Spain was wonderful for several reasons. First, it was much, MUCH cheaper than Paris. Second, it was sunny. Third, the culture was so friendly and chilled-out (siestas...duh).
In Madrid, we stayed at Hostel Bahia Madrid, which was right near Plaza del Sol -- right smack in the middle of the city. I've got to say, it had a lot of character. And by "it," I mean the senora who ran the place. She was an interesting person to put it nicely. But, anyway. We went to the Prado, Reina Sofia, and explored the giant botanical garden. We also found out that our concept of the Spanish schedule was completely off. The whole eating reallllly late, like 11 o'clock late, was not true. Places started closing when we wanted to go out, and it was surprisingly difficult to find bars open during the week. I'm convinced we were just not going out in the right places. We did do a tapas night, though, which was very tasty.
Barcelona was another story. I've been to both Madrid and Barcelona before, and I always remember that I like Barcelona better than Madrid for some reason. Barcelona is often advertised as "young people" city with lots of nightlife and progressive culture. This is pretty accurate. First of all, our housing experience was completely different. We found a very nice, very well-equipped apartment near the arc de triompf (yes, it seems every major city has one of these) for 6 people for a little bit less than our "just okay" hostel in Madrid. Amazing! The city itself just has so much character. The weather was beautiful, so we walked everywhere, went to visit Park Guell of course, and found ourselves at a heavy metal bar with random chippendales one night.
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