Because the train was late, we got free breakfast and coffee, which was nice. Steve’s mom found an all-inclusive hotel in Salou, Spain: about an hour outside of Barcelona by train, so because of the great deal, we decided to stay there. The six of us: Trevor, Farhan, Steve, Dani, Em and I had no idea that this place would be our residence for the next seven nights… The girls unpacked, in our room, and the boys in theirs, and we met for dinner. After that we played pool and chilled. We walked around the town at night, and sat on the shore for a while. The beach was close to our hotel. The next day, Dani, Em and I went to the beach again. We went back to freshen up for happy hour. We ordered our first drink, and then got news about the eruption of volcano Eyjafallajokull in Iceland. oh, man… that meant that all flights were cancelled, and individuals who where from England had to take the chunnel home. seemed simple enough, but the kicker was that France was having a train strike! We had to go through France to get to a chunnel station. woof. All the next days were spent trying to figure out what to do, and we mixed in things like walking on the beach, strolling downtown, laying in the sun, and washing our panties. haha Really though: we did laundry in the sink and bathtub, and then hung it all on our balcony to dry. Trying to find transportation was hard to do for a party of six relatively broke colligates. After tears were shed and tempers flared, we finally decided to take an overnight bus to Lille, France, and chunnel home from there on. The next day the boys rented a car to go to Barcelona, but there wasn’t enough room for the girls to go. (Farhan had an international driver’s license, but noone else did.) We were bummed, but went mini golfing, and ‘defaulted’ back to the beach. We came back to the hotel in the evening, and decided to go for after-dinner-drinks. Steve and Farhan surprisingly came downstairs and asked if we wanted to go to a hukkah bar. sure. That was a relatively fun. They talked to the owner for a long time after he talked to our table. He was a large guy from London, actually, and told funny riddles after playing a few party tricks on us. The last full day we were there, the trains finally had a few seats open, and the three girls were able to go to Barcelona for the day. I had seafood paella, played on the public playground, walked down the Rambler, and went back to our hotel in Salou in the evening. The last day, we packed in the morning, said goodbye to Manuel- the restaurant’s maitre d- who had become quite accustomed to our presence. For breakfast that morning, we had mimosas with our eggs and toast, and then finally left for our bus that would take us to Lille, France. I was so happy to be going back to England. I was ready to see the rest of our group, and to have free internet access again. I hadn’t really talked to very many people but Dani and Em for the past three weeks, and while we enjoyed each other’s company, we were looking forward to hearing about our classmates adventures. Kristi visited her family in Slovakia, Brian went to Greece, and Drew traveled alone throughout the hole trip! There was much to share. Our bus to France was stopped for random searches and ended up being 3 hours late, but we finally made it to France, and went shopping in a nearby mall to pass the time as we waited for our chunnel train home. Dani and I sat next to each other, and had a really nice conversation. I don’t think she knows how much it meant to me. As a non sequitur, Dani is terrified of the chunnel, so I was there for moral support. When we got to London, we met up with Abby on the train back to Cambridge! It was grand to catch up with her. :)
