Honduras - Turns out, spending a week underwater is exhausting

I spent the last week at Barefoot Cay in Roatan, Honduras relaxing and SCUBA diving, lots of diving.

Getting to the resort was a bit of an adventure as I had to leave the company holiday party early (a decision I regret and wish I'd made better flight decisions), flew on TACA (a Central American airline, better than China Eastern, but still not very good) through San Salvador (not exactly a bustling airport hub) and got to Roatan on a puddle-jumper airplane.

Once we got to Roatan, the island had an interesting dichotomy of natural beauty and human poverty that seemed endemic for the locals, in direct contrast to the luxury of the tourist resorts. I couldn't shake that contrast, which sort of detracted from the vacation for me, forcing feelings of guilt. The resort was very well maintained and appointed, it felt very much like Hawaii, although there was almost nothing to do outside of the resort. Most of my time not spent diving was spent reading as I picked up the A Song of Fire and Ice series and made significant headway.

As for the diving, the best location was Mary's Place, a collection of cracks that happened to be right outside the shore break from our resort. It felt like underwater spelunking and at times reminded me of the X-wing trench run scene in A New Hope. Other diving highlights included a field of garden eels, a very bold and determined sea turtle and increasing my total bottom time past 12 hours (and not getting decompression sickness). The sea life was less vibrant than I expected it to be, however that assessment could have been a result of my exasperation of seeing the same things day in and day out for 10 dives. I also developed a new diving move called Top Gunning (you turn upside down and swim face to face with another diver without warning them first).

Omaha - I think Warren Buffet's stalking me

Instead of spending the week before Big Game near Stanford, like I should have, I spent it in Omaha putting on a conference for work (I only get the most glamorous assignments, no?). We stayed in the hotel across the street from the convention center, which is about half a mile from literally everything else in Omaha, which was less than fun given the temperature. However, I still enjoyed walking down to the Old Market district, the "hip" part of Omaha, and eating at a place called The Twisted Fork. After that we walked across the bridge behind the conference center to Iowa, which was across the river. It only took us about half an hour to walk around the conference center and get to Iowa (not an exaggeration, that place is huge). The first setup day of the conference we were eating breakfast in the hotel restaurant, which was fairly empty and who happened to be sitting 20 feet away? Warren Buffet, the Oracle of Omaha. And then we passed him in the crosswalk after lunch that day. Later in the week we ate at a restaurant called The Boiler Room, which I'm convinced is the best restaurant in Omaha.

San Antonio - Riverwalk? Meh.

I spent 6 days working in San Antonio at a conference at the Marriott Riverwalk, which meant I had a lot of time to meander the Riverwalk which, honestly, didn't impress me. It struck me as a tourist trap, much like Pier 39 in San Francisco, but with less interesting food. The best place we ate in San Antonio was at Rosario's, a little Mexican joint about a mile from the Riverwalk, but lightyears ahead in terms of food quality. The only really touristy thing I did was visit the Alamo, which was quite disappointing. I don't see why it's a point of pride for Texans.

Spain - Beautiful Barcelona

March 28
I had a bit of a struggle with an unactivated Eurail Pass at Atocha as my pass was apparently not "activated" at Algeciras, but a nice grandfatherly Renfe employee helped me out and I didn't miss my train to Barcelona. When I got out of the metro in Barcelona looking for my hostel I got a bit lost. I got to the rather spacious hostel and got acquainted with the more diverse crown (LA, Chicago, Denmark, UK, NZ, Germany). During the afternoon I visited Montjuic and the Olympic Park, which was gorgeous and had a fantastic view of the city. I wandered through the Barri Gotic which had a fantastic Old World-feel, similar to Tangier, but less suspect. Barcelona reminded me a lot of San Francisco the more I thought about it.

