Barcelona.

The city of Barcelona is very high on my list of favourite destinations. It is a buzzing hub where – somewhat paradoxically – relaxing is easy. The city has attained a high score on the yuppie hip meter, but it is just as enjoyable for old folk and young students alike. Every couple of years I find myself drawn to it, there is something in the vibrant Barcelona mix that makes it incredibly addictive.
Barcelona has just about everything you could wish for: architecture, history, museums, nightlife, beaches, hills… It is terribly difficult having to choose from all the dishes on the city’s menu, so I hope to make the choosing a little bit easier.

Getting there

Quite a few low budget airlines offer flights to Barcelona at reasonable prices (last time I paid sixty euros all in return). Most fly to Girona, a little over a hundred kilometres from the city. Three transport options are available once at Girona airport: car hire, train or bus (Sagalés). By far the easiest way is by bus – Ryanair flight times coincide with bus schedules. It is also a fairly cheap option: nineteen euros for a return fare; the ride is about an hour and ten minutes. Be sure to take the bus that goes directly to Barcelona, not the one that goes through Girona first! Also take note that tickets must be purchased either at the airport or online, as the airlines do not sell them.
The bus goes to the Estacio del Nord, from where it is a short walking distance to the city centre. If you have a lot of baggage, there are usually a few taxis around and fares are relatively inexpensive.

Places to sleep

It of course depends on what you are looking for, but I always go for the cheapskate option: a hostel. The best one in Barcelona in my opinion, is Kabul Hostel on the Plaça Reial, smack bang in the city centre. It is ridiculously good value for money – especially if you go for a dorm bed – prices starting from about sixteen euros per night (including free breakfast and dinner); check out the website for details.
I keep referring to hostelworld, but this website offers a great range of all types of accomodation; if you are with a large group and want to stay on for quite a while, it would be a good idea to rent an apartment.
Another good option would be free lodgings. Yup, free. This requires some googling, but there are people who let you apartment-sit while they are away, or just let you stay at theirs for a couple of days without having to pay for lodgings. I myself haven’t tried this yet, but I think it is well worth looking into.
For those of you wanting to stay outside of the city, there are quite a few campings around Barcelona, a quick search on the web comes up with campings as close as twelve kilometres to the city (camping Tres Estrellas).

Getting around

Barcelona has a brilliant public transport system: very user-friendly and not too expensive. Most of it is operated by TMB, Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona. I would strongly recommend buying a tourist and leisure ticket: they go from ten euros for two days to a little over twenty euros for five days. These tickets allow you to travel on the TMB metro and bus network, Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat urban lines, Renfe’s Rodalies train network and the tram. It excludes the tourist buses and funiculars. You can purchase tickets on the TMB site or at the metro stations. I suggest buying a map of the city with a metro map included, which makes it very easy to find your way around.
The city also has quite a few information kiosks, where they speak English and/or French; very convenient if you find you are not such a dab hand at reading maps.
One note of caution: mind your handbags and rucksacks, as in every city, tourists are an easy target and the metro is one of the pickpocket’s favourite stomping grounds.

Things to see and do

I have chosen the Plaça de Catalunya (PdC) as a starting point for its central location; a lot of buses leave from/come through here, and the metro station provides good connections to other stations.

The city’s famous Ramblas start from the Plaça and go all the way down to Mare Magnum; here are a few higlights:

- Plaça Reial (left hand side coming from PdC): pretty square, Hostel Kabul is located here. An absolute must if you want to lunch or dine at a good restaurant, is Les Quince Nits, very popular and not too expensive but quite a long queue if you don’t show up a bit early!

- La Boquería (right hand side coming from PdC): market halls offering a plethora of fresh fruit, vegetables, dried fruits & nuts, meat & fish…If you are a bit peckish, pop down and treat yourself to a delicious fruit salad or an all-fruit smoothie.

As mentioned above, at the end of the Ramblas (Columbus’s column) you will find Mare Magnum, a shopping and cinema centre (there is even a club on the top floor).
If you cross Mare Magnum and walk to the beach of Barceloneta, you can go left to the pretty Palau del Mar and a bit further to see famous Frank Gehry’s Fish. If you go right, you can walk to the cable car tower. Here you can take the cable car to Montjuïc, one of Barcelona’s hills. It offers beautiful views of the harbour and the city. At Montjuïc, you can visit the Olympic Complex and go for a stroll in the park halfway up the hill. To go down, there are two options: walking to the Plaça de España (best option, as you will pass the palacio and quite an impressive set of steps) or taking the funicular. From there you can take the bus or metro back into the city centre.

