whole blocks of red and yellow-roofed buildings butt up against more standard cream-colored buildings with matte-black roofs. Stockholm’s historic buildings have been conserved well since the city escaped the destruction caused by war that so many of the other cities in Europe experienced.

From the center of the city, the oldest part, Gamla Stan, or The Old Town, many of the longest-standing buildings exist—mostly churches and royal buildings. These buildings were built between 1250 and 1600. They are low-ceilinged, sometimes leaning, and heavily-packed together. Very similar to medieval areas that we saw in Barcelona. The co-working space that Jonathan and I work from is on Gamla Stan, right across from the palace, where every day we see the changing of the guard from the most beautiful space I’ve ever worked out. It's named, The Castle, and is a five-story space, housed in what used to be an old church.

Among all of the man-made beauty, the forests, parks, and water make Stockholm an idyllic combination of urban landscape and nature getaway.  

Throughout the city there’s an abundance of home goods and Scandinavian design stores. One of our favorites is DesignTorget. Fire, candles, and cozy blankets are everywhere here. It’s one of those stores where you want to buy every single thing. Chambersticks, linens, knick knacks, plants, hanging lights, cookbooks, and the mortar and pestle that I never need but feel like I have to have. All of it is beautifully designed and made of quality, sustainable materials.  

But, for us, the shopping is the least interesting part of this city. We’ve spent many days visiting Stockholm’s museums like, the City Hall, built of eight million red bricks, featuring a tall spire and tower that visitors climb. This building is an icon of Stockholm. If you see any skyline photo or illustration, it likely includes City Hall.

We visited City Hall one lazy Sunday and it was well-worth it. Set on the edge of Kungsholmen, one of the 14 islands that make up Stockholm, it has a stunning view of the entire city. This building is where the Nobel Prize dinner is held every year and also where the offices and meeting rooms of the 200 people in the municipal council are housed. Its huge halls are covered in paintings and tapestries. It’s almost overwhelming how immense and decadent these rooms are, especially the grand hall whose walls are lined in actual gold.  

In the center of the city, one island, Skeppsholmen, is almost entirely dedicated to museums, the Modern Art Museum and the Architecture and Design Museum (ArkDes). We visited the ArkDes to catch the tail-end of an exhibit—The Future Starts Here—an exploration of how technology is shaping our lives and its potential impacts on each of us and the world. It was a fantastic exhibit, featuring art, design, and cultural objects that we use in our day-to-day lives, technology that is shaping politics, design of cities and space, and the future of technology and humanity.

Outside of the temporary exhibit, is the primary museum, the core of which is a large room with stations, along the walls featuring displays with pictures and descriptions sharing information on the architecture through time periods in Stockholm. Set away from the wall, at each station, there is a dedicated table filled with models, materials, and actual relics from the architecture of that era. It’s one of the coolest exhibits I’ve seen and was a wonderful way to see how the city has evolved.

In addition to the museums, the libraries in Stockholm are incredible. They are built with the purpose of showcasing the books and providing an abundance of workspace. All of the libraries I’ve visited are regal on the outside and cozy on the inside, with dark wood and green bankers lamps. They are everything libraries should be. And what is best about them is how incredibly accessible they are. The space isn’t just reserved for students or members or some exclusive group of PhDs like other libraries I’ve tried to visit on our travels. Instead, it’s open to everyone, as I believe libraries should be.

It’s this commitment to accessibility that makes me love Stockholm so much. When we visited the Stockholm City Museum, (a beautiful free museum in our neighborhood) I read about how when they started their planning efforts, in the 1800s, to expand the city out of the Old Town, the planning committee worked to design residences and commercial spaces prioritizing access to light, functional places to live, an abundance of public spaces, and accessibility. It’s amazing to me that this kind of foresight existed even then. Today, there is a Stockholm City plan in the works to support the Stockholm of 2040. Its core focus is a "Stockholm for everyone.” And its goals are :

1. Provide good accessibility to accommodate a growing city
2. Create a cohesive city where “people with different backgrounds must be able to encounter each other”…and “must be accessible to all of the city’s residents."
3. Provide good public spaces to “offer a good environment in which to live with good access to the benefits of urban living and well-designed, safe public spaces encouraging participation and engagement in local community life."
4. Create a climate-smart and resilient city “in which efficient land use and transport-efficient lay-out foster greater accessibility, a lower climate impact, and limited consumption of resources."

In no other city have I seen such recognition of and building for not just functionality, but quality of life for everyone. There’s an honest acknowledgement of human needs. The benefits of being connected to one another and nature, to exist in nice and comfortable spaces, and designing for accessibility for all.  

Unlike the UK, where many parks are private and libraries had limited access or in the US where walkability and public transportation are seemingly last on the list of priorities. There are open beaches, parks, libraries, free museums, and seating areas all over this extremely walkable and subway-connected city.  

I’m sure that Sweden has its faults and that many cities have very similar initiatives as the ones I’m describing here in Stockholm, but I’ve yet to see a city that works as well as this one does.

I've also never seen a city with a hat exhibit in the street!

We arrived in Stockholm to find that it is officially summer. This means that everyone is off work, on vacation, and out of office. Each year, starting at the end of June, there is a big celebration, called Midsommar, where everyone celebrates the summer season and then their months-long vacation begins.

At first, I was a little disappointed. I hoped to make some friends. I was planning on attending meetups and joining running groups that would allow me to get to know some people. But, those are all on hold until August, when the city gets back to real life.

I quickly got over my disappointment, sliding into my own version of summer mode. While I still have to work—unfortunately my clients in the states don’t operate on the Swedish holiday calendar—I’ve relaxed a bit. We spend our mornings lazily—reading, exercising, and working on creative projects at our neighborhood coffee shop before we head to our office in the center of town to begin our workday.

Usually, July and August fly by just like the rest of the year, but slowing down has helped the summer really feel like summer. People in Sweden love this time of year. It's their reward for cold, dark winters. They spend every possible minute outside. Nearly every restaurant and cafe is empty inside, but the patio and tables outside are full, even if it’s raining. It helps that the sun rises between 4 and 5 am and doesn’t set until between 10 and 11 pm. The trails that trace and connect the islands are full of people walking or riding bikes and reading, writing, or napping on the beaches or grassy patches in the parks.

One of the most interesting characteristics of Stockholm is that it’s made up of a dozen, connected islands. You can get to them by train, bus, foot, scoot, or my favorite method—the ferry. I read somewhere that Stockholm is considered the Venice of the north. Water is everywhere and there are canals, large and small, that connect to the archipelago, just beyond Stockholm where a collection of 30,000 islands begin.

The islands range in size. Some can only host a single house and some are big enough for a large village. We took a trip to one of these islands on a recent Sunday. On recommendation from multiple people, we decided to visit an island called Grinda. There are no cars on the island, it’s mostly forest, and you can walk across the entire island in 25 minutes. It’s idyllic.  

Jonathan and I went full summer mode and lazed about all day. We laid on the beach, learned and played a garden game called Kubb, sat at a cafe for a couple of hours people watching. We walked around the island and then we sat some more. It was lovely, but the hour-long ride on the ferry over to Grinda was probably my favorite part of the whole day. Brackish water. Islands covered in lush green trees. The wind. There's no wide open sea. Instead, the ferry winds its way between the islands so you get to see dozens of different worlds along the way.

Nature is abundant in Sweden. Even in the bustling metropolis of Stockholm there's plenty of parks, plants, and earth. All the streets are lined with trees and you can’t go far before you find yourself on a patch of grass. There are lime trees with flowers in bloom. The smell is rich and citrusy and fills the squares and corners that the trees take up space in. Each time I sense a lime tree, I stop and take big, deep, breaths.

As in most other cities we’ve lived in, running has offered me a chance to explore and discover the city. Here in Stockholm, I have a favorite run that covers four islands in one run. It’s an 8 to 10 mile route and it takes me from Sodermalm (where we live), through Gamla Stan (the Old Town), across Östermalm (the center of the city), and onto and around Djurgården (a nature preserve on an island). It’s entertaining to watch the sights change.

The streets of Sodermalm are filled with stores and restaurants. Locals sit at small tables outside cafes reading their paper or making their way out of the train station, moving too slowly through the surrounding construction, where irreverent signs say things like “Want to sound like a local? Complain about the Slussen construction.”

The Slussen construction has been going on for years. We had to navigate the same construction on our way to a ferry the last time we were here in December 2016. There are windows cut into the walls that line the bridge over the construction, where passersby can peak through and see the progress. It doesn’t look much like progress. It just looks like construction.

Once I cross over the congested bridge, I run the perimeter of Gamla Stan. Gamla Stan translated is "Old Town" and it’s where most of the tourist attractions live, which makes for some exciting dodging and weaving on a run if I don’t get out early. But if I get out late, there’s a chance that I’ll see the changing of the guard at the palace.  

Past Gamla Stan, I enter the “fanciest street” in Stockholm in the neighborhood of Östermalm. The section on this part of the route runs between beautiful historic buildings and a harbor. It’s a long stretch dotted with cafes along the water where people drink their coffee in the morning and sip their cocktails in the evening.

