Thank god for credit cards

As a stereotypical American, I decided that even though I can't afford anything it would be a good idea to take a trip to the French Riviera. A trip to be solely funded through copious use of my credit card. The SO who was visiting from LA still works and could help  in paying for stuff but she forgot her credit cards at home and brought about 200 dollars in cash for her two week stay. How convenient. She told me she was gonna pay me back so I shouldn't worry, right?

Anyways, as text bores me and pictures excite me....

The SO arrived on the 19th and we spent the first couple of days hanging out in Barcelona.

Sand-dog at the beach.

Had some healthy tapas at Cerveceria Catalana.

I've been living in Barcelona for about 7 months now and the SO and I visited Barcelona 4 years ago but we've never been to the Boqueria till now.

The weather in Barcelona, as it has been for the past 5 months, has been spotty. It finally cleared up during the afternoon and I got to bust out my artsy shot of the day. 

What's a day of walking without some gelato? Two scoops please.

What's a day of walking without some pintxos? Yes, we had ice cream and then we had some mini tapas. And some beer. Don't judge us. 

To accommodate Easter Sunday into our Spring Break, we actually had a weird schedule. Week 10 or Finals week ended on the 19th and then we had one week of Term 3 classes to be followed by our week off. Odd? Yes. Surprising? No. I've learned to accept the oddities of living and studying in Spain. Like how they have no ham and cheese bocadillos (sandwiches) at our school cafeteria. They only have ham OR cheese sandwiches. When a classmate bought a ham sandwich and a cheese sandwich, took the cheese out, placed said cheese within the ham sandwich, our lunch ladies looked as though they witnessed the second coming of Jesus. It's like it never occurred to them to do that. *facepalm*

Oh yeah, so since I had class to attend the SO went out and re-visited some of her favorite BCN sites. Parc Guell being one of them. 

She also enrolled us in a cooking class at Cook and Taste. Set-up was that the cook would guide volunteers in preparing certain dishes. Our menu for today was pan con tomate, tortillas, chupito de tomate, paella and crema catalana. All prepared over a 5 hour period. 

Observing the ingredients of the chupito de sopa. It's basically a mini gazpacho. 

Ignacio, chef du jour. Oh sorry. It's Ignaaathhhio. Gotta lisp the c's cuz we're in Barttttthhelona. 

Let's just cut to the chase here. I'd show you more pictures of people preparing food but it's just a lot of slicing, dicing, mixing and cooking.

Interesting fact about Paella. It's only called paella because it's made in this dish. The actual iron pan there is called the paella. So whatever you cook in this dish becomes known as paella. If you cooked cats in there it would still be called paella instead of animal rights abuse. Calm down PETA activists I would never eat cats. Not enough meat on them. 

Total time to eat dessert: 10 seconds. 

So after about 6 days in Barcelona hanging out, socializing with ESADE peeps and attending birthdays, we were off to the southern coast of France for about 6 days of eating, drinking and sightseeing. Our priorities for the trip reflected in said order. 

Funny thing, my family and the SO's family happened to share the same ritual of always getting McDonald's breakfast before we head off on a trip. We proudly continued the tradition by eating at the McD's in the Barcelona airport. Nothing beats a Sausage Egg McMuffin and coffee. Too bad they didn't have Hash Browns but I guess we didn't really need the extra fried potato boost in the morning this time. 

....annnnnd we're in Nice.

The fresh flowers market in Vieux Ville (Old Town) Nice. 

Cafes aka tourist zones. 

Plaza Messena 

Our hotel room and view from the hotel room. Not bad for 60 Euros a night. Hotel was called La Malmaison. Room was actually fairly big and we had a small terrace too. Place gets my stamp of approval. 

Our first dinner in Nice at Voyageur Nissart. I believe I had rabbit while the SO had duck.  

Our first full day in Nice was started off by a nice lunch at Le Borghese near the Old Port. 

I can't even remember what I had here.

But the SO had salmon. It was the Plat du Jour. The Plate of the Day. It sounded good so she had that. 

Not everything we did centered around eating and drinking. Remember the last item on our list? Sightseeing? We went to the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art to get us some culture. According to the website, 

"The artistic program of the museum finds its main structure in the relation between the New European Realism and the American Tendency towards the Art of Assembling and Pop Art." Uh huh. *nods head*

Are you ready for some culture? 

Boo-ya. That's right. It's reindeers doing it. Ready for some more culture?

Tattooed pigs. We are on a roll here. 

Blue!!! Just blue. 

Toasted bread with a cut-out of a man. Why not. 

One of the cooler things I saw was this bulldozer. Made to also look like the Notre Dame cathedral. It's a stretch I know but just go with it. 

This is an example of why you should never get a tattoo with Japanese or Chinese writing unless you're 186% sure that it's correct. In the above instance, it should actually be 幸せ娘。The tattoo art has an extra わ in it that's unnecessary.  

After getting cultured to the max we headed over to Palais Lascaris. The bottom floor had an actual old pharmacy from the Victoria era exhibited. 

Yes, that is another gelato in her hand. 2 scoops as usual. The beach in Nice is not a sandy beach but a rock and pebble filled beach. Not too great for laying out unless you like acupuncture. 

View of the Mediterranean Sea and Nice. 

Don't do it. You have so much more to live for. And the water is only 3 inches deep.

For dinner we went to Oliviera. Probably our favorite restaurant out of the ones we went to. I had beef tartare. 

She had rabbit. Tasted wonderful and especially fitting with Easter around the corner. My kids are gonna hate me. 

The super nice owner filling up a bottle of olive oil for us to take home. The restaurant specialized in various olive oils and the owner was nice enough to sample a few and to appreciate the subtle differences between the oils from various regions. Could have just been a ploy to get us to buy and eat more stuff. It worked. 

Monaco, Cannes, Grasse and everything in between will be covered next so stay tuned.

PS: To the hater who pressed dislike. Don't hate the playa' hate the game.