Starting out again from the PdC walking towards the sea, you will pass the Barri Gòtic and El Call, the old city centre – be sure to visit the cathedral. You can spend quite a while here shopping, dining, sauntering…
With your back to the PdC, you can go left to the Parc de la Ciutadella to relax after all the walking you have been doing. You are likely to find acrobats and hippies playing guitar, entertainment and relaxation at the same time!

At the other side of the Ramblas, opposite the Barri Gòtic, lies El Raval. This cool quarter has undergone quite a bit of rejuvenation, but it would be best to avoid this area late at night (that goes for most of Barcelona’s little streets). Things to visit here are the Palau de la Virreina and the Museo d’Art Contemporani.

North of the PdC lies the Passeig de Gracia. There is so much to see and do there, that it would be best to take a look on your map and decide which museums and casas you would like to visit. One of the most famous casas is Gaudí’s Casa Milà, definitely worth a visit.

One of the city’s must-sees is of course the Sagrada Familia, a stunning piece of architecture. Keep in mind that if you are going to visit it (as in going inside), you might be queuing for the better part of an hour.
It is easily reachable by metro and not very far from Domenech’s Hospital de Sant Pau, also an architectural highlight.

From the Sagrada, you can go on to Parc Güell, an absolute jewel of a park. It is a bit of a walk from the nearest metro station, but they help you out with signs everywhere. If you go up by the way indicated from the Lesseps station, you get a bonus thrown in: escalators! It saves you the very steep climb but lets you enjoy the views.
If you don’t feel like walking too much, you can take bus 24 (Paral.lel – Carmel) from the Passeig de Gracia. It takes about thirty minutes, but it stops very close to the park (eighteenth stop).

On the other side of Barcelona, opposite Montjuïc, lies Mont Tibidabo. You can go up there by bus and tram, but it would be good to check if public transport will run during your visit. I believe they have made some changes since February 2007, or that at least is what this article tells me.
Tibidabo offers some beautiful views of the city (especially at dusk), and entertainment for everyone at the amusement park.

Finally, for those of us who enjoy the nightlife, you can go down to Vila Olimpica (metro station by the same name) where you will find a short stretch of club after club, with free drinks galore. Cocktails start from three euros, tipsyness from six and major window-humping, backing up and stranger-snogging from fifteen. Making your way back is best done by taxi, but one word of advice (sounds rather dumb, but please take it to heart, I speak out of experience): make sure at least one of you is sober enough to know where you are going, the area is rather seedy.
You will also find a quite few clubs spread throughout the city; Fellini’s on the Ramblas is very popular, so is Jamboree right next to hostel Kabul.

New Zealand.

Going back in time to summer 2006 – on a sunny winter’s day I set foot on the other side of the world for the first time. After months of cursing over how to organize such a trip, I found myself on a comfy bed in a warm hostel in Auckland. Two months later, I was busy spending my last NZ dollars on a tax-free shopping spree at the airport. In between, I had one of the best holidays of my life, and this blog thingy here allows me to share my experiences with everyone wanting to go a bit further than their back garden.

The advice here is based on my own travels, but I try to include some very handy tips from fellow globetrotters, as to make a more comprehensive guide to organizing your holiday.

Transport: how am I going to get there and get around? When looking at far-away destinations (from a European perspective) such as NZ, air travel is just about the only option unless you decide to spend months travelling by boat. Singapore Airlines provide the best service, with prices as low as £550 return fare. This of course applies to bookings made well in advance, in my case I bought tickets six months prior to departure. I also chose to stay in NZ for two months, as three weeks wouldn’t be worth it for my student budget.
An important point to mention is the travel visa and airport security: in NZ, you need a passport (you know, that booklet you apply for with the council). You get a travel visa/visitor permit stamped in your passport, which is valid for three months counting from the day of arrival. Overstay your welcome, and you might find yourself in a spot of bother, as NZ security & immigration is very strict. If you plan to stay longer, you might want to consider applying for a working visa, which allows you to work and travel at the same time. Do take the time to read the rules on the site linked to above, it’s better better to be safe than sorry. If you are from a visa-free country, you don’t need to apply for a visa beforehand, but make sure you do if your country is not listed.
What airport security is concerned, make sure to check out biosecurity & quarantine rules if you plan on taking anything other than clothes and basic necessities with you. I speak from experience, as I had my wellies go through quarantine and labelled as biohazard because there was a bit of European mud on them.

Getting around NZ is very easy, with great bus services linking the back of beyond with major cities such as Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. As I didn’t (and still don’t) have a driver’s licence at the time, I chose to travel by bus and rail. Intercity (and Newman) provide bus passes which are great value for money. Larger towns can be connected by rail, and sometimes it might be a quicker option (e.g. from Masterton to Wellington), but keep in mind that it is nowhere near as dense a network as in Europe.

