Boston/Barcelona/Canary Islands/Azores

The Basílica de la Sagrada Família

A Healthy Shift!

Barcelona was originally on our first round the world trip planning but we couldn’t possibly squeeze it in due to the shortage of time and our ambition of visiting way too many other cities in one go. Times flew by. We finally made this trip 15 years later! During the planning, we stumbled onto Canary Islands and Azores. I had to pick between spending more time in Canary Islands vs Azores. I picked the former because the weather was warmer and sunnier.

Boston

We flew to Boston first to celebrate Christmas with my best friend and her family. On our flight, hubby sat next to this guy who had the flu (this was before the mask wearing days). A day after we arrived in Boston, I started to have the chill and stuffy nose. Hubby’s flu symptoms started to surface on the next day. We both tried our best to keep a distance from everyone to avoid spreading the virus. But my friend smiled and said not to worry because they had strong immune system. We had a wonderful Christmas celebration together before we took off for Barcelona. As always, we were touched by my friend and her family’s heartwarming hospitality. Because we live so far apart after we both graduated from college, even though we see each other once or twice in a decade, our friendship picks right back up where we left off as if there were no years have passed. When we arrived in Barcelona, I emailed my friend about our safe arrival but sadly learned that her family also got the flu 😔. We felt so bad. We learned our lesson about the importance of trip sickness prevention afterward.

Barcelona

From the Barcelona Airport, we took the AEROBÚS, which is the official shuttle bus service that connects Barcelona Airport with the city center (Pl. Catalunya stop) in 35 minutes. It departs daily from Terminal 1 and Terminal 2. After we got off the bus, we started to walk toward the direction of the hotel but we got lost. We asked a local who seemed to be in a hurry to go somewhere but had a friendly face. She stopped to look at the map with us and actually walked with us many blocks to our hotel! The people in Barcelona were like the Hawaiians of Europe. They were down to earth. Of course, we read on the net about the pickpockets in touristy areas. Fortunately, that didn’t happen to us.

We were still not well so we slept a lot in our hotel room (luckily the bed was very comfortable). We bought homeopathic remedy at the local pharmacy to help us get well. We drank a lot of water as well to “hose” the toxin out of our system (we must not underestimate the therapeutic power of water because our blood is about 90% of water; our brain and heart are about 73% of water!). When we were on the mend, we visited our first tourist attraction: Parc Guell. That was my main reason of visiting Barcelona, to see, touch, and feel Antoni Gaudí’s unique architecture with my own eyes and hands. Not to be missed, we visited La Sagrada Familia, Antoni Gaudi’s world-famous masterpiece and is the most visited landmark in Barcelona. It is still under construction since 1882! It was crowded with people of different races traveled all over the world just to see this remarkable minor basilica.

Unfortunately, during the luggage handling, the airline smashed one of the corners for our favorite expandable Samsonite carryon. They gave us a new replacement, but we had to go to a particular location to pick it up. Disappointedly, the size of the new carryon was much smaller than our original one and not expandable. But they said that was the European standard size for carryon. Oh well. Around the corner from the luggage place, we saw a Bang & Olufsen store. We were warmly welcomed as soon as we stepped in. We listened to Ed Sheeran and Andrea Bocelli’s “Perfect” over and over again in different speakers. The two sales guys at the store knew we could not purchase any product that day because we were traveling. We were honest to them. But they still spent two fully attentive hours with us explaining everything about different speakers. I immediately fell in love with Bang & Olufsen speakers. From all of our travels, it is the experience like this that touched our soul (when people were just nice with no expectation). This stays in our memory the longest.

We ate where the locals ate and had some tapas. Spanish food was very good. On our last day, we just laid on the beach under the warm sun and just listened to the laughters of the children playing on the sandy beach. It was nice to be doing nothing for a change and just appreciate the little things and sounds in life.

Canary Islands

After spending 4 days in Barcelona, we flew to Las Palmas (Canary Islands). Las Palmas is located in the northeastern part of the island of Gran Canaria, about 93 miles (150 kilometers) off the Moroccan coast in the Atlantic Ocean. It is a Spain territory. One word of advice is don’t eat any Asian food there. We were at a very crowded all you can eat sushi place. We waited in line for hours; they finally gave us a tiny table. The food and the service were horrible. They were definitely not serving real sushi. We couldn’t understand why the place was packed. On New Year’s Eve, we went to a very nice and small French restaurant with lots of loud and fun music. Food and service were excellent. The owner actually came to our table, sat down and chatted with us for a while. After the owner found out I used to work at Pixar and also worked on the trilogy of “The Lords of the Rings”, he asked us to come back the next day because his family wanted to meet me. When I met his parents the next day, I tried to speak a few words in French with them. They asked for my autograph. Hubby had shrimp ceviche topped with foie gras. The food was like Iron Chef quality and presentation but with a very reasonable price and great service. We stayed in Las Palmas for three nights.

Azores

We spent only one night “layover” at Terceira which is a volcanic island in the Azores archipelago, in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean. It belongs to Portugal. It was very green but overcast. We went to a very nice pub restaurant where the steak was very cheap and delicious. We wished we spent more time at Azores. The people there were nice. That concluded our 12 days journey.

Getting Healthier!

When I returned back to work, I got infected by the flu virus again from my colleagues who were sick, one after another. The long work hours made it worse. I finally recovered by requesting an office to the farthest corner away from everyone else. It took months for a full recovery. My immune system was so beaten by then. I was sick of getting sick. I finally opened my mind and agreed to try a cellular redox supplement that my homeopath had been trying to suggest me to take for over a year. I am forever grateful for her 21 years of care and friendship. She didn’t giving up on convincing me. This redox supplement has substantially strengthened my health. I finally got back the quality of health I deserve regardless of my age. I feel happier, a lot more energetic, and have a clearer mind. I now have a sound safeguard during traveling because I live to travel and be healthier another day!