The Mistakes I Made in Morocco and Spain—Ranked

When I picked out Morocco and Spain as the next big trip, I got straight into planning. I knew I needed to get tickets to Alhambra in advance, I knew I wanted to book some of the small riads, or guest houses, in Marrakesh that fill up quickly, and I knew I’d need to plan some internal travel to get between countries.

Despite my intentions, not everything went as expected. It was a great trip, but I learned some lessons along the way—which you can perhaps learn from!

In an attempt to organize the disorganization of my trip, I rated my personal travel fails on a scale of 1 to 10. Here 1 is a mistake that’s worth it or has such a silver lining I’d do it again, and 10 is an extreme travel mishap that’s hard to bounce back from. Check out my list of travel fails and lessons learned:

• Following someone who says they’ll help you find your hotel (3/10). This is a costly mistake, but a relatively benign one. We knew that we didn’t want this random man to show us to our riad in Marrakesh. Even though we had a map, he managed to stay one step ahead of us because our taxi driver told him where we were going and he didn’t have luggage to carry. He demanded payment, and we had to give him cash to get him off our backs. It was a mistake to not get rid of him sooner and one we’d been warned about, but I admire the hustle so I’d rate it a mid-level mistake. Lesson learned: Don’t tell your taxi driver your exact destination and/or just walk the other direction to get rid of someone.
• Losing a passport (9/10). As a rule, this is a very bad thing to do. Governments don’t like it. Police departments don’t like it. Luckily, I lost mine in Spain, a relatively small country where the government recognizes emergency passports (Some countries are big! Some countries don’t recognize emergency passports! Try extra hard not to lose your passport far away from the capital city or in a place like France where they don’t recognize emergency passports). Unluckily, we had to make a pricey day trip to Madrid where the U.S. issues emergency passports, but it’s a nice place to visit. It doesn’t take that long to fill out the paperwork and they don’t charge much to get a same day emergency passport, but you can be scrutinized extra hard when coming back into the U.S. It was a hassle, but I had an understanding travel partner for which I’m grateful and honestly, it could have been worse. Lesson learned: I don’t think I learned my lesson. Frankly, there weren’t enough consequences to compel me to start wearing a travel fanny pack.
• Not finding the most famous attraction (4/10). Somehow we booked advance admission to Granada’s famous Alhambra fortress and palace complex, printed our tickets, got in line at our time slot to visit the most famous and beautiful palace, and didn’t visit the palace? It turns out we went to the wrong ruin and after hours getting lost in the huge grounds, we left. Lesson learned: Read the signs. But also, you can always tell yourself you’ll go back to visit.

Looking for Nasrid Palace

Not the famous Nasrid Palace

• Getting the train timetable wrong (5/10). Generally speaking, if there are enough trains running, this shouldn’t be an issue. For us, it caused us to miss our flight back home. Lesson learned: Don’t trust online timetables.
• Missing a flight home (8/10). This is pretty darn bad, mostly because it can be expensive. I’d never missed a flight in my life so it was an experience for me! We were lucky and only had a $100 change fee per person, but we had to book an extra hotel night. Lesson learned: Plan to get to the airport early. Even if you arrive before your flight leaves, there are rules for some airlines that prevent you from checking in. I also learned I’m capable of putting on a show for the airline staff in French! They weren’t particularly moved by my tears.
• Booking a bad hotel (2/10). Our last-minute hotel after missing our flight was fancy (thanks, Hotel Tonight), but happened to have a terrible sewage issue. It’s hard to sleep if you’re not sure if you’re sniffing sulfur… or something else. Lesson learned: Read the most recent one-star reviews. Temporary factors like construction, traffic, health hazards, or yes, sewage smell seeping into your walls might not affect the average ratings right away, but might be the very reason that a place has availability or a discount.
• Finding out the flight you missed ended up delayed (9/10). Now this caused me agony. It was bad enough that we knew the plane hadn’t left yet and they wouldn’t let us through security. I never wanted to know this and the anger I feel about this will probably never go away. Lesson learned: Don’t ever let yourself or your loved ones look into flight status after you miss your flight. Let what’s in the past stay there.
• Eating food that makes you sick for days (1/10). I’d do it again. The food in Morocco tastes great and it would be more of a mistake to not eat adventurously. Lesson learned: Gatorade packets and mini mouthwash are great travel companions.

