Spain, Again!
I just got back from another trip to Spain; ostensibly to improve my Spanish, but also to visit my loverly friend Lia, head to Benicassim Festival and eat lots of delicious Spanish food! If you’ve read any of my other blogs or articles then you’ll know that I don’t fly short-haul; I take trains and coaches. Waaay less carbon emitting. Love.
£80, if you booked a couple of weeks in advance and go mid-week will get you a return from Ashford International to Paris on the Eurostar. I am a big fan of the Eurostar. Last time I went to Spain, I got caught in SNOW coming out of Barcelona (yeah. SNOW) and my coach was a million hours late. I missed my Eurostar home. A same-day ticket was €230. OUCH. I produced my now not valid ticket, told them about the coach and the SNOW and the gentleman took my ticket, wandered off, came back, put a stamp on it and said it was totally fine for me to get the train that day. FOR FREE. Woop!
Once I arrived in Paris I bought my ticket to Carcassone on one of the machines, because the queue was heeuuuge for the desks, as it always will be during the summer. Unlike British ticket machines, French ones tell you the times of your trains. Helpful! I spent one night in Paris, visited the Montmartre cemetary with an Argentine chap, and got my train fine the next morning. Paris to Carcassone, in the South of France, was roughly €45. Once in Carcassone I crossed the bridge and found the Tourist Information where I asked about Youth Hostels. Not only did she draw me a line to follow on the map, she also rang ahead and reserved me a bed! Tourist Information is definitely THE first stop when you arrive somewhere sans pre-booking a hostel. However, Carcassone, as well as being
beautiful, is pretty expensive.
Each night in the Youth Hostel cost me €30, but it did have a really, really nice kitchen, and the whole Old Town part is basically a shopping haven. Every building is a shop/ Every person is a shopper as Metric say. Still, the cathedral is free and the castle is free for E.U citizens under 25, so take your passport when you leave the hostel! (Do that anyway…in a money belt.)
I decided to go directly to Cordoba from Carcassone as I had my laptop on me and needed to leave that at Lia’s flat before heading to Benicassim. My laptop proved useful at Lia’s, but did not connect to the free wi-fi at either hostel, in Paris or Carcassone. I don’t know why. I spent an hour with the guys at the Paris hostel trying to figure it out. (Hilariously, I work at a helpdesk in my old Uni library, connecting people to the wireless every day. Yep.) It cost me just over €200 to get from southern France to southern Spain. I had to change twice, at Narbonne and Barcelona. The price was mosly giant because there is only ONE slow, cheap train from Barca to Cordoba a day, and I got the speedy train which costs €130 and only takes five hours instead of ten. I am FINE with a ten hour train, which costs €60, but only one a day?! Better planning required, perhaps?
I stayed one night with Lia in Cordoba before we headed up to Valencia to meet Laura, Kate and Kev and to watch the World Cup final; Spain versus Holland!
They totally won!
I mostly ate patatas bravas and ensalada verde, or fried potato and green salad. They have a nasty habit of putting a creamy garlic sauce on the patatas bravas, so ask for them “sin salsa” when you order. In the second photo you can see Lia’s plate piled high with the stuff. We scraped it off mine but the taste was still SO STRONG I have no idea how she managed to eat it.
It was around €50 to get from Cordoba to Valencia by train, for a single. We had to get the coach return as there were no trains! The coach was €48,50, I think. We got the overnighter so we weren’t sat in gawdawful heat the whole ten hour journey and because it was unlikely we’d be back in Valencia by 10am, which is when the other coach was. From Valencia to Benicassim we got the festival coach, which cost €30 return, and took an hour. You can read about what I ate at Beni here and there’s a few photos at my Flickr. I’m supposed to be writing a review for Amelia’s Magazine too, so I’ll add in a link here if/when that gets done.
Back in Cordoba, other people cooked for me! That was awesome and novel. Lia threw together a tagine one night; lentils, aubergine & courgette, plus the ever necessary cumin. Lia’s friend Antonio made both salmorejo and patatas bravas! With his very bare hands! Salmorejo is made with bread, tomatoes, garlic and oil and is basically a thick, cold soup which is DELICIOUS.
Fit and friendly Spanish guys cooking for me? Please Sir, can I have some more? He also made a lentil salad; lentils, lettuce, tomato, vinegar & oil dressing, & a vegan moussaka; lasagna, aubergine, tomatoes. Yum. Stephen also tried to make lemonade, basically, lemon & sugar water. Tasty.
We also visited Sevilla one day (€16 there, €12 back, 45 minutes each way) and it’s really beautiful! We sat in some pretty gardens, wandered around the Plaza de Espana, which houses a Military Museum and some government offices, playing in street fountains and found vegan tapas! They also sell a ridiculously refreshing drink called granizada limon which is basically a lemon slushy, but made with real lemon and crushed ice. There were lemon pips in it!
I made a race against time to get back to Paris in time for my Eurostar out, and stopped a night in Barcelona on the way. I took the ten hour, €60 train out of Cordoba to the north, found my hostel with little difficulty (I always end up talking to myself about how lost I am on the streets of Barcelona…) and decided not to go for a late night walk, but stayed in and watched Bill Hicks instead. The next day I threw my stuff in a locker at Barcelona Sants station (€4 euro for under 24 hours for a ‘small’ locker – big enough for my phat backpack, sleeping bag and handheld giant shopper bag full of CRAP. I grew to loathe that bag.) and proceeded to walk up the hill towards Parc Tibidabo. I didn’t make it, but it was an awesome walk! Next time I’m there, I will. Fo’sho.
I wandered my sunburnt self back down to La Rambla, and to Maoz falafal. Thank gosh I set up tweeting from my phone, as I had no clue where it was but dear ole @LeoCookman DM’d me with the address. Lifesaver. (When I returned to the internet, I discovered that Maoz had tweeted me too with their address! I only get DM’s text to me though. BUT STILL! What service!) The falafal itself was oh-so-good. I didn’t take a photo, but Vegan BackPacker do and Vegan Eats and Treats spent way more time than I did finding vegan food! God, I enjoyed that falafal so much. I had it with homous, cucumber, lettuce and SUN-DRIED TOMATOES. Mmmm, *drool*. You can hang out there as long as you like, as well, refilling your salad. There’s SO MUCH FALAFAL in one pitta that you’d be a fool not to take advantage of the free salad. A FOOL. Yeah.
After that, I hopped on my overnight train to Paris Austerlitz (€132, 12 hours. I managed to get a carnet joven ticket, which is a young person’s railcard ticket…despite not being Spanish, or having a young person’s railcard. This worried me when I got on as they directed me to a different queue…where nothing happened. Whoop! Got about €50 off the ticket cost thanks to a thoughtful train ticket seller man.) Upon arriving in Paris, I chucked my stuff in the Gare du Nord lockers (€4 for a locker for under 24 hours. LOVE EUROPE. At Liverpool Street Station in London it’s £8 per item. What the faaack.) and walked to the Montparnasse cemetary. (I like cemetaries, alright?!) It only takes about an hour and a half to walk across Paris. Found some homous in a FranPrix supermarche and got ripped off on bread. 90c in PARIS for FRENCH BREAD! That’s more than it costs in England. Poop. Apparently, you can only check in the Eurostar one hour and fifteen minutes before, so I sat on the floor and read Jalouse for forty-five minutes before nearly getting moved on, except my check-in desk had just opened. So don’t bother getting there two hours before your train!
So, Spain! Ridiculously easy to eat vegan in. Just make sure you have a kitchen and a half-naked Spanish boy to cook for you.
