The flight was almost pleasant, although the plane was packed. We got the upgrade to the "club class", which is Air Transat's version of business class. Unfortunately, they stuck us to the triple seater in the middle. But there was plenty of leg room and food was no worse than usually.
Arrived to Barcelona at 11:30, half an hour ahead of time, claimed the luggage and hopped on the Airbus which stops exactly in front of the hotel.
Hotel Ayre is a pleasant surprise. Room is small but clean, modern, with queen size bed, plasma TV, free Wi-Fi internet and free mini bar. The mini-bar contains 4 bottles of water: 2 regular and 2 sparkling ones, so nothing to envy us on.
Since neither of us could sleep on the plane, we dozed off for a few hours, woke up at 6 PM and went to search for a seafood dinner. Logical choice was Barceloneta, the port. I hate to admit we went to the most touristy part, where the restaurants are lined up next to each other, and waiters pull your sleeve, or in the lack of it, grab you by the elbow to get you to their restaurant. We ended up at the place where no one was hunting the tourists and shared a yummy seafood paella and black rizzoto.
After dinner went for a walk on the sandy beach where no one would serve coffee that late. The beach was full of young people, unfortunately fully dressed. No one was swimming.
On the way back to the hotel, the pickpockets made their first move on me. It was close to midnight, we took the escalator after leaving the train. A young, dark skinned man inserted himself on the escalator between me and Maggie, most probably planning to stall me while someone behind me works on my backpack. Since all the booklets and brochures we read about Barcelona warned about pickpockets, we were not unprepared, although I can't say I really expected the following to happen, especially not on the first night out in town. The man played with a set of keys and made a show of dropping them right at the top of the escalator. The drop was done so badly that I could tell it was intentional. Then he bent to pick them up, blocking my way. Since the escalator was crowded, I was turned sideways, my back towards the wall, then I literally kicked the guy in the butt with my knees and pushed him out of the way. He started shouting something, but then walked on as the other people started paying attention. A very pleasant English-speaking couple asked us if everything is OK. They complained about being pickpocketed themselves. All the zippers were closed and everything was intact, but the experience left both me and Maggie shaken.
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