“Are you vegetarian, or opposed to a two-hour afternoon hike to a country house restaurant in the middle of the woods?” Joanna asked.  Sunday was Kevin’s birthday.  Of course I wasn’t opposed! Our day turned out to be as fantastic as I thought it would be.

We met about 15 of Kevin and Jo’s friends at a cafe and then set off.

Under the big words it says Vil la Joana:

We were hiking up hill when all of a sudden, I saw a castle!

It’s probably a church, but still, not something I usually see in Colorado!

Here we are panting and sweating, taking a break.   There’s Montserrat and Terrassa!

We crossed the road,

And after much longer than anyone thought it would be climbing up hill, it finally sloped down.

It was so beautiful, it was like I’d never seen a forest before! I talked to a girl from Scotland (where I was flying to the next day) and a girl from Minnesota.  All of their friends were very nice.  As one of them commented, most of the group were people from somewhere else and wanted to live in Barcelona.  My kind of people!

Finally we reached the restaurant.

So they have this Catalan tradition of pouring wine into your mouth like this:

And sometimes it gets all over your face and your clothes.  

They were all excited to watch a newbie figure it out.  I was scared.  

I did it!  And I got wine all over myself!  I was too scared to extend my arm.  There are videos.  

Happy birthday Kevin!

They told the waiter the birthday boy was the guy in the blue shirt with a dry sense of humor.

On the way back we saw horses.

And yes, Wendy, we were all jealous of the people riding the horses.

Then we came upon a tree that is so old and important it is being supported.

It was a really fun day, and really fun weekend.  Most of all, it was fun to connect with my old friend.  When we were together it didn’t feel like we hadn’t seen each other in 20 years.  She felt like my current good friends except she shared memories with me from much longer ago.  We talked about our favorite people from middle school, and when Samson Mung hurt his leg in my swimming pool, and wondered what everyone was up to now.  But we also had so much in common now!  It just makes me want to move to Barcelona more.

Birthday Hike

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