The next stop

I have always been so accustomed to traveling within the United States. When I was younger I would constantly beg my parents to take us overseas or even to Hawaii, but it was just never within reach for us. I was grateful to drive all these lengths to see the different states but I still had a strong yearning to venture further. I did not have a specific place in mind, just anywhere that wasn’t home. I would become so envious of my friends who got to travel overseas every summer or school break. I would live vicariously through their lives and ask them to send me postcards/pictures and even bring me back a piece of their vacation. Looking back, I had obtained a sand collection as gifts from friends who went to tropical islands. For example I have glass bottles of sand from Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Cayman Islands and Riviera Maya. These small grains of sand give me the sensation that I was able to walk along those beaches and be apart of their atmospheres.

I started to become hopeless that I would never have the chance to travel outside the United States but finally that day had come. My junior year of high school, the language department was organizing a Europe trip for 10 days traveling across Spain, France and Italy. Reluctantly, my parents made it happen where I was able to go and I am forever grateful for that experience. The first new soil I encountered was Barcelona, Spain; even looking down at it from ten thousands of feet in the sky, I knew it would be a special place. Barcelona was such a diverse city, you are immersed within the loud nightlife but are able to walk 15 minutes away so elongated beach strip, nothing like New York City that’s for sure. I was astonished to see how crystal blue the ocean was and I wish I was able to swim in it but it was too cold out. The city offered such amazing natural light fixtures I loved walking through the farmers market on the antique cobblestone admiring all the handwork done by locals.  One of more outstanding features I had come across during my short visit there was at the Park Guell. There was a land feature that was disproportional and slanted looking made out of limestone or some other type of mineral I believe, but it was truly like nothing I had ever seen before. Barcelona was truly an amazing place and it was only the first leg of the trip, I had high expectations for what was coming next