Posted May 25.

So I left Andorra on Thursday and made it to Toulouse that afternoon. My hosts in Toulouse, Guillaume (nicknamed Mouts from his last name Mouton (Sheep)) and Bea, were awesome. They're planning to leave in the next 4 months or so to take a 10 month trek through the Americas (plural) so they have huge maps all over the walls detailing their proposed journey.

Friday, I went to take a look around Toulouse and met up with a Couchsurfer from Colombia named Martha. We toured around Toulouse, got crepes and enjoyed the sun. I went out with Mouts to a poker night Friday night and lost 5 Euro. Saturday it was raining but another Couchsurfer I had contacted, Emilie, had offered to take me to see a castle (Montsegur) south of Toulouse so we went to do that. It was a bit wet and very foggy but we got a guided tour and it was really interesting. It was too bad the fog was so thick because it would have been a great view otherwise (it's on top of a mountain, 1200m up) but was cool nonetheless.

We had a little party at Bea and Mouts' Saturday night and Sunday I left for Bordeaux. I hitchhiked all the way here and it worked out really well! I met some cool people and saved money. Awesome.

Current plans are to stay in Bordeaux til about Wednesday then head to la belle Paris!


Couple new pictures up on Facebook and HERE

Posted May 22.

The circus we went to in Reus was actually Trapeze artists from all over the world who came together in this tiny town in Spain for the weekend. Some of them were really amazing but they were hard to take pictures of because they were moving so much. I think I got one or two though. I made it back to Tarragona and wandered around there for a bit the next day before catching the late train to Barcelona.

I didn't meet my host in Barcelona, Frederic (from France), until late and we started having a great chat. He had to leave for work at 7AM so when we were still talking at 5AM we decided to make it a night and went for a walk in the early morning. After Fred went to work, I went to talk a look around Barcelona. I was pretty tired though so I decided to walk towards a park which was recommended to me as having a nice view. It wasn't far on the map but it took over an hour to walk to. Ugh. But I made it and had a nap. I completely forgot to take a picture of the view though. Oops.

I made it to the bus station and was all ready to head to Andorra when I got a call on my cellphone from a couchsurfer named Juliane. She offered me a couch for another day if I wanted and, since I hadn't really seen ANYTHING in Barcelona yet, I decided to go for it. So I changed my ticket and met up with her that afternoon. We had lots of fun, I got to meet some more couchsurfers and see a bit more of Barcelona.

Tuesday, I left for Andorra on the latest bus and didn't arrive until 11PM. Even at night, Andorra is really pretty. The country is only 400km^2 and it's nestled in the Pyrenees. You could almost argue it's a city-state because the space between "towns" is so small. Andorra's economy relies mainly on tourists. I really got to see that yesterday when I went to look around. The capital, Andorra la Vella (Andorra the old), is mainly one big outdoor mall. Mostly they sell booze, tabacco and electronics. Just about everything is duty-free so it's pretty crazy.

For example, you can buy 4.5L (LITERS!) of decent vodka for €25 (about 35 dollars). The bottle is so big it can't really be practical. You can get a carton of name-brand cigarettes for €15. Cheap cigarettes they practically give away. Electronics weren't that cheap, compared to Canada but compared to the rest of Europe they were have the price.

Today I'm heading (finally) to France. I really wanted to hitch-hike, I had my signs made and everything, but the roads in Andorra are practically impossible to hitch-hike on and I missed the bus that goes to the French border. I can still catch a bus directly to Toulouse (my first French destination) but that's nowhere near as much fun. And it's expensive. I'll have to try again once I make it to France.


You can see my last Spanish pictures HERE