Having transport in place, it might be a good idea to start thinking about having a place to sleep. Lucky for us non-New Zealanders, NZ accomodation in ho(s)tels is quite cheap with one New Zealand dollar (NZD) equalling €0.49/£0.39. The US dollar is also stronger, at $0.75. You might find shared rooms at hostels from as low as NZD 10, so if you feel like splashing out, you could even go for a single room. The internet is a great place to start looking for accomodation with sites such as Hostelworld listing numerous options. There are also quite a few accomodation guides (like the Friar’s Guide) available at the better book stores, listing more upscale places to stay.
The perfect solution for me to keep the budget low but at the same time enjoying myself the most, was becoming a Wwoofer. ‘Willing workers on organic farms’ are people who work for a couple of hours a day in exchange for food and accomodation, and the things you learn and the people you meet only make for a richer holiday. The weekends I spent on my own sightseeing, and during the week I learned to extract honey, herd sheep, build straw houses…Being a Wwoofer gives you first-hand experience at being a New Zealander. All you have to do is sign up, which costs NZD 45 for an overseas address, and you receive a book with details of over a thousand hosts throughout the country. It’s up to you to contact the families and arrange for your stay, which makes for a very independent way of travelling.
Other options include coach tours, which are usually aimed at young people and offer a whole range of different travel formulas. It’s a great way to meet people from all over the world, though you do have to keep in mind that you are in a group, so there is a little less leeway to do your own thing.
For those of you lucky enough to have a driver’s licence, car rental is a very good idea. You can go wherever you want to and you don’t have to bother with bus timetables…Quite a few people choose to rent a motorhome, which will save you the overnights in hostels, but it is quite expensive.

On to the fun bit! Once you have the framework that is funds, transport and accomodation in place, it’s time to check out what New Zealand has to offer. And it’s a lot. Ranging from relaxed holidays at the beach to mountain-climbing adventures, you will have plenty to choose from. You can decide once you are there, or you can make a shortlist of must-see places as not to be overwhelmed by the plethora of activities. I will give a quick (which here means extensive) overview of my itinerary and recommendations, but with two months of travelling I didn’t have enough time to fit all of NZ in.

North Island:
Auckland: as NZ’s largest city, it’s probably the most hustle and bustle you will encounter on your travels. I definitely recommend going to one of the Asian food halls to have a very cheap and tasty lunch; the Sky Tower is a must if you want to see all of Auckland from its highest vantage point. The Memorial Museum is a great place to learn more about the history, nature and geography of Aotearoa and is easily reachable by bus.
Whangarei: the area around Whangarei is very lush, with temperatures in winter still beating out a Western European autumn. I went hiking in the bush for a day, but you could also go a bit further to Paihia and enjoy the beautiful scenery at the beach. I couldn’t make it all the way up to Cape Reinga, NZ’s northernmost point, but from what I have heard, it’s worth making the trip if you have the chance.
Hamilton: I found the area around this city had a very colonial feel about it. It’s rather flat but picturesque, and the weather is a bit colder than up north. I had a bit of bad luck with the weather, so I couldn’t go outside as much as I had wanted to, but it still felt like a nice location for a short stopover. My host lady was so kind as to drive me to my next destination, and if you should plan on going to the Coromandel, take the route via Paeroa, it has some impressive scenery (when you leave Hamilton you drive up towards a high mountain range, very Lord of the Rings-like). If you feel a bit more adventurous, go down to the Waitomo Caves to go rafting and see the glow worms!
The Coromandel: one of my favourite places in NZ. Great climate, a beautiful forest and coastline. If going by car, you can take the larger road that loops around the Peninsula. There are also plenty of hiking tracks around here, but be careful, the length of a hike indicated in hours means from A to B, not from A to B and back. Make sure to be very well prepared and rule number one (this is what everyone in NZ will tell you): when lost, never ever move. Sit and wait till a rescue team comes. Do not follow a river downstream. Some must-sees on the Coromandel peninsula include Hot Water Beach and the Siamese Kauri, located in a beautiful grove.
Hawkes Bay: rolling hills and sunshine, Hawkes Bay is a cornucopia of fresh produce and beautiful architecture, with Napier being a very pretty Art Deco city. I was lucky enough to be here on a Saturday, when there was a parade of old cars, people dressed up in twenties and thirties clothes and a big band playing. If you have time, pop down to the beach for a bit of relaxing.
Tauranga, Te Puke, Lake Taupo, Rotorua: I took the bus from Hastings to Masterton via Tauranga, Te Puke, Lake Taupo and Rotoroa, and I wasn’t dissapointed. Taking the Intercity bus is great to admire the scenery along the way, and this route will take you through the kiwifruit fields, past Lake Taupo (definitely worth stopping over and enjoying a swim or other activities on the lake) to the volcanic lands around Rotoroa. Geysers everywhere, and for those interested, some pretty good Lord of the Rings tourist tours.
Masterton: this city lies in the Wairarapa, a gorgeous if not rather remote area of New Zealand. I spent most of my time here tucked away in the bush somewhere, with one visit to nearby Greytown, a small, quaint and cute town, very nice to spend an hour or two leisurely strolling around, visiting the art galleries and enjoying a pain au chocolat at the French bakery. The Mount Bruce National Wildlife Centre is a great way to meet some of the local wildlife, such as Kakas and Kiwis.
To get to Wellington I took the train from Masterton, a very busy commuter’s link, but yet again a great way to enjoy the landscape.
Wellington: without doubt my favourite city in NZ. It’s also called the Windy City, because, well, it tends to be quite windy there, as I noticed. When going in winter, wrap up warmly because the wind feels like frostbite! There are so many things to see and do in Wellington, if you have a good travel guide, take a walk through the city and up to the park, you won’t regret it. I spent most of my time at Te Papa, one of the best museums I have ever visited. Entrance is free, and you can leave your backpack at the reception (if you haven’t got a hostel to leave your luggage; they don’t have lockers at the train station anymore). You might have to shell out a bit on a couple of exhibitions such as the Lord of the Rings one, but I was lucky and got in as the thirteen year old daughter of a lesbian couple (they had a family voucher). From Wellington, you can take the Interislander ferry across to Picton on the South Island. Make sure to make your reservation by telephone, as you can ask for supersavers and save yourself a great deal of money. Do check if your ferry is still going, as the weather across the Cook Strait can play up sometimes. For those wanting to spend a bit more money on flying across, it’s supposed to be worth it; although the ferry ride was breathtaking enough.