I definitely hope to visit both Morocco and Spain again, but maybe I’ll review this as advice to myself first.

Have you made some major travel mistakes? I’m sure I have more ahead of me, so share your lessons learned in the comments.

A view of a traditional village in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco.

La Màgia of Catalonia

One of many pieces of street art that help make Barcelona such a gem!

Barcelona is a magical place! Before it was home to the 1992 Olympics, before it was a beach destination and one of Europe’s most popular cities for tourism, Barcelona was part grungy fishing town, part haven for artists and architects like Antoni Gaudí and surrealist Joan Miró, and part stronghold of political dissidence in the age of Francoism. The Catalonian region, with Barcelona as its capital, has been trying to secede from Spain for some time now. It’s history makes it intriguing, but more pressingly, its beauty and uniqueness today is makes it a city to behold.

Will it ever be finished? While much of Italy is under constant renovation, the construction of Gaudí’s Sagrada Familia, begun in 1882, has yet to be completed.

The highlight of my visit to Barcelona may have been the Sagrada Familia Basilica. It was amazing to see such a long-term project that was still in the making and to see the people who had traveled from all over the world to marvel at the world’s strangest cathedral. The building was so different from the archetype I have by now seen hundreds of variations of in Italy. There were marble columns but they were all different sizes and meant to look like trees. There was a crucified Jesus at the altar, but he was flanked by a colorful umbrella-like support structure. The inside differed greatly from what my expectations were based on the sandcastle-like exterior, but it didn’t disappoint either! Visiting the church was good in another way – after eating a good bit of corn by mistake in Madrid, I was feeling nauseous for days afterwards. The church was a restful place with plenty of seating, a very calming vibe, and views that could be taken in from any of its chairs.

Sun hitting the Sagrada just right

Interior of the Sagrada Familia

Waterfront area with a mix of old and new

Smoothies in every flavor in the market

We visited a food market, Mercado de La Boqueria, where I tried my first ever empanada (they are so rarely offered in vegetarian versions in the U.S.) and a fruit smoothie – they had booth after booth with colorful drinks lined up and coated in ice making for a very fun photo! It was cool to see the Spanish cuisine and so many people and items crammed into such a bright and bustling building.

My close second favorite after the Sagrada Familia Basilica was Park Güell, an art-filled public park and garden with ample amounts of Gaudí’s whimsical architectural style. The buildings are half gingerbread icing and half Playdoh village for just the right amount of “aww” and awe factor. It is worth the climb because from the very top you can see all the way to the water, with the skyline in between. People pay to enter an area of Park Güell with colorful mosaic benches for phototaking, but we waited until minutes before sunset, when entrance is free. The sun was setting fast but it was even more beautiful with the eerie darkness creeping in!

The Magic Fountains of Montjuïc

Another highlight was making it to the first show of the year at the Magic Fountains of Montjuïc.  The square was packed with people who had come to see the opening show of the season, and I definitely can see why. The show was magnificent – with impressive lights, a fun if occasionally odd soundtrack, and beautiful lights and choreography. I never realized water could dance until I watched this spectacle. It is nothing like any fountain show I’ve seen – the Bellagio Fountains in Vegas are graceful and all, but they have nothing on this display of the sheer force and amazing elemental properties of water.