March 29
I missed my scheduled bike tour due to my failure at map reading (a very uncommon occurrence), so I wandered through the Parc Guell and visited La Sagrada Familia (I must have walked halfway across the city of Barcelona and back). I checked out the Camp Nou, where FC Barcelona plays, and I was a bit surprised to find that it had gone fully Nike commercialized, although I probably shouldn't have been. I bought lunch in La Boqueteria, an exceptionally large farmer's market. While wandering the city I happened upon dozens of beautiful plazas and buildings randomly hidden throughout the city. That night I went out on a date with Stefanie, the German girl, to get Tapas and wander the city at night.

March 30
I made it to the bike tour today and that was rather fun as I spent most of the time talking to the guide and the guide in training. I found out that the guide in training thought I was also training to be a guide, so score one more for my attempts to not appear outwardly touristy. We saw a large portion of the city I visited the previous day, but this time I actually learned the history behind it. I spent more time with Stefanie today seeing the Museum of Barcelona history and lounging about a park. It was a nice vacation romance, but it wasn't meant to be.

March 31
Don't book 6 am flights, because that means you have to be at the airport at 4 am, which is stupid. I'm pretty sure I was the first person at the Barcelona airport that day. I had to connect in Amsterdam to make it back to SFO and I had the tightest connection of my life, making it by about 5 minutes after getting stuck behind a family with small children at Schengen Zone customs in Schiphol. I flew KLM, which was pretty nice, except for the huge group of Italian tourists who were going to San Francisco on what must have been their first vacation ever.

Spain - The Revenge of Madrid

March 25

I left Algeciras in the morning after stopping at a rather nice farmer's market I stumbled upon the day before. I read 100 Years of Solitude on the trip, which I think has made me more introspective than I otherwise would have been. I realized that I really do appreciate making a deep connection with other people. The train ride was rather uneventful, except when I realized the guy sitting in front of me was the same guy who took my picture on top of the Rock of Gibraltar two days before. I took a stroll around the university district and I was kind of surprised at how industrial and "downtown" the buildings appeared. The students, however, were impeccably dressed, much better than American college students. I got to my hostel in Madrid (right off the Plaza del Sol, it was actually a fantastic location) and found it full of other American college students (surprise?). I went out for vegetarian tapas and a museum visit with the girl from Berkeley. We visited the Reina Sofia and I spent a long time contemplating Guernika. I was also rather interested in the Spanish Civil War Royalist propaganda which stimulated my design/history/Spanish interests. After dinner we met up with the other students from the hostel and went out clubbing at a huge place called Kaptial in Atocha, that is apparently famous/notorious. Went home at 4, which was apparently early. Oh well.

March 26

I left the hostel fairly early, after having a surprisingly good conversation in Spanish with girls from Argentina and Spain in the hostel "kitchen," and spent a while at el Museo del Prado. Glossing over my impressions of particular paintings, I did take a much closer look at the painting than I did the last time I was here, almost a decade ago. When I visited the Parque del Retiro it was pretty much exactly as I remember it being. I visited a food market near the Plaza Mayor that had dozens of delicious things to eat that I wish I could have taken home. I even decided to take a siesta today. When I woke up from my siesta I found out that I was sharing the 8-person hostel room with 7 girls in a group from Memorial University in St. Johns, Newfoundland, Canada. 

March 27

I spent the morning perusing El Rastro (giant flea market) with the Newfies. The only thing I found that I liked was a print, however, when I tried to haggle the owner said "No, this is art." There were a lot of get to know you questions, but the girls started to warm up to me. We parted ways for dinner while I went to meet my friend Walter at a sherry bar near Plaza del Sol called La Venecia, which was a little run down place, but fantastic Sherry. Afterwards, Walter and the Newfies and I went to El Tigre in Chueca, which was a phenomenally fun and cheap bar. They served huge plates of tapas with every (huge) drink and we had well more than we could eat. We hit another bar after that with a group of American college students doing a trip abroad, but that was much less interesting. Hanging out with the Newfies made me feel like an experience traveler, an old hand.