At the end of the fancy street, I take a right turn and enter Djurgården. A huge green landscape, six miles around, where Skansen, the local Zoo is located, and museums line the shores. I head away from the museums and make my way along the quieter side of the island. I can see across the canal, the nearby island is close and it’s fun to spot fellow runners and walkers on the opposite side of the water. Boats travel through the canal and the trail is full of other other runners and walkers on weekends but on weekdays it’s quiet and I mostly have the trail to myself.  

When I reach the tip of the island and head back toward Östermalm on the other side of the island, there are much larger boats. Ferries and Viking cruise ships take passengers out to islands in the archipelago or further to Finland or Estonia.  

The other day, on this run, I came across sheep being herded by dogs. The 30 or so sheep were blocking the road, so I had to come to a stop while the dogs did their jobs and hustled the sheep onto the green space along the road, interrupting their constant grazing. After taking a dozen pictures of the adorable sheep, I started up again, heading back towards home, and on the edge of the island was stopped by a British family, lost, on their way to the ABBA museum. I obviously know where the ABBA museum is. When we visited in 2016 we took a trip and it was highly entertaining and worthwhile. So I sent this group off to sing dancing queen, while I made my way back through the many worlds on my route and to our home in Stockholm.

I thought I could escape my winter lows with a trip abroad. I expected a change in scenery would trick my SAD; misdirect it and leave it confused at the intersection of real life and travel life.

It didn't work.

I was able to keep the grey days at bay while in Barcelona and Amsterdam, but once we arrived in Edinburgh, where the days are actually grey, the SAD found me.

Edinburgh is lovely, but heavy. Thick, stone blockhouses line the streets. Gothic buildings sit on corners, walling in the cemeteries that spread across the city. The fortified castle sits above it all, sometimes hidden by the low, leaden skies.

While in Edinburgh, we visited dozens of restaurants, breweries, and bars, but I couldn't shake the sense that we were partying in the middle of a funeral.

As a Colorado native, sun is my energy. Without it I don't know how to operate. But the sun isn't a frequent guest in Scotland and so while there, I did all the things that one might do to shake a depression—I ran, went to yoga classes, explored the city, meditated, spent time by the sea, traveled on weekend trips.

Sometimes my efforts to shake the sad worked and lots of times it didn't.

One Sunday, while Jonathan was at a board game event, I went out, in the rain, determined to alter my attitude.

I made my way to the Leith Shore. A canal, lined by restaurants and shops that promised to be lively, but instead it was a ghost town. A few people walked along the shore, but for the most part everyone was huddled inside. As the rain picked up, I decided to take the opportunity to visit a store and replace some travel supplies.

I found myself in a chair, in a department store, getting a pep talk from a Portuguese makeup artist. My eyes welled with tears, in one of those moments where you're crying but you don't know why you're crying, in front of this wonderful stranger, as he rattled off inspirational quotes and applied blush to my cheeks.

Afterwards, I bought a raincoat and cried my way home in the rain, defeated.

_____________

I've put off my writing about Edinburgh. I don't want to unfairly characterize the city through my sheen of depression. I also don't like to indulge negative experiences by giving them words.

But, the city is interesting and weird and weighted with history. We were there for six weeks. We saw a lot. And, a lot of it was great.

So, in an effort to dust off the cobwebs on the blog and my brain and get back to sharing our experiences, here are some highlights from our time in Scotland.

Edinburgh is stone and dirt. From the cemeteries and castles to the ancient volcano—worlds and worlds have existed in the city.

In the center of town sits the Princes Street Gardens—what used to be a river (or loch) where dead bodies were dumped and "witches" drown is now a beautiful, lush sea of green, dotted with flowers, trees and park benches where the residents of town take picnics.

Above the park is Old Town and the Royal Mile leading to the Edinburgh Castle and nearby, the Greyfriars Kirk (a famous "haunted" cemetery).

Old Town is dense with sights. Closes cut their way through parts of town, exposing hidden cafes and gardens.

On a haunted graveyard tour, we learned that the bridges in this part of town contain hundreds of vaults. The south bridge connects new and old town. It has 19 arches, most of which are enclosed by buildings, exposing only the largest arch. Within those enclosed arches are the vaults.

Today, many of the vaults are used for restaurants, bars, karaoke stages, and keg storage. But in the 16th and 17th century, the vaults housed many of the poorest residents of Edinburgh and were centers for gambling, prostitution, and where one might go to find a body for the doctors who are in need of cadavers for experiments and surgical theaters.

There was a lot of death in Old Town. The Royal Mile hosted daily hangings. The royal family executed people frequently, usually based on superstitions, and battles were held in attempts to take over the heavily fortified Edinburgh castle. Oh, and also plagues.

It makes complete sense that Edinburgh seems haunted.

But! It also has history that doesn't have to do with death.

It turns out that Scotland's capital has a rich literary history. Sir Walter Scott, inventor of the historical novel, is from Scotland and is widely celebrated. Monuments for him have been erected all over the country. We visited one in the center of Edinburgh. It was one of the first landmarks that we noticed the day that we arrived, a victorian gothic structure, it's hard to miss. Oddly enough, it's only the second largest monument to Scott. The largest is in Havana, Cuba. (What?!)

A visit to the monument is a fun way to see the city. As you climb the narrow stairs, higher and higher, you reach a 360 degree view of the city, where you can New Town, Old Town, Calton Hill, Arthur's Seat, and the North Sea.

Nearby is the Writers' Museum—a free museum, right off the Royal Mile, dedicated to three Scottish writers and their work, housed in an old Victorian house, Lady Stair’s House at the Lawnmarket.

An aside...I delighted in the names of things in the UK, like the name of the house. It was all so formal and when said in our current culture, made me feel like I was in a fantasy novel.

The museum features the works and belongings of:

• Sir Walter Scott (obviously). If you're not familiar, he wrote Ivanhoe, Waverley, Rob Roy, and many more. I haven't read any of them
• Robert Burns. This man, is the national poet of Scotland and the author of Auld Lang Syne. There is an entire holiday in his honor in January, Burns Night.
• Robert Louis Stevenson. The author of Treasure Island is from Scotland. Who knew?!

And! Much of Harry Potter was inspired and written by JK Rowling in Edinburgh. There are dozens of stores where you can buy wands and Harry Potter tchotchkes. A street in Old Town called Victoria Street was the inspiration for Diagon Alley and during the cemetery tour mentioned above, we visited "Tom Riddles" grave.

Edinburgh is a Harry Potter fans dream. Here's a list of sites if you're interested.

Another highlight and great place to visit is The National Museum. It's a huge museum that houses collections of Scottish and international art, science, engineering, space, natural history, and world cultures. It's a stunning space and has so much to see. Plus, it's free. We spent nearly an entire Saturday here.

Edinburgh really is a wonderful city. It is just easier to recognize how nice it is from a sunny coffee shop in Stockholm :)

When we originally planned our itinerary for 2019, our third stop was London. However, once we got to the business of actually finding and booking a place to live in London it became clear that the city was way outside of our budget.

We made a quick change of plans and decided to head to Edinburgh. An interesting, yet more affordable city. But, long before making this itinerary change, I signed up for a conference in Cambridge, England.

So, in the second week of our Edinburgh stay, I packed up my bag and headed to the train station for a five hour journey from Edinburgh to Cambridge. On my way, I had the idea for Jonathan to come meet me on Saturday in London, so that we could experience the world-city that neither of us had ever been to.

And, so began a quick London getaway.

Meeting on Saturday morning in the King’s Cross station, as I got off the train, I was met by a throng of people waiting in line to take a picture with the 9 and 3/4 platform from the Harry Potter stories. It was mayhem.

There were hundreds of people queued. We did like any good tourist might and we took a picture of other tourists waiting in line and made our way out of the station to start our 42-hour adventure.

Here are some of the highlights of our trip, for anyone making a quick and (attempted) cheap trip to London.

Hostels won't break the bank

Given that we booked our lodging just days before arriving, I needed to find somewhere affordable to stay and so I hit up the abundant hostel options in the city and landed on Clink78, a huge restored prison.

It was packed with people of all ages and we were able to find a place to stay for under £150 for two nights. While a bit loud, it was a fun place to crash for a quick weekend and was pretty centrally located.  

A look at the palace and a walk through St. James park

The weather was relatively nice for our weekend trip, which made it easy to walk all over the city to get a look at the sights. We stopped by the palace, the parliament, the Thames, and attempted a look at Big Ben, but it’s currently under construction.

On our walkabout, we made our way through St. James park and I might say that the park was the highlight for me.

They have a bird sanctuary that is incredible. It was so fun to see the variety of birds in the park. There is even a pelican in the park! Nature creates so many incredible colors. It’s truly amazing.

A last-minute show with tickets from TKTS

While sitting at a pub, it occurred to me that we should go to a show. I googled a couple of musicals that were happening and quickly found that most things were sold out. So, we headed out to find some food and on our way passed a TKTS stand. If you’ve ever been to New York, you know that the TKTS stand is the best place to get last-minute cheap theater tickets. It only took five minutes of standing in line to get our super-discounted tickets to the Matilda musical. Score! (get it? 😜) And, whoa.

I hadn’t heard much about Matilda, but I knew from reading the Roald Dahl book that I loved the story. Holy shit. This show is fantastic. It’s one of the best musicals I’ve seen since Wicked. And it was even better because it was a total surprise! I laughed. I cried. I laughed some more. For anyone who grew up in the 90s and likes the story of Matilda and appreciates a good show, this is a must.