South Island:
The Marlborough Sounds: some of the most beautiful scenery I encountered on my trip, quite chilly in winter but a lot of sunshine (the further down south you go in NZ, the colder). For those who travel by car, be sure to take the Queen Charlotte Way, an absolute must. I stayed with a host family who operated a homestay, so if you aren’t a Wwoofer but still want to enjoy the great hospitality of a NZ family, I can only recommend you stay at Sherrington Grange, you won’t regret it. And say hi from me when you are there.
Nelson and Motueka: Nelson has a great farmer’s market on the weekends, and it has a lovely beach. I only stayed there on my way to Motueka, but it’s an enjoyable town. From here, many people set out on trips to Abel Tasman National Park. You can go hiking, canoeing, mountainbiking…definitely find a way to fit it in!
Motueka is a small town known for the many artists that live in the area. I spent most of my time gardening at a sculptor’s, fitting some time in to walk my host’s dog down by the river – peace and tranquility abound. After Motueka, I went back to Sherrington Grange because I enjoyed my stay there so much, passing up on travelling further down south.
Christchurch: the intercity bus from Blenheim (renowned for its wines) takes you through Kaikoura to Christchurch. It’s by far the most stunning bus ride. If you have time, stop at Kaikoura to go whale watching or seal spotting, it might burn a bit of a hole in your pocket, but it’s pretty cool. Christchurch itself is a lively city, I only spent a day there passing through, but there is plenty to see and do.
Akaroa/The Banks Peninsula: another gorgeous peninsula, it is very popular with travellers from all over the world. You can take a scenic bus tour from Christchurch to Akaroa, which makes a few stopovers to enjoy some mulled wine at a pub and a very short beach walk. I did some child minding here, limiting my time to go down into the village. But some Japanese tourists told me it was absolutely amazing to go swimming with the dolphins, so if you are not afraid of getting your feet wet, go for it!

Unfortunately I didn’t have enough time nor money to make it down to Dunedin, but don’t pass up on the South if you can help it! Highlights include the Franz Josef glacier (a world heritage area), Milford Sound and the cities of Dunedin and Queenstown.
The easiest way to get back to Auckland for your flight home is to fly. Air New Zealand have great value domestic flights, and it takes about two hours to get there. You could also fly out to your country from Christchurch having flown in to Auckland, but this will cost you much, much more.

Some final information: NZ is a remote country, with only four million inhabitants. Three million of those live on the North Island, two million of which live in the area around Auckland. The remainder of the population lives in the cities or out in the bush; you don’t really have villages as such, it’s more large farms and single houses. Be sure to go well-prepared, but you won’t really find yourself stranded as there are great bus links.