Today I was homeless.

I actually checked out of the hostel at 11am but my flight to Rome didn’t leave for more than 19 hours.   There was no sense in staying there another night as my flight was at 6:30am and that along with the loss of an hour due to daylight savings time meant I would have to leave for the airport at 2:30am.   The hostel was nice enough to let me store my bag there all day while I went out exploring.   They also let me hang out afterwards and even fed me dinner which was just the way they operated.   Pretty cool stuff.

I decided I would try to see everything I hadn’t seen yet during the week.   I was on my own today and it was actually kind of nice.   I started out by heading back to the Sagrata Famila only this time I paid to go inside.   The enormity of it all hits you immediately as you walk in.   In fact I was so taken aback that I actually walked back outside to re-enter only this time with a video camera:

After exploring the cathedral for an hour or so I walked into the city to see the Arc de Triumf   (yes, Barcelona has one too).

A few snapshots later and I stopped for lunch.   One thing I’ve noticed with my food so far in Europe is that there are always unique combinations on your plate and my lunch was no exception –   steak with fries, tuna salad and egg.   It was yummy.

Of course my stop for lunch kind of messed up my timing and my planned visit to the art museum was dashed as it was closing soon.   Oh well, I’m sure there will be plenty of art to see as I travel Europe.

I did however manage to catch the amazing waterfall music and light show outside the museum.   I was amoungst thousands of people as we watched the waterfalls march to the music.   It was just a nice peaceful and serene thing – something I’ve been able to be apart of several times this trip – and a good time to think about things and smile.

As I said earlier, the hostel fed me tonight even though I technically wasn’t a guest anymore.   At 8pm we all sat down to roasted potatoes and mushroom risotto – yummy.

Afterwards myself and a friendly couple I met the other night from New York – Corwin and Megan – sat down to play cards again.   It was actually the perfect end to the day as I really didn’t want to go out and I was ready to move onto my next stop.

I ended up heading to airport just before midnight as Corwin and Megan left to their own hostel (they had to move for tonight due to ours being full) and everyone else in the hostel was getting pretty boisterous as they got ready to head out drinking.   I wasn’t really meshing with all that as I was already mentally checked out and ready for my new destination so I figured I would just hang out at the airport and maybe catch some z’s on a bench.

Arriving to an airport that is closed was a new experience for me.   Instead of the hustle and bustle I had grown accustomed to it was eerily quiet.   No food stands open.   No check-in counters.   All but one entrance locked up and no employees except for a handful.   Oh yeah – I can’t forget the 30 or so other travelers lying or sitting on the floor trying to sleep.

I tried to sleep too but it just wasn’t happening mostly in part to my paranoia of actually sleeping longer than the 3 hours I had before I needed to be up for check-in    I was so worried I would sleep in and miss the flight that I found myself waking up every time I dozed off a little so I just did a long walk back and forth a couple of times til 4am rolled around and the counters started to open up.

Two and a half hours later (ugh) I was boarding my flight to a new city and a new country which is always exciting but more so in this case as this starts the second leg of my trip.   It’s exciting because unlike the last leg of Portugal, Spain and Morocco I don’t have anything booked beyond my hostel stay in Rome meaning I can come and go or change direction as I please.

More importantly though – I won’t be homeless anymore.