Dishoom

After our incredible theater experience we headed to Dishoom for tasty Indian food.

Funnily enough, prior to boarding my train in Edinburgh, Jonathan had walked me to the station so we could grab lunch together before I left. A quick google search led us to Dishoom on St. Andrews square. In a hurried lunch, I told Jonathan that we had to come back to this incredible Indian restaurant. It was SO GOOD.  

Then, while at the conference, I shared with one of my fellow attendees that I had plans for a quick weekend away in London and he said, “you must go to Dishoom”

Well of course! So, tickle-me-thrilled that Dishoom was only a block from the show and ended up as our obvious post-show dinner location. If you visit London or Edinburgh, and you enjoy Indian food, Dishoom is a must. The vibe is great, the cheese naan is fantastic, and all of the food from the curries to the grilled meats are phenomenal.  

Sunday strolls

Sunday morning brought more walking around, exploring, and tubing. The tube is so easy to use. We made it all over the city, so easily, it was crazy.  We enjoyed breakfast in the most adorable little neighborhood, in the area of Islington, near the City, University of London at a place called Exmouth the Grind. I ate my first bowl of porridge. It was delicious.

After breakfast we walked around the neighborhood and poked into a couple of stores, played in a park and then attempted to make a stop into the Charles Dickens museum, but unfortunately they were having a special exhibit.

So, we made our way to the British National Library where we spent a few hours exploring the floors and a literature exhibit that had some incredible pieces on display like Shakespeares first folio and parts of the Magna Carta. This library is beautiful, and huge.

There are reading rooms on every floor, but they are closed on Sundays and required a Readers Card. So, if you are looking to spend time in the reading rooms, you can only visit them through a tour.

The Thames, Shakespeare’s Globe, and the Millennium Bridge

If you make your way toward Shakespeare’s Globe on any day other than a Sunday, I highly recommend that you visit the Borough Market. It’s one of the largest and oldest food markets in all of London. And then you can make your way over toward the Thames for a visit to the Globe and a walk over Millennium Bridge.

Our last tourist stop was 221b Bakers St. As viewers of the BBC Sherlock show and a long-standing fan of Sherlock generally, we had to make a stop at the renown 221B. It was fun, if a bit uneventful. We took the train to Baker Street. Walked about two blocks and there we were. We took our selfie and then went to the Pub next door for a pint.  

There are few places quite so lovely as Amsterdam. After living in Barcelona, West Amsterdam was a shift, to quieter more standard days. Instead of the wild, humming atmosphere of El Born, we were surrounded by a reserved and practical energy, in a bookish city full of bikes.

The city and the country have a dedication to bike culture and bikes as a mode of transportation, building an incredible infrastructure for bike transport that makes it an incredibly freeing way to get around and explore the city. With our bikes we could see, feel, hear, and experience so much more than if we were in a car or a tram.

Nearly everywhere in the city is within a 15-minute bike ride. We quickly became familiar with the rules of bike transport and even became accustomed to riding in the rain to the gym, to our pancake breakfasts, or to the museums, of which the city has 400+. My belief is that the national commitment to movement of body and mind contributes to the high quality of life in Amsterdam.

People are outside much of the time, no matter the weather and they love their exercise. Living on a park meant that just outside our window, we could watch people running, riding, rollerblading, and working out in groups at all hours of the day. Since many of the Dutch work an average of 38 hours per week (compared to 44 for Americans), they have more time to spend outside with family and friends.

Education, access to education, and literacy is highly valued. It was so fun to walk down our street and peek into the homes along the road, many with huge collections of books. At one point in history Amsterdam produced almost all of the books in the world. They have several beautiful historic libraries and one of the best public library systems in the world. And, as a city with its origins rooted in world trade, it’s an incredibly diverse city and one of the most welcoming of different cultures than any I’ve ever experienced. You can feel its sense of acceptance in the air. It's one of the most diverse cities in Europe with over 180 nationalities represented.  

But, the Dutch don’t have it all figured out. It was interesting to see how such a progressive city, that values education and diversity, still struggles with issues of racism. For instance, there’s a holiday celebrated every year where the participants show up in black face. You heard that right. Black Face. It’s become a controversial event and one that seems to have divided some Dutch.

While not perfect, I can absolutely say that Amsterdam is one of my top five cities and I highly recommend you make a trip. I also want to debunk the idea that it's only a destination for the red light district and weed industry. There is so much more to this little city.

Here are some of our favorite places and things to do in Amsterdam.

Food & Drink

We didn’t spend a ton of time in the center of town, so most of our recommendations are for places outside the centrum. I also have to warn you, that most standard dutch food is primarily made up of fried things. Not that it’s bad, it’s delicious, bitterballen, frites (which are actually Belgian), and croquettes are food that you’ll find everywhere and while they make for great bar food, I was often left craving a giant salad.

However, there is a pretty interesting modern food scene. If you’re vegan, the Dutch have your back. It seems that there’s a big vegan food movement with dedicated vegan restaurants and vegan options on almost every menu.  

There are also lots of pop up restaurants and food stalls. Our favorite spot was Foodhallen. It’s a huge space that includes a library, a cinema, and stores. But the food hall is the main attraction. With dozens of food stands serving food from all over the world. It is really busy and can be difficult to find a seat, so I highly recommend going during slower times of day…for instance grabbing a late lunch between 2 and 3. Some of the things that we had here were nachos with cashew cream cheese, BBQ spare ribs, a gin fizz from the beautiful gin bar. But there is sushi, pizza, tapas, tacos, Indian food, etc.

The thing the dutch really do right is breakfast. Get pancakes. They know how to make pancakes and you can get them almost anywhere and they will be delicious. They aren’t like American pancakes, they are more of a cross-over of crepes and American pancakes. If you’re on the outskirts of town, make your way to Local Hero or Bartack. If you’re in the centrum, there are dozens of places to go.

Another great breakfast spot in the centrum is Omelegg. It’s an incredibly delicious omelette restaurant that has the most creative dishes and the servings are huge.

One of the most fun days we had was when we took the ferry over to the Noord and visited two of the local breweries, Oedipus and Walhalla. I highly recommend making the trip. First, because it’s such a treat to take the ferry. It’s free and fast and comes often and then it’s great to see the local beer culture. Oedipus is more of an open warehouse space and Walhalla has a dark-wood interior and cozy.  

Lastly, visit Winkel 43 for the best apple pie of your life. It’s not on the menu, but you just simply need to sit down and order apple pie with or without cream (with :)) and your life will be changed.

Coffee (the kind you drink)

Amsterdam has a wonderful cafe atmosphere. There are an abundance of coffee shops where people can set up to work, drink coffee, and enjoy what I found to be really delicious cafe food, usually in the form of creamy greek yogurt and homemade muesli, or tasty housemade breads and juices.

Some of my favorites:

White Label
KoffieSpot  
Monk Cafe

Note, if you plan to work in these shops, while they are welcoming to people who are on laptops, they often don’t have outlets for use and they expect that those who are working to set up at the community tables so that the individual tables aren’t taken for those who are just stopping by to eat.

Culture

There are so many museums to choose from, but if you can only go to one, I highly recommend the Anne Frank House. Visitors tour through the actual home of Anne Frank and get a sense of the stress and intensity of the time in WWII occupied Netherlands. You must buy your tickets in advance and I recommend going early in the day on a weekday. The space is pretty small and can get crowded quickly, so getting there early before the rest of the tourists have had their breakfast will give you a bit more space and time to experience the house.

If you’re looking for more museums, take a trip to the Rijks Museum or the Van Gogh museum. The Rijks museum could be a two-day endeavor. The space itself is a work of art and there are entire rooms dedicated to some of the best artists in the world like Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Vermeer, Leyden, etc..  

If you’re looking for modern art, check out the Stedelijk museum. If you’re in the museum area and looking for somewhere to work, this museum also has a library with excellent internet. It’s quiet, hidden, and a delight to work in.

And, if you’re looking for something a bit more historic, check out the Palace in the center of town.  

Another fun spot to visit is the De Balie center. This organization hosts events and talks in both dutch and English on a variety of topics. We visited one night and listened to a talk about the state of journalism in Europe. They have events daily and an entire English-speaking event calendar.  

And, lastly—if you like science, the Nemo Museum is a must. There are tons of installations and interactive exhibits that make this museum oh-so-much fun.

Other Fun Things to Do

Rent a bike and get out of the center of town to Vondelpark. Seriously, my favorite experiences and memories of this city are in this park. It’s so full of people and such a beautiful park, about 2.5 miles around, it’s a wonderful place to take a picnic or just ride your bike in circles and people watch. It’s right near many of the museums, so it’s easy enough to visit here for a late lunch after hitting up the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh, or Stedelijk museum. Don’t miss this park.  

Rent a boat and tour it around the canals. It’s so easy and a great way to spend time in the canals. All you have to do is book the boat online through a company called Sloep Delen, show up and activate the boat with your phone. Then, download the VarWater app to get recommended routes and rules for boating through the canals.

Day Trips

Netherlands charm isn’t just restricted to Amsterdam, the surrounding areas are also wonderful. If you’re visiting Amsterdam for a week or more, I highly suggest making your way to Utrecht or Haarlem. They are mini-Amsterdams and almost have more charm for their smaller size. They are also generally, less touristy in the central areas of town.

