The search for food while traveling on a budget has been quite the adventure. So far, within the 7 countries I have traveled (Western and Eastern Europe) I have discovered one consistent factor regarding food; unless you cook it yourself or you’re flashing some cash, it’s almost impossible to eat healthy. From England to Romania, meat, cheese and bread are the dominating ingredients to any and EVERY meal.
Before leaving for this trip, my diet consisted mostly of vegetables, low carb, high protein. Blah! Blah! Blah! Mostly because is was fairly inexpensive to eat like that in Vancouver; even while eating out. You could hit up some sushi, both healthy and cheap, for $8-$10 easy. Or some decent soup and salad for $8-$12. Over seas, eating cheap on the run or even for a quick sit down you’re looking at greasy fast food or a sandwich. Believe me you get pretty sick of sandwiches after a while. Of course there are definite exceptions and that’s what we’ve been living off for two months. Some of the things we’ve been served have been either so bad or so good we had to take a picture. I thought I’d highlight some of our WINS! and definite FAILS! of European cuisine.
FAIL!
Globespan-Some Meat Thing
Globespan Airline: Vancouver to London
I know this photo has already been posted, but I needed to emphasize how bad it was one more time. It smelt like farts and kind of looked like farts too.
Price:Free
WIN!
Liverpool-Carrot and Squash Soup
Liverpool: Some amazing hippy veggie restaurant
We split a huge bowl of carrot and squash soup and a hummus plate. A little pricey, but totally worth it.
Price:10lbs/$20
WIN!
Manchester-Fruit
Manchester: Fruit Stand
After visiting the Natural History Museum stopped in a park for a snack.
Price:Under 1lb/under $2
FAIL!
London-Fish and Chips
London-The Anchor
We went looking for authentic British fish and chips, but seriously missed the mark with overpriced heat lamp fish
Price: 9.75lbs/$18 for one
WIN! and then FAIL!
Pamplona-Ham Sandwich
Pamplona-Every Restaurant
This is a picture only an hour into arriving in Pamplona, still fresh to the cheaper cuisine. So simple and perfect! What they considered Ham was what I would consider Prosciutto. My 15th ham sandwich in, I started having nightmares about tons of bread and greasy meat. Veggies please!
Price:5euros/$8-$9
WIN!
Najera-Chorizo Soup
Najera-Tiny Mom and Pop restaurant that Osisn took us to
After the sandwich diet for days, this was truly a treat. It was a set menu which included 3 courses and a bottle of wine for the table. Your choice of pasta, salad, soup and roast chicken, lamb or beef.
Price:10euros/$16
WIN!
Najera-Stuffed Red Pepper
Najera:Tapa Bar
All the pub/cafe type restaurants served tons of yummy tapas for almost nothing. You just get a bite, but that’s all you need. This pepper is stuffed with lamb.
Price:1.5-2euros/$2-$3
TBC
~Josıe
Spain was kind of a gong show almost from start to finish. Not necessarily bad, but just a gong show.
Our plan was to meet up with my friend Oisin in Pamplona for Running of the Bulls and then head North to his home town, Najera. We only had 2 days to get there from London if we wanted to make the Running of the bulls (which was a huge motivator for going). Our two choices to fly into were Barcelona and Madrid. On the map they both looked about the same distance apart. (little did we know Barcelona was two hours further on bus). Our first mistake. Our second mistake was that we booked a flight that flew into Barcelona (Gerona). Not researching ahead, we figured it was just another section of the same Barcelona airport. Wrong. Gerona is city an hour North of Barcelona and we needed to catch a bus from there to get to Barcelona. We love spending time and money we don’t have to.
We flew Ryanair. Note to self: Never fly Ryanair. It was a brutal. Nothing was served on the flight. Not even water. They constantly tried to sell you things. From shitty overpriced sandwiches to toy airplanes from the 80’s. Blah! Thankfully it was a short flight and the view was amazing.
Ryanair
Ryanair
Once we took the bus over to Barcelona we fumbled our way into a hostel for one night. The first bus to Pamplona was early the next morning. It was about 9:30pm by the time we checked it. Our hostel was really nice and they had 1euro beers in a vending machine in the lobby. We didn’t even take our bags off and we had already cracked a cold beer while checking in. Ahhh!! I love Barcelona already!
We wandered over to a court yard that was lively, full of beautiful trees and smelled of delicious food. As soon as we sat down there were street performers right in front of our section of tables. There were jugglers, Capoeira dancers/singers and an acrobatic act. It so much fun! We probably spent more money than we should have, but it was so nice to just sit and hang out without power walking trying to see tons of sites.
Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona- Capoeira
Our bus ride to Pamplona was long, but was expected (6-7hrs). We had front row seats the whole way. We arrived dirty, stinky and hungry. There were TONS of people wearing all white with red scarfs and sashes. Apparently Pamplona only has a population of approx 20, 000 people normally, but explodes during the week of Running of the Bulls. Approx 2 million people show up every year, all in proper attire, to see this 100 year old tradition. Oisin was lovely enough to come save us from the crowd at the bus station and brought us to an apartment where we met his friends, washed up and left our bags for the evening.
Pamplona-Oisin
Because this small city has an enormous population influx of during this particular week there is obviously no accommodation. Literally none. The small hand full of hostels and hotels are booked well in advance. Most people just sleep at the bus station or in the street. Not even kidding. There are people EVERYWHERE. Our plan was to just drink though the night and sleep the next afternoon in Najera. I can’t even possibly imagine how anything could go wrong with this plan.
Pamplona
Pamplona
Pamplona
The night began around 7:00pm. We (Oisin, his lovely Spanish friends and us Canadian rookies) left the apartment in search of food. We all starting drinking, dancing in really packed smokey clubs, watching the mini parades and drinking and drinking and completely forgot about food.
Pamplona-Litre Beers
Pamplona
It was so surreal. People, people, people, people everywhere. Seeing kids that have been up for days functioning off Redbull and the Spanish drink of choice, cheap red wine mixed with coke. PS: It’s really really good! One of the clubs we hit was the famous Hemingway Bar. Everyone was drinking tons and having such a blast. Especially Neil. Heh!
Long story short.
Neil had a few too many, we had no where to sleep, Oisin and I were also very tired, we all slept in various places in the bus station along with 5,000 of our closest new friends, we woke just in time for the Running of the Bulls (8:00am), dragged our hungover asses to see them, we end up getting a view that only allowed us to see the tops of peoples heads running past, we meet up with Oisin and caught a well needed bus to Najera, the land of king sized beds and roofs over our heads.
We took a 5 hour nap then went to Oisin’s Mother’s house for a home cooked Spanish meal. Yum!! She made Chili Con Carne and we drank white wine until we we’re sleepy again.
The next day, we slept ’til almost noon. Then we wandered around the quaint little town trying all sorts of tapas suggested by Oisin. One of our ’surprise’ tapas was sheep intestine fried in butter and garlic served with bread. I must admit that I probably would not have tried it if I was ordering off the menu, but it is one of their traditional foods so how could one resist. It tasted really salty and garlicky. It almost had no real taste of it’s own.
Najera-Sheep Intestine
Najera
We also went to a restaurant for a full proper lunch. It was three full courses and a bottle of wine for the table for around 10euros each. Everything was amazing and I was so happy!!
Najera-Chorizo and Potato Soup
Next on our agenda was a hike up the local mountain. Along the walk we could see part of the fortress originally built in 1032. Pretty cool. Hot and kind of still full from lunch we make our slow ass way to the top. The view is incredible! We could see the Najerilla river, the whole city and miles past it.
Najera
We end up restaurant hopping a little throughout the evening, trying all sorts of tapas and drinks. I found myself taking to the liquor a bit too much and way too much fun while the boys gamble there money away.
The next day I woke up with a major hangover and unexpectedly had to make our way all the way back to Pamplona because we bought round trips bus tickets Barcelona-Pamplona thinking we were smart travelers. No we’re not. Mistake number three. So we had to get our shit together in mins and made our way to Pamplona only to find out that we have a 12 hour wait for the next bus to Barcelona.
Long story short.
We wait for hours in the park nodding on and off, getting cold, waiting in the bus station, make new English speaking friends, wait longer, pee behind the parked buses because we are in the current state of party apocalypse and there are 2 million people to one bathroom, catch the bus at 4:30am and drive to Barcelona.
Pamplona-Waiting for the bus
Pamplona-Waiting for the bus
Yay!!! Bed!
We sleep, sleep, sleep and then sleep some more.
We wake up to beautiful Barcelona. Amazing architecture (Guadi), beaches, shopping and sandwiches(?). There are sandwiches everywhere. We are hard pressed to find a decent cheap meal for our poor traveling asses. None the less we eat sandwiches for two full days and see the some of the sites, hit the beach, drink beer, sunbathe our Canadian transparent skin and are content. Happy. Warm.
Barcelona-Church
Barcelona-Shopping
Barcelona-Beach
Barcelona-Beach
On to Croatia…..
~Josie