La Barceloneta beach, modernized with upscale hotels but maintaining the scent of the sea

While Barcelona is known for its beach, there were a few too many hawkers selling tapestries or foot massages or cold beverages to really sit and relax. We also found it to be very windy. That said, it was nice to see such a wide expanse of sea! If I had more time, I would have loved to hang out at one of the trendy (probably pricy) beachside restaurants that line La Barceloneta neighborhood’s waterfront. It was interesting to learn the history of such a pristine and iconic place – before the 1992 Olympics, the neighborhood was populated by fishermen and Romani (or gypsy) people and lined with small shacks. These were removed and all but forgotten after the city cleaned up for the public spotlight.

Overall, Barcelona was one of my favorite cities to visit, and I hope to go back one day. No other city in Europe has art, culture, and beach vibes to the extent of Barcelona, and it is truly a sight to be seen! When I was there some bad weather preventing me from seeing all the city and the worst stomach ache of my life meant I did not get to try much of the tapas and food, but despite all of that, it was an amazing experience – which says a whole lot!

 

Living out mis sueños en España

Plaza Mayor, the main square in Madrid

Like many students who studied Spanish all throughout middle and high school, I dreamed of one day visiting sunny Spain and eating all the mazapan and tacos (oops that’s Mexico) and dancing all the tango (oops that’s Argentina) on the Day of the Dead (…and that’s Mexico again). So maybe I did not learn or retain all that much about Hispanic culture from my many years of language classes, but that did not mean I was any less excited to visit! I decided to dedicate more than half of my spring break to visiting Spain because I knew I wanted to soak in as much of it as I could. Maybe just maybe, I would sprout into the fluency I so desired?!

I may not have become fluent in the Spanish language(s) but I learned a lot along the way. For instance, I knew that Catalan, the mother tongue of most people in the Catalonia region of Spain including Barcelona, differed greatly but it was crazy to see how much it differed from the Spanish I knew and how it was similar in some ways to French, yet unique from any other language I’d seen. More on Barcelona will come in a future blog post, for now I’d like to recount my time in the capital city of Madrid.

Madrid city slogan: “Fui sobre agua edificado, mis muros de fuego son.” In English it means: built over water, my walls are made of fire. Legend has it that Madrid’s location was chosen for its underground aquifers and that the Moors who built it surrounded the city with walls of flint to scare invaders with sparks any time weapons were thrashed at it.

Like in so many of the cities I’ve visited now, I started my trip off right with a few miles of sightseeing by foot as part of a free walking tour. Walking the city gives you a great perspective of what the tiny streets and major thoroughfares look like, and you get to know the people much better when you see them out eating and shopping and living, versus taking the metro to see… the scenic subterranean escalators? The guides on walking tours tend to be knowledgeable non-locals who remember what it was like to be a newcomer. On our walking tour we saw murals, bits of history (including a restaurant that claims to be the world’s oldest and the first ever equestrian statue with a horse that stands on just two feet), and lovely old architecture. The difference between Madrid and so many of the other cities I’ve visited in Europe is that it is strikingly metropolitan – it feels like perhaps an older American capital city or like some patches of New York City.

There was certainly a lot to see in Madrid, from the national art museum, Prado, which I visited for free thanks to their daily open hours, to the long shopping street Gran Via, to the extremely massive Parque del Retiro. Some things I didn’t get to in the short time I was there – the nearly three thousand rooms of Madrid’s royal palace are on my list for my next visit! The best that Madrid has to offer couldn’t be summed up in a few attractions though – it’s the tapas and the siesta and the dancing; it’s the blending of cultures and the lifestyle that make Madrid a city I can see myself choosing to live in.

While there’s many personal anecdotes I can share about travel and visits to Madrid in particular, I would like to dole out some advice to eat Spanish food while in Spain – it’s delicious and if you happen to instead opt for an Italian arancino rice ball you might find it is made of corn and learn just how allergic you are to corn. More on that… when I write my next blog post about beautiful Barcelona!

We loved the funky-shaped cypress trees in Parque del Retiro.

A beautiful mini lake in the middle of Parque del Retiro complete with boaters enjoying the warm day!