The past couple of weeks have been dulled a bit by rain. As someone who was raised in Colorado, weeks without sunshine take their toll. So, to mix things up and shake the funk that the rain was threatening we took a couple of weekend trips outside the city. We didn’t successfully escape the rain, but we did discover some new and interesting places!

One Saturday, I got back from a run and Jonathan had the idea to visit a nearby city called Utrecht. I had never heard of it, but it turns out that it's one of the largest cities in The Netherlands. We packed up our stuff, rode our bikes to central station, fighting the raucous crowds in the centrum and hopped on a 45-minute train, with our bikes to the historic college town.

It was adorable. Just adorable. It’s like a smaller, college-town version of Amsterdam with canals and small streets and shops and brown cafes. The town boasts a gothic church, its building started in 610, but was damaged in a storm in 1674, leaving the nave in ruins and separating the tower from the rest of the church. So, now, in place of the nave there’s simply a square. It’s a pretty interesting sight!

While we were there, we spent a couple of hours in a different old church that had been turned into a brew hall. A huge, beautiful space, packed with people enjoying one another and the over 100 Belgian beers that the hall offered. A pretty good use for a church, I’d say.

We also found the best brown cafe ever. What is a “brown cafe?” you ask. Well, I’ll tell you!

When Jonathan and I first visited Amsterdam in 2015, we spotted cozy, dark, wood-interiored bars all over the city. Each had a very similar aesthetic, served similar beers, and many of the same snacks. There were always a bunch of locals, sitting lazily at a table, who had clearly become part of the place. These had to be part of some category of bar. We asked around, but no one seemed to know what we were talking about. It took me four years to find the name of the type of bar it was and this only occurred after ducking into a dark bar in Utrecht. Jonathan describes these bars as "somewhere that you would get your next D&D mission."

Like I said, they are dark, with regulars that are basically part of the furniture, only a handful of beers on tap—always Heineken—and only sometimes have food. They all have candles everywhere and some of them have cats. Outside there are always a few faux-wicker chairs with people drinking Heineken out of thin glasses. They are perfect.  

The other thing that we discovered is that Utrecht is a huge board game town. We visited three or four board game stores while there. There is actually a street called board game row. If we were ever to move to The Netherlands, this might be where we would end up.

A couple of weekends later, we took made a getaway to Brugge. We had visited Brussels in 2015, but only for an evening and had a lackluster experience. So, thought we’d give Belgium another try. This past Friday we hopped on a train and rode three hours to the little Belgium town in Flanders. The only impression I had of Brugge before arriving there is from the trailer of In Bruges, which is so cliche. I haven’t even seen the movie, but arrived expecting a moody, shifty, somewhat violent city.

That impression was further reinforced when after arriving to the train station in Brugge and walking out onto the station square we witnessed a full-on fight, involving probably six or seven people, screaming, yelling, crying, a woman laid out on the ground, police nowhere to be seen, onlookers staring blankly at the scene. We watched the drama unfold for a few minutes in complete confusion. At moments we thought it was resolved and then someone would go back in for a punch, be pulled off, and then head back in for more.  

It was bizarre. I think the last time I witnessed a fist fight was in my early 20s at a sleazy bar in Denver and even then it was brief—a punch, a scattering of people, confusion, the end.  

We shook off our violent arrival after walking through incredible architecture and over charming canals on our way to our AirBnB.

Brugge is incredibly walkable. Even though we stayed on what seemed like the edge of town, everything was within a 10 or 15 minutes walk. After checking into our place, we made our way to a perfect basement bar. Le Trappiste, to enjoy a slew of Belgian beers. The ceilings were low and vaulted. We then enjoyed a fancy dinner at a delicious place called Lieven. The restaurant is a bit more formal than our usual haunts, but the food was delicious and the service was really nice.  

The town was pretty quiet the first night we were there and our first few hours in the city were tame as we prepared for what I referred to as a day of debauchery and indulgence. Belgium is home to many of our favorite indulgences—frites, chocolate, Belgian beer (and also waffles) To make sure that I did something good for my body before pouring poison into it all day, I went on a nice, albeit cold run around the rim of Brugge. The main area of Brugge is egg-shaped, which makes it pretty easy to navigate. And, they have a wonderful trail that takes runners, walkers, and bikers around the full circle of the city. I was really impressed with the infrastructure of the path and the parks along the way.  

After my mini-attempt at health (in all honesty, the run was more of a ramble, there was too much to stop and look at along the way!) we headed straight for sugar and started off our day with waffles. Then we made our way to the Saturday market where there were trucks and tents set up selling fruits, cheese, croquettes (this area of the world loves croquettes) and also tons of trucks selling rotisserie chicken.  

While checking out the market, a small, and somewhat half-assed parade started. I think it was in celebration of St Patrick’s day, but it also could have just been a bunch of friends who decided to get drunk on Saturday morning and march around the square. Hard to tell.

We then made our way down the tourist trap streets where there were gobs of chocolate and waffle shops and horses clip-clopping their way alongside us, taking tourists on historical tours of the city. Honestly, maybe it’s just a result of the candy shops and horses, but Brugge reminded me a lot of a drunker version of Mackinac Island. While there were still cars the city clearly runs primarily on tourism and the abundance of chocolate and waffle shops was similar to the toffee and ice cream stores that line the streets of Mackinac.

We indulged on chocolate pralines and spekulooos before heading to a brewery tour at the Halve Maan brewery, a fifth-generation Belgian brewery. The tour took us through the original site of the brewery and shared how the brewery built pipes under the city of Brugge to transport beer to its bottling and distribution plant. It cost $4 million dollars to build the pipeline and $400K of the money was raised through a kickstarter. Pretty impressive!

The tour included three Belgian beers. If you’re familiar with Belgian beers, you’ll know that three of them are the makings for a drunk afternoon. At an ABV of between 7 and 12%, these are not “sessionable”  

After seeing the brewery and learning about its operations, we enjoyed a Blonde, a Dubbel, and then shared a Tripel and Quad with a bunch of brits and an Irish couple. It was a good and tipsy hour or so.

Fun fact—the Dubbel has twice the malt of a Blonde, a Tripel has three times, and a Quad has four times, making each of these progressively stronger in alcohol.

The three beers pretty much wiped us out. After going on a fruitless search for frites, (the frites place was closed!) we shared a pizza and took a nap.  

Getting old is annoying.

After sobering up and regaining our energy, we went back out into the city to complete our search for frites. It was a delight to discover that there was a night-time kayaking race happening in the canals. We joined other onlookers and watched as individuals and pairs, in headlamps, paddled through the canals. We still have no idea what they were doing, but it was entertaining nonetheless.

We found our frites, enjoyed a beer on a busy corner, sitting outside and people watching. IMO this is something that we don’t do enough in the US—have tables outside on corners for coffee and beer-drinking. It’s so enjoyable to sit out in the air, watching the bustle of people, even in the cold!  

On Sunday we spent our morning at the Belfry of Bruges, a medieval bell tower. We climbed 366 stairs to the top for a great view of the city and a chance to see the bells in the tower while they were charming. It was such fun!

Then off we went to catch the train to head back to Amsterdam.

Arriving to the station back “home” we made a quick decision to go to the first spot we had a beer in when we started our adventures together in 2015.

Before our trip to Europe in 2015, Jonathan and I had only traveled domestically together. While those trips went well, traveling for two weeks outside the US was new to us and it was a bit of a test to see how well we really adventured together and if we could spend that amount of time together.

It was a bit dicey at first. I got real cranky during the layover in Heathrow on our way from the states to Amsterdam and the Brits served Jonathan beans in ketchup for breakfast. Gross.  

But, once we arrived to our destination, and sat down to cheers to the beginning of our adventure, we kicked off years of incredible experiences together.

It was nice to stop back into where our adventures started over three years ago. And, as we left to head to our apartment, the sun came out!

We arrived in Amsterdam on Saturday, February 16. After taking a taxi from the airport (the first Tesla I’ve ever been in!) and getting settled into our place, right on Rembrandtpark, we made our way to the Mercatorplein, a square or plaza around the corner from our apartment where there are restaurants, shops, and a grocery store. One of the small delights I’ve found in visiting these different countries are the different words used for central areas. In Barcelona, it was Plaça, like the Jaume I Plaça and here they are Pleins as in Mercatorplein.

It’s the same with the streets, avenues, etc. Here in Amsterdam, the streets are Straat, for example Orteliusstraat. But, in Barcelona streets are named “Carrer” Our street in Barcelona was Carrer de la Seca. These small differences are so satisfying to know.  

I probably wouldn’t notice these differences as much without Jonathan who is incredibly attuned to language. Traveling with a language-nerd is a real gift. I highly recommend it.

Once on the square, we found a super cozy restaurant, called Zurich. With a fire pit in the middle, candles on tables, low-lighting, it had everything I want for every restaurant I ever go to, to have. Almost every restaurant we’ve been to is like this. Why is there such an abundance of warm restaurants and open flames in Europe but not in the states? Why are Americans so afraid of candles?!

These cozy restaurants and bars are so abundant that there’s a word for them—Brown Cafes. These are traditional Dutch pubs named after their wood decor. It was in one of these, in 2015, where my love of the Belgian beer La Chouffe was established. I love hanging out with this little gnome!

