Author: Sean

Walking past the Cooper Union Building one day I just liked the sky.

Dinner at Esparanto on Avenue C.

On March 21, 2002 I had the good fortune to depart for a ten day trip to France and Spain with my friend Mike Ayers, flying from Newark to Marseille and then driving with Michael de V south past Valencia. Here are some highlights from the trip.

Marseilles

Marseille is port city on the Mediterranean in the south of France. My friend Mike Ayers has friend he met at Virginia Tech named Michael de V, from now on referred to as MikeD. MikeD has been living in Marseilles for about a year and speaks fluent French so we began our trip there.

Shortly after arriving in Marseille, we were spit at. Well, first MikeD was seached at the airport and then we were spit at. MikeD was considrately waiting for Mike and I at baggage claim at the Marseilles airport when security thought he looked dangerous. They questioned him, frisked him, and asked him to empty his pockets. After producing an avalanche of old receipts and tissues MikeD was taken to a private room where they searched his shoes. Mike and I were not even questioned.

MikeD drove us to his apartment near the center of a very hip and active section of downtown Marseille and then hurried to work. Mike and I were exausted from the trip so we decided to just wander a few blocks and get some sandwiches at the market. While walking towards the square a man on a bench spoke some French to Mike. Making the wrong choice, Mike stopped to listen and that was when we noticed the almost empty wine bottle in resting in the man’s crotch. The man spoke in French and Mike said, “sorry” and began to walk away. Then the man began speaking nonpassable English seemingly trying to ask for five Francs. Realizing what a mistake it was to even stop in the first place we just walked away. Behind us he cursed in French even though he new we couldn’t understand and then “HAAAWWWK…THHPT!” he loudly spat. He did not hit us.

We had a brief layover in Charles de Gaul in Paris where were first exposed to the new Euro. Great architecture for an airport.
MikeD’s has family that live in Gemenos, a quaint, sparkling town nestled at the base of mountains outside of Marseilles. This is the Mikes post crepes.
MikeD’s grandmother’s cottage right. There were old grape vines in the back that the family used to make wine from.
MikeD and his grandma. She was a real character and spoke much more English than I spoke French.
We chilled at the cottage to enjoy the warm afternoon.
A windy(twisty) and windy (breezy) drive into the mountains gave us a great view of Mt. Victor, the favorite subject of Cezanne.
The mountain road was extremely steep, twisty, and trafficed, but 8 or 10 skateboardes whipped past us slaloming like snowboarders.
We ended the night watching the sun set over the Med, drinking at a beach front irish bar.

Barcelona

How does one begin to describe Barcelona? I guess you could say it’s the Spanish equivalent of New Orleans, a place unique to itself. We spent two nights at the Kabul Hostel. I don’t recommend traditional hostels for anyone over 21, but we survived. The common room had Internet access and a vending machine that sold cervezas for one Euro and turned into quite a hang out for most of the evening. Everything starts late there and we had dinner at 10 and drank until 5 both nights. Our internal body clocks were still set to NYC time, so this helped.

Despite the unbelievable nightlife and energy of Barcelona, the best part of it and the whole trip really was Floquet (pronounced “FLO-key”, loudly). Floquet is the only known albino gorilla in existence and the star attraction of the Barcelona zoo. I love him so much it makes me feel funny. To understand you have to look at the pictures.

Barcelona’s Arc de Triumph. I’m the blue spec at the bottom of the left leg. Palm Trees are cool (shout to the Drag).
The view from our hostel window. We had to share a room with eight strangers but the place was right in the center of it all. This plaza was full of happy drinking folks until dawn and had several night clubs on it’s edges.
Here is Mike completely unimpressed by a normal black gorilla. Pshaw!
The first sight of his majestic white bum. Notice my reaction in the reflection. Legions of children pressed their noses to the glass and yelled “Mama! Floquet! FLOQUET!!”
A transfixed Michael locks eyes with the last true demigod on Earth – Floquet de Nou. He not only was so cool, he had three juvenile gorillas that hyperactively orbited him at all times. We dubbed them the “Henchmen”.
The single happiest moment of my life.
Look and you shall know.
Floquet Cam
