Last Day of the Adventure

I've been backpacking around Spain and other parts of Europe for 2.5 months, but even long adventures must come to an end.

On my last full day in Spain, I left Valencia on an early train and arrived two hours later in Tarragona, a major Roman outpost in ancient times and an important fortress from the time of Carthage to Napoleon. The city is home to some of the best-preserved Roman ruins in Spain, including various fora, city walls and aqueducts. I found it impossible to walk even a few blocks in any direction in the city without running into stone ruins of some sort, most of which were probably of Roman origin, although there were a few structures that could easily have been the remains of wrecked 20th century buildings. I wandered along the the lengthy stone wall and learned a lot of useful information about the proper design of defensive fortifications (at least in pre-artillery times) from the many writings and drawings on display.

Tarragona struck me as a rather pleasant town, but I managed to walk through most of the central sections in a few hours, and so decided to continue on to Barcelona early in the afternoon. It was strange to arrive in a city that was even slightly familiar, after over two months of seeing only new towns almost every single day. Here, I didn´t need to follow my usual routine of walking to the tourist office for a map because I already had some idea about where I wanted to stay, where I would eat, and where I would use the internet. With all these basic needs met relatively easily, I enjoyed walking around the crowded city streets.

The day re-confirmed Barcelona as my favorite city in Spain, and, so far, in Europe (sorry Tonie). However, I no longer had the desire to walk every single street in the city, which is a sure symptom of travel fatigue for me. Although I can´t say I´ve had enough of travelling, I´ve probably had enough of bumming around Spain by myself, and the idea of going home does sound nice right now. With that thought, I´m signing off my last blog entry from Europe.