It’s been a surprise to find that living here has been relaxing. While we’re still filling our days exploring and working out when we’re not working in the afternoons and evenings, life is calmer here than it is in Barcelona.

In Barcelona, there was so much happening all of the time. Festivals, parades, people everywhere, incredible tapas and wines to enjoy just steps from our apartment. There was a heightened sense of urgency to have all of the experiences, all of the time.

Here there is a different vibe. It’s just regular life. People get up, they go to work, they get home. We see them through their street-facing windows cooking dinner, watching TV, cleaning. So ordinary.

This could be due to the fact that we are staying just outside of the centrum in West Amsterdam. As we make our way into the Centrum it gets progressively more crowded and then once near Dam Square and the Central station it’s pure mayhem. This mayhem is the reason my clients keep asking me if I’m partying all of the time. Answer = no. I’m too old for that shit.

Our time spent here is in the quieter spots—the Jordaan, with its adorable shops and tiny streets, on the canals near our apartment among the gable-topped houses, in Rembrandtpark and Vondelpark, at the museumplein, and in the Noord.

Within a couple of days of arriving, we bought a couple of used bikes. Such freedom! You can get anywhere in this city on a bike in 15 minutes. It’s amazing. The first weekend we were here, we took our bikes all the way across the city, on to a ferry, and over into the Noord.

The Noord holds a special place in our hearts. In 2015, we made a trip to Europe, bookended by Amsterdam. Our first stay in the city, we stayed in an AirBnB that I had booked in Jordaan. The stay was mostly uneventful. We rented a room in an apartment and the most notable thing about the experience was that I think the host was going through a breakup and spent most of his time in a dimly-lit living room chainsmoking. But, other than that, it was lovely.  

Our second stay, at the end of our trip, we stayed in an AirBnB in the Noord that Jonathan booked. Title of the location “Romantic Circus Wagon + 2 bikes” The minute Jonathan found it, he was smitten and it was booked. It turned out to be further from the center of town than we expected. To get there one had to take a car, or take a bike and then a ferry. The location itself was basically a trailer park. But at least we had the nicest trailer on the property — a romantic wagon!

The bathroom and showers were located through a community space. To shower, brush my teeth, use the restroom, I had to walk through a throng of baked 20somethings. I didn’t shower for three days. Thanks, wet wipes.

We had an hour-and-half long conversation with the host about lions and the interconnectedness of the universe. He was high. We were not.

We woke up New Years day freezing and without any power in our wagon.  

The whole thing was insane and totally fantastic.  

After landing back in this little country, we had to head back to the site of our 2015 experience. We made our way across the river, into the Noord, back near our circus wagon to tool around and visit a couple of breweries. We spent the day outside, in the sunshine, playing games and riding through the open streets of this warehouse-district of sorts.

For the first ten days of us being here, the weather was fantastic. Sun-shining, everyone outside in the park and on patios, temps in the 50s/60s (Fahrenheit) I didn’t learn until the weather was about to turn that Amsterdammers hadn’t seen the sun since December. In retrospect this makes sense why the spring-break-like energy was so palpable. While I write this, it’s steadily raining outside and while it was raining lightly enough that I could still get out for a run, I’m not sure I could handle weeks of this gloom.

Over the past couple of weeks we’ve done a good job of going full Dutch. We have tulips in our house, I’m eating lots of yogurt (did you know that it’s thought that the dutch are so tall because of their dairy intake?! Maybe it will help me out.), I've started to drink tea, we’re riding our bikes everywhere, we bought our museumkaarts so we can go visit all of the incredible museums.

The only thing that we haven’t hopped on board with is the language. Amsterdam is an incredibly diverse city with 176 nationalities represented, making it one of the most diverse cities in Europe. And, somehow almost everyone speaks English. Really good English. The dutch have such good English that some of them sound like they are from the US. So, learning dutch hasn’t really been a priority and also...it’s hard, man. There’s a letter that is made up of two letters—an I and a J—but in the dutch alphabet, it is one letter IJ and when put together it looks like a Y (if you really look closely and know how it’s pronounced). It’s used often in words like Brewery.  

Even though we don’t speak their language and are clearly stupid Americans just hanging out in their city, the people we’ve encountered are really pleasant. We’ve met people at our gym, at a game meet up, our local coffee shop, and our co-working space. I would describe the dutch as trusting, direct, and pragmatic. They aren’t overly enthusiastic, but are kind and generous.

Last week, I worked out of a coffee shop for a few hours. I had ordered two coffees and when I went to pay, I found that they didn’t take Visa (this has been a surprise to me in a few places, even some grocery stores only take MasterCard) I only had enough cash to cover one of my coffees. As I was scrounging through my wallet counting out every last euro, the barista asked if I was coming back to the shop, when I answered “yes” he said “just pay next time.” Thanks, man.

All in all, Amsterdam is a delight.

Walking through the Gothic Quarter in Barcelona one morning, I overheard a tour guide say to her group, “During this tour, if you feel like we’re going in circles, it’s because we are.” I felt so validated.

When we arrived in Barcelona, I had trouble getting my bearings. The area we stayed in is referred to as the old town and is filled with narrow and curving streets and alleys. Some of them connect and some of them don’t. It took at least three weeks for me to feel like I knew where I was going.

On top of the layout of the city, the people are diverse and dynamic, and the city is so complex and dense that it took some work to start to understand the social underpinnings and cultural history that created such a city.  

During our visit we took tours and talked to locals. I read The New Spaniards and Homage to Catalonia. And, we sat down with expats who have chosen Barcelona as their home. After six weeks, I felt comfortable in the city and started to understand, at a basic level, what makes Barcelona, Barcelona.

This city is so amazing. It could take months to find the right words to describe how vibrant it is. It’s taken me a long time to put together this post. I’m not an expert and I really care about properly expressing how magical our experience was. In a novice attempt, I’d like to share some of the discoveries that opened up Barcelona to me and helped me to navigate it with more confidence.  

Spain and Catalonia

When visiting Barcelona, it’s important to understand the difference between Catalonia and Spain. Catalonia is a region of Spain, known as an autonomous community. Catalonia has some of its own government control, like it’s own police, but it is part of Spain—to many Catalonians chagrin.

Everywhere we went there were yellow banners waving and Catalonia flags flying. Recently, like SUPER recently—October 2017—the Catalan independence referendum was held, and declared a breach of the Spanish Constitution by the Spanish government. Riots ensued.  The Catalonian separatist officials that drove the referendum are in prison and actually went on trial during our last week in Barcelona. There were rallies and protests all over the city during the trials. It’s a big deal and an issue that Jonathan and I understood only peripherally before visiting. There are still strikes and marches happening, demanding the release of the government officials and the previous president is currently in exile in Belgium. If you get a chance, watch the documentary Two Catalonias.  

Catalonia is different than Spain and if you visit, know that the issue is nuanced and that many of the locals care deeply about this separation. To be called “Spanish” is potentially an insult.

There are also two languages spoken and written—Spanish and Catalan. Often, if you go to a restaurant, these two languages will be on the menu, before you’re ever offered an English option. Catalan has more French influences. One of the most distinct characteristics of Catalan was its use of the “X” which is pronounced like “ch” in champagne. As a related example, one of our favorite places to go for tapas and Cava is Xampanyet—pronounced shampanyet.

The Government

It’s helpful to remember that the country was ruled by a fascist dictator up until just 1975. While much of the world was involved in WWII, Spain was in the throws of a Civil War and the fascists won. Spain was led by Francisco Franco, a friend of Mussolini and Hitler, from 1939 to 1975. The country has gone through huge changes and swift modernization since Franco died. It’s insane that Barcelona is as modern and progressive as it is given how short of a time they have been a democracy.

And, they seem to exercise their democratic rights quite regularly. I’m not sure that I can remember a single day while we were there that we didn’t see some kind of protest, strike, or gathering of people in front of the town hall on Plaça Jaume I. All of the strikes and protests we encountered were peaceful. People held signs and chanted phrases.  

Over a period of four weeks there were two taxi strikes. The cabs parked in the center of a central avenue and the taxi drivers marched down the Passeig de Gracia. Apparently, this is a regular occurrence. So regular that there is a website with the schedule for the strikes so you can plan around it if, say you’re headed to the airport.

Living Basics

Grocery Shopping

Buying groceries took us a few weeks to get a handle on. There are several ways to shop in Barcelona. Many people visit four or five stores to collect all of their food. There are stores specializing in breads and cakes, meats and cheeses, dry goods and legumes, and a ton of fruit stands. Many people stop by each individual store to get all of their groceries at these specialty stores.  These stores are charming and have high-quality, delicious food.

Some of our favorites were: A dry goods store, Casa Gispert around the corner from our place where, on a whim, Jonathan bought sundried tomatoes and the best rice for risotto, Carnaroli. This purchase resulted in us creating a ritual of cooking sun-dried tomato risotto on Tuesdays. It was delicious. Here’s the recipe, I encourage you to make it, but only with Carnaroli. I didn’t know that risotto could get better. I usually use Arborio rice, but Carnaroli is a risotto-making game changer.

We also bought all of our coffee at El Magnifico and had an opportunity to try varieties from all over the world—Ecuador, Costa Rica, Ethiopia, etc. El Magnifico is one of our favorite places we frequented in Barcelona. They take such care in the work they do and we made a special connection with the owner while we were there, joining a Colombian coffee cupping. If you visit Barcelona, please make a stop into El Magnifico. Their coffee is the best and the people that work there are wonderful and talented.

For our cheese, meats, and wine cravings, Vila Viniteca was a regular haunt where we picked up wine, manchego, and chorizo several times. The store is separated into a cellar and a cheese & meat shop. Their selection was tremendous. If you’re looking for Cava and want to buy a bottle, head here, and grab yourself a bottle of Recaredo. Then, pair it with some manchego and chorizo and you’ll have the best picnic on the planet.

If you don’t want to make six stops to get your groceries, you can visit one of the many public markets that house dozens of stands all in one location. Almost every neighborhood has one. In our neighborhood, the Santa Caterina market is the spot.

It’s a fabulous market with an abundance of food stands and restaurants around the perimeter where you can grab a cerveza or an espresso before you shop. These are great places to shop, but they close earlier than expected. Ours closed at 2 pm, which was disappointing when we tried to head there to get goods for dinner at 4 pm.

There are also standard grocery stores like Aldi and Dia. These are akin to a small King Soopers or other. In some cases, depending on the neighborhood, there are small groceries stores that are more locally owned. We discovered one of these after living two blocks from it for three weeks and transitioned from shopping at the Santa Caterina to De Tote—an adorable market with a wine cellar and bakery, and it was open on Sundays. Bonus!  

Almost no grocery stores, specialty food stores, or markets are open on Sundays. We were burned by this no fewer than three times before we finally lodged it in our brain and were apt enough to plan our shopping and eating around the Sunday closures.

However, if in a pinch, there are always the Supermercats. These are everywhere. They are similar to the Bodegas in New York, selling drinks, candy, and other dry foods and essentials. Generally, shopping for groceries happens way more frequently in Barcelona. Instead of doing one big shopping trip per week, we found ourselves visiting the store every two or three days for a few things each time. It seemed that many people operated the same way.  

Food and Wine

If you know me, you know that I love wine. But I wasn’t prepared for how delicious and accessible Spanish wine was going to be in Barcelona. Holy moly. What a treat! A glass of good wine is no more than 3 euros at any restaurant that you visit and you can buy amazing bottles of Rioja, Tempranillo, and Cava for less than 8 euros at the store. I’m talking good bottles. Wine prices in the states are a crime. I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to go back to buying wine in the US.

One of the most hilarious wine experiences we had was drinking out of a porron. This is a traditional glass wine pitcher that holds almost a full bottle of wine. If you want to imagine what it looks like before you go google it, just read this quote from George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia:

A porron is a sort of glass bottle with a pointed spout from which a thin jet of wine spurts out whenever you tip it up; you can thus drink from a distance, without touching it with your lips, and it can be passed from hand to hand. I went on strike and demanded a drinking-cup as soon as I saw a porron in use. To my eye the things were altogether too like bed-bottles, especially when they were filled with white wine.

Note- bed-bottles are bed pans. 😂

On one of our excursions, Jonathan and I were served wine in a porron. And we made all of the mistakes. You’re not supposed to touch your lips to the spout, but instead, pour it into your mouth. We must have looked like idiots with our lips wrapped around the porron. We also made the assumption that the porron held about half a bottle and ordered two. A bottle of wine would have been fine over the course of a two-and-a-half hour lunch. However, the porron holds a full bottle. So, we managed to drink two bottles of wine over lunch and were surprised to find ourselves pretty tipsy on our walk home.  

The meal we enjoyed while getting drunk was a traditional meal of calçots. What are calçots you ask? Green onions. But! They are green onions that Catalonia loses their shit over during January and February. They are prepared on a fire, served to you in a charred husk that you peel off, and then dip the meat of the calçot into a romesco sauce.

As Jonathan said after indulging on onions, “I didn’t ever think I would say that I made myself sick on vegetables.” These are a huge deal. Specialty restaurants pop up all over the region selling the onions. The restaurant that we went to was a fabulous outing for anyone who makes a visit to Barcelona. Only about 40 minutes outside of town by train, you head to Sant Cugat, where after walking through the town, you arrive at a fabulous trail system that connects Barcelona and Sant Cugat through Collserolla natural park. It’s splendid. We walked about thirty minutes on the trail, along with tons of other hikers and bikers and arrived at Can Borrell. They served us the most gluttonous meal I can remember having in my adult life. Piles of calçots, meat, bread, fries, beans, everything. Just everything. I don’t remember a time I was this full.

In general, eating out in Barcelona was a great experience, but there are some things we had to get acquainted with before we could really eat out properly. Here are some of the basic things we learned along the way.

• Everywhere you go, they will offer you "pan con tomate". This is bread with fresh tomatoes rubbed on it, olive oil dripped across it, and salt. It’s delicious. Sometimes restaurants will serve this to you with just the ingredients. Pieces of bread, whole tomatoes, and a head of garlic. You are to take one clove of garlic and rub sparingly on the perimeter of the bread. Cut the tomato and rub the pulp on the bread, add some olive oil and salt and voila!
• Catalonians love olive oil. Love it. They put it on everything and on multiple occasions we were told, “always more olive oil!"
• A tortilla is not the tortilla you know. Instead it’s an omelette of eggs, onions, and potatoes and it’s delicious.
• Nachos are not the nachos you know. They are corn chips.
• Fuet is a cured meat and it’s amazing. Get it.
• At many restaurants it's hard to get a table if you don’t have a reservation. Be sure to make reservations at the restaurants that you really want to check out. (Recommendations on restaurants to come in a future post)
• Waiters will not bring you the check. They don’t want to rush you and will let you sit at your table chatting for as long as you want. We were told that this is called “sobremesa” the time after the meal when you relax and the conversation really gets started. This is a lovely practice, but as a result it can be difficult to get the check. When you’re ready, get the waiters attention and ask “La cuenta, cuando puedas.” Which translates to “the check, when you get a chance?”  

The Rhythm of the City

My heart was so full in this city. This is really where language can't capture the spirit of our experience. It’s so alive. The people are active all hours of the day and there is always something happening. We would turn a corner and a street fair was set up, or a band was playing on the corner, or people were firing muskets, a dance festival was happening, or something was lit on fire.  

My favorite experiences during our time were when we set out with minimal objectives and just let the city take us. If you visit Barcelona, do this. Just walk and you will have an adventure.

The Catalonians love a parade. We saw four of them during our six week stay. They also appreciate slowing down, long lunches, wine and beer on plaças in the sun. Do these things.  Many people don’t speak much English, but communication happens, and service people appreciate it when you try to speak their language. I would usually start a conversation in Spanish and quickly have to move to English, but just my attempt earned me points.

The day usually starts for people around 8 or 9 am and goes until midnight. You will see restaurants full of people at 11 pm on a Sunday night. It doesn't stop!

This city lives so fully and the rhythm is intoxicating. I can't wait to go back. What a wonderful world we live in.

Last fall, I read a book called Flâneuse. Of french origin, a Flâneuse is a female stroller, urban explorer, an idler. The book is a wonderful series of stories of women who walk in cities, their experiences, and their histories. It gave me words for one of my favorite things to do.

I have found no activity that is as simple and magical as walking in cities. There are so many surprises when I explore an unfamiliar place on foot. Time passes so fast as I experience dozens of small universes in just a couple of hours. The pace and spirit of each street, the shift in atmosphere as you move into a new area, daydreaming about the strangers and their destinations. I’ll often stop in a cafe that catches my eye and delight in the chance encounters and connections that otherwise wouldn’t be made if I were traveling with an objective, which I often am.  

It occurred to me the other day, that just being in a new city, far away from my friends and family, offers a chance to experience way more than I usually would.  

When I’m at home, stopping into businesses that I know well and visiting areas that I’ve been dozens of times, my senses are dulled. I’ve been here before, I have objectives, places to go, people to see. There isn't room for serendipity.

This week I walked all over Barcelona. To the beach, to nearby neighborhoods, through my area in El Born, in the Gothic quarter. One day, while on a solo adventure, I was walking down Passeig de Sant Joan. A street protected by trees, lined with businesses, a common thoroughfare. As I walked, I spotted a Cupcake shop. I’ve been craving a cupcake. There are lots of churros and an abundance of chocolate here, but not many cakes.

I stopped into the sweet store, La Cava Cakery and found that the owners were an Irish couple who had moved to Barcelona from Dublin several years ago. Without the urgency I usually have to hurry the transaction and get on my way, I had the opportunity to stay a while and indulge my curiosity. I learned about the couple, why they came to Barcelona, what they like about it, what they miss about Ireland. After talking a while, they shared with me an entire personally curated guide on what to do and where to go in Dublin. It was a goldmine! (email me if you're curious and I'll share it with you!) I made a lovely connection with this pair of strangers and it felt so good.

Over the weekend, Jonathan and I spent Saturday in a new neighborhood, Gracia. Our itinerary was pretty loose, but I still had an agenda and had made a reservation for dinner. Luckily, I had made room for wandering. As we made our way through the streets, we started to notice piles of wood on corners of roads and in the plazas. We came across a sign that suggested that there would be meat cooked in the street starting at 20:00.

We didn’t know what we were in for, but we knew it couldn’t be missed. We abandoned our dinner reservations and decided that we were going to experience whatever this was. We went to a movie at a beautiful old theater and when we came out at 8 pm, it was mayhem.  The streets were full of people, there was a parade weaving its way through the neighborhood shooting off muskets, playing bagpipes, and carrying huge marionettes. The piles of wood were lit and people were huddled around them for warmth and to cook meat on the heat. Hundreds of people gathered in the main plaza to watch as the parade finished their route in the center to play music, dance, and set off fireworks. It was completely wonderful and totally insane. Had I stuck to the plan, we would have missed all of it.

A few days later, after a workout, we stopped into our favorite neighborhood coffee shop, El Magnifico, to buy new coffee beans for the house. While sipping our espresso, we ended up lingering a while and chatting with the owner, Salvador, about the different regions and types of coffee they were selling. He ended up extending an invitation to join him at a cupping that morning and told us to meet him back at the shop in an hour. I’ve never been to a cupping. I expected it to be a tourist thing that they held at their shop regularly.  

When we returned to the shop, Salvador led us into the street, down an alley, into another store and into a basement where there were only a few store owners, employees of Magnifico, a coffee sommelier, and a coffee distributor preparing for a cupping of Colombian coffee. Much like a wine tasting, we heard about the region in Colombia that the beans come from and the people who grow the them. There were seven different coffees presented and then we embarked on the cupping. It was such a fabulous experience!

While I felt totally out of my element, being the only non-coffee professionals in the group, it was fascinating to see the process, hear the discussion (even if it was mostly in Spanish), smell the coffee, and learn how to slurp coffee off a spoon!

Had we not slowed down to connect with Salvador, we would have missed one of my favorite experiences of 2019. Of course, I wouldn’t have known what we were missing, but I’m now richer in experience and spirit than I was before.

As someone who spends a lot of time rushing through life, trying to gobble it all up as fast as I can, I tend to barrel through days, only remembering pieces of events. This month has provided me lots of reminders to slow down and take my time.  I don't always do it, but when I do, I always discover something magical.

You have traveled too fast over false ground;
Now your soul has come to take you back.

Take refuge in your senses, open up
To the small miracles you rushed through.

-John O'Donohue

Our recent days in Barcelona have been full of sights and spectacle!

Last Tuesday we made it to the Sagrada de la Familia. I spent two hours walking around slack-jawed. The best way I can describe the inside is Alice in Wonderland meets the Christian Church. They've been building the church for over 100 years and the plan is to finish in 2026. There are debates among locals if it will actually happen.

The construction is supported by donations and the fees that people pay to visit. We watched parts of it being built while we were there. A huge stone hung over our heads, held by a crane, on the way to the spire of the Virgin Mary. Crazy town.

We also made it to a soccer game where Barcelona closed out the other team. I think the final score was 4-0. The first goal was made just as we took our seats which was perfect. Everyone went wild! The stadium was pretty similar to a football stadium in the states, but the crowd was way more energetic. Similar to the energy of a hockey game. There was an entire section of fans across from us that jumped and chanted—waving flags for the ENTIRE GAME. The entire game, you guys. I was tired for them. But, loved their enthusiasm.

We felt pretty stupid when, during half-time (is that what you call it at a soccer game?) we went to get our hot dogs and beers—like you do at a sportsball game—and after ordering and paying, Jonathan looked at the beer can and noticed that it said 0% ABV. First time in my life that I've bought a non-alcoholic beer. 🤦🏻‍♀️Unsurprisingly, I didn't drink much of it :) The hot dog (or Frankfurter, rather) was delicious, though!

On Saturday we made our way to an area of the city that's full of museums and we visited the Caixa Forum—a museum and community center that hosts multiple exhibitions. We checked out a Toulouse-Lautrec exhibit. It featured a bunch of drawings, music, and paintings from the late 1800s / early 1900s from France and the culture of the Moulin Rouge. We heard the can-can song a dozen times. The other exhibit that we checked out was by a Sevillian artist, Velasquez. He was the artist for the royal family in the 1600s. Art related to royalty during this time period is never very interesting to me—royal portraits, war!, death!, crucifixion, manliness, blah, blah, blah. Jonathan enjoyed it.

I signed up for a 10K race that happened on Sunday. So, Saturday I took a walk through the city to visit the expo and pick up my bib. There was a stage at the expo where dozens of people were line dancing to American country music. What?! Why?! The electric slide to Garth Brooks in Barcelona. Amazing. During my walk, I also came across a parade. Just a random parade of men on horseback, carriages, and ponies. NBD. I also encountered an open wine-tasting market—30 or so booths set up, serving wine and people walking up and down the street with full glasses of wine. The city is so alive all the time.

Ultimately, I didn't end up doing the race. It was pouring rain when I woke up on Sunday morning and I don't have the proper gear for that kind of shitty weather, so instead, we walked a few blocks to check out El Born CCM—a museum/community. The space holds ruins of the streets and buildings of Born from the 1700s. Apparently, the structure that it's in was built as a market, hundreds of years ago and was in disrepair. There was a bunch of debate about what to do with it and in 2002 they decided to renovate. But! During the renovations they uncovered an archeological site and decided to turn the space into an exhibition and community building.

Since it was raining, I was excited about the opportunity to cozy up and make some chili for dinner and stay in. But somehow I keep forgetting that all of the grocery stores are closed on Sundays. So, after I pouted a bit and overcame my disappointment of not getting to do what I wanted to do, we decided to use the opportunity to check out a speakeasy bar/restaurant in our neighborhood, called Paradiso. You enter into what seems like a small bar but are ushered into the restaurant through a refrigerator door. They have ridiculously elaborate cocktails and pastrami sandwiches. Jonathan's cocktail was served in a wooden Trojan Horse that nearly covered the entire table. It was delightfully ridiculous.

As I shared with Jonathan this week, I'm starting to get my Barcelona-legs. I'm starting to get a sense for the rituals of the day. For instance, not only do people in Barcelona stay up late, but they get up early! We expected the city to be a ghost-town at 7 am when we walk to the gym and it's not. It seems—after talking to a few people—that everyone here goes all day. They just take a lot of long breaks. According to a Belgian who has lived here for a couple of years, the people of Barcelona start work when everyone else does, around 9 am, but then they take a break from 11 to noon. And then take a long lunch from 2 - 4. Once they close out their work at 6 or 7, they head to dinner from 8 - 10. I love the fluidity of it. I have a habit of working in long blocks, no breaks longer than fifteen minutes and unsurprisingly by the end of each day I'm exhausted. I'm going to try to adopt the Barcelona approach to the day, but maybe with fewer drinks during working hours 😂.

I'm reading John Hooper's, The New Spaniards. In it, he suggests that "Spain is a difficult country to come to grips with from almost any angle."

It was such a relief to hear an expert on Spain articulate the experience I'm having.  

Finding my footing in Barcelona hasn't been easy. Each day I try to create associations in my mind in an attempt to understand the city that I'm in, the people that are here, and the culture, but I can't seem to establish any connections.

In El Born, where we're staying, there is a maze of beautiful and complex streets. I've walked these streets every day for the past two weeks and I still don't know where I am half the time. Landmarks I write to my memory disappear overnight. Depending on the day and the time, any street might look completely different. Stores and restaurants keep a variety of hours and if they are closed, a gate is drawn over the storefront.

There are dozens of cultures represented in a single city block. We've met more people from Argentina than we have people from Catalonia. While the diversity is exhilarating, it's made it difficult to get to the core of the Catalan culture. The complexity makes my head spin.

We made our way out of the city on Saturday to visit Cava country via train and I was surprised at the relief I experienced on a winery tour. The familiarity was comforting. The wine-making process is the same all over the world, it's something I know and it gave me a foothold to ask questions outside of "What is happening right now?" "Where am I?" Which are the primary questions I've found myself asking over the last two weeks.

The first winery we visited was Recaredo. It's a beautiful space with tunnels and tunnels of cellars. We ended up on a private tour with a knowledgeable and gracious guide. She shared the values and process of the winery—its dedication to biodiversity in their vineyards and the genuine representation of their grapes.

I learned about double fermentation, a cork's impact on oxidation, and most importantly, how delicious Cava is. Cava is the champagne of Spain. It tastes similar to Champagne but is half the price. The Cavas at Recaredo were nice and dry, without any additives, with fine bubbles that paired perfectly with the Catalan meats we ate as a snack.

Once back in the city, we continued our Cava cruise with a visit to a restaurant just two blocks from our place, El Xampanyet. Since arriving in El Born, we've peered into Xampanyet a dozen times, admiring the people inside and the lively atmosphere.

When I was in 7th grade, I was a lead in a play with a title that I don't remember. I sang a solo, the title of the song was "On the Outside Looking In" on the topic of exactly what you'd expect—feeling left out. Every time we passed the restaurant and observed the bustle—the people packed tightly into the small space, yelling and laughing—I sang that solo to myself in my head.

We had plans to go on Friday, but got there too late and it was closed. On Saturday, after returning from Cava country we went straight there. It was closed again. Three hours later, we made it happen. We got to be on the inside and it was everything we had hoped. It was packed. I spent two hours, standing at a bar, butt-to-butt with a stranger, drinking glasses of Cava that just kept coming and eating tapas with my fingers, while I watched the waiters and bartenders deftly make everyone in the space feel comfortable and cared for, even though the place was overflowing and you barely had room to lift your glass to your mouth.

It was a wonderful spectacle—people from all over the world, full of joy at just being fed and surrounded by other humans.

I finally felt like I got a bit of my footing in Barcelona. We can't wait to go back.

Recently, someone asked Jonathan what prompted us to spend a year abroad. His answer was “Andrea is restless.” When I related his comment back to him, he was surprised that he’d said it, I think, worried that he’d hurt my feelings.  

But, it’s true. I am restless. Doing the same thing more than a few times bores me, which means I have trouble keeping habits and being in the same place for an extended period of time. I’ve never lived in a house longer than two years. I switch up the coffee shop I visit throughout the week. And, if I don’t go on at least one trip per month, my spirit languishes.

I find familiar spaces and situations heavy with expectation. The unknown and the new provide freedom.  

Luckily, I’ve found a partner who also enjoys the thrill of experiencing new things and understands how it nourishes me.

Jonathan and I have traveled frequently throughout our relationship. We usually take two trips outside the US each year. One trip is almost always to Europe over the holidays and the other is to somewhere else like Cuba or Canada.

In August 2016, we spent ten days in Vancouver. We enjoyed the people and the water. We stuffed ourselves with Poutine and rode bikes. The weather and ease of getting around without a car was dreamy. So dreamy that we discussed the prospect of moving there.

Later that year, during the holidays, we spent three weeks in Stockholm, living in the cozy neighborhood of Kungsholmen. Getting up each day and walking across the street for a workout and then taking the train deeper into the city to visit one of the many sights. After a couple of weeks spent abroad, we felt like pros and again the idea of moving came up.  

As we entered 2017 and we became more comfortable with the flexibility of our remote businesses, the idea of moving abroad took a clearer form and we made a decision—2019 would be spent outside of the USA.

After much preparation and planning, a frantic December 2018, visits with friends, and a full day of flights, we’re finally here, kicking off our adventure in Barcelona, Spain.

The final days before our departure had a couple of challenges. To start…a freezing, snowy move. Our house was packed up on December 30th, on a beautiful clear day. Our house was moved to storage on December 31st in snow and freezing cold. It took six hours to move our 800 square foot apartment. We had planned for four.  

When we got to the storage space, the movers suggested that everything might not fit. I frantically started packing random shit into our car to make room. Luckily, we all worked together to pack the space as dense as possible and made it work. I'm not exaggerating when I say that we have shit from the ceiling to the floor and the back wall to the door. There’s no chance we’ll be pulling anything out of there until we’re moving it all out!

I also managed to throw away a bag full of my nicest beauty products—perfumes, lotions, makeup. Probably $700 worth of products. NBD. I'd put everything into a Whole Foods bag to take to my parents house where we’d be spending the night before we left. As we were clearing out final items from our place, I thought it was recycling and I took it down the dumpster and tossed it. After driving through the snow to Louisville and saying goodbye to our place, our street, Pearl St. and pulling into my parents driveway, I realized what had happened. So! We turned around and drove through the snow, back to Boulder, where I dumpster dived for my makeup. Luckily, it was a success and now I can say that I've been in a dumpster on New Year's Eve 🙂

But, the memory of the move and the smell of dumpsters feels like decades ago. After arriving in Barcelona, we’ve been blown away by the complexity and diversity of the city.

Neither of us have ever visited Spain, so we didn’t know what to expect. Everything I know of Spanish culture I know from Mexico and Cuba. Now, I'm in a European country that speaks Spanish. I don't have a model for that in my brain!

There are mountains in the city, and water as a backdrop to Gothic architecture, and a dozen languages being spoken in any restaurant we visit.

It’s also still Christmas.

Apparently, unlike the rest of the world, Spain celebrates the twelve days of Christmas, after the 25th and the culmination of everything is the weekend of The Epiphany—this past weekend.

Saturday night was the big event—the parade of the three kings—Melcior, Gaspar, and Baltasar. They all arrive in the city to be given the keys to Barcelona. Children write letters not to Santa, but to the three kings and then they leave out their shoes and a bowl of water for the king's camels to drink. The kings deliver presents, dropped into the children's shoes, which they open today, while they eat the Kings Cake, which is the same cake that people eat for Fat Tuesday.

The parade was a trip. The turnout was as big if not bigger than the crowds for the Macy's Day Parade. Families show up with ladders so that their kids can see. Brilliant. There were huge floats for all three kings and their entourage, nets swung into the crowds for kids to put their letters for the kings into, and then at the end three floats shoot candy (rather violently) at the crowd. It was fantastic!

Everyone was wearing crowns and kids LOST THEIR SHIT—screaming desperately, "Hola, Gaspar!!" "Hola, Baltasar!" Throwing their letters into the nets.

My face hurt from smiling so much and Jonathan and I have been singing the song from this video for the past 36 hours.

We’ve been to several wine bars, run on the beach, walked all over the city, and shopped at the fresh food markets for our groceries. We are settling in to our place and starting our first full week in the city.  

Next on the list is to brush up on my Spanish. I’ve got work to do.

The other day, we went on a search for coffee grounds. We visited our local market where we stood wide-eyed at a counter watching all of the hubbub and waiting for someone to help us. We gave up and started to walk away, when one of the cashiers became available and, in a rush, I returned and asked “Yo tengo cafe?” Wrong conjugation, dummy. The woman stared blankly at me until I exclaimed “coffee?? Coffee grounds?” Ah! Yes. The stupid American doesn’t know how to find coffee. The woman was gracious and showed us the options and ultimately it was a success. But, seriously—get it together Andrea. “I have coffee!?” No you don’t, idiot.

I’ve soothed the humiliation of my coffee hunt, by making an excessive amount of coffee each day in a moka pot and feeling oh-so-european.

I love Boston—its history, architecture, people, and the Charles River. I've made it a tradition that I take a solo trip to Boston each fall, usually under the guise of a work trip, for a marketing conference.

This year was my second year staying in Beacon Hill. The area transcends time. It's both modern and historic—the quiet,cobble-stone streets give the sense that you're existing in some monumental period in history. Everything feels more important.

On my last visit, I discovered a beautiful cafe, Tatte Bakery and Cafe, and have made it a regular restaurant in my rotation.

There are places that evoke different versions of myself—who I become in specific locations dictates my relationship with the place. At Tatte, I become a sophisticated, intellectual. My time here is spent immersed in the news, watching the Boston locals make their way through their days. If you arrive before 8 am, you can enjoy the quiet before the space becomes full and buzzing with people starting their days. On weekends, small groups of people gather over Paella, frittatas, and avocado toast on the patio, tending to children and sharing the events of their weeks as the farmers market sets up next to them on Mt Vernon Street.

Another favorite past-time in Boston are long walks and runs along the Charles River. During my visit in September, it seemed like the whole city was out, enjoying the weather along the water. Docks filled with people relaxing, reading, and picnicking, rowers cutting through the water and sailboats seeking a gust of wind to take them toward the Boston Harbor.

I discovered a new cafe during this recent trip, called The Thinking Cup. As soon as I entered and spotted the ham and butter sandwiches, I was transported to Europe. The cafe is full of small tables, dark wood, and leather. I spent two hours here reading. I could have stayed the whole day, relishing the bustle of the cafe and taking in all of the people, intimately squished together eating and talking.

But, instead, I made my way to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, stopping on the way for a peek into the Boston Public Library, which has an incredibly beautiful reading room.

It happened to be Museum Day, an annual event that provides free access to museums around the country, so I got in free to the Museum of Fine Arts. The museum has a really incredible collection, but the piece that most struck me was Joseph Turner's, Slave Ship. I must have stood, staring at this painting for twenty minutes. It's a harrowing depiction of a true event during the days of the slave trade.

From the museum: "One of Turner’s most celebrated works, Slave Ship is a striking example of the artist’s fascination with violence, both human and elemental. The painting was based on a poem that described a slave ship caught in a typhoon, and on the true story of the slave ship Zong whose captain, in 1781, had thrown overboard sick and dying slaves so that he could collect insurance money available only for slaves “lost at sea.” Turner captures the horror of the event and terrifying grandeur of nature through hot, churning color and light that merge sea and sky."

If you can, I suggest visiting the Boston MFA to see this piece in person.

A new restaurant discovery was Spumino. This stylish and classic restaurant was the perfect restaurant experience. Seating is primarily set around countertops with backless stools, providing for encounters and conversations with fellow diners.

The restaurant is small and offers a close view and connection to the kitchen that's complemented by the excellent service. I enjoyed the best Bolognese I've ever had, in my life.

Lastly, I enjoyed the performing arts with a show, Dance Up by World Music/CRASHarts—a collection of performances by a variety of choreographers. My face hurt after the show from smiling so much. The dancing was amazing. One of my favorite pieces was a modern dance piece choreographed and performed by Doppelganger Dance Collective, a group run by Shura Baryshnikov, the daughter of Mikhail Baryshnikov. Another performance that has stuck with me was a goofy, Broadway/hip-hop-style piece by The Wonder Twins. Both of these pieces were full of incredible dance and the Wonder Twins are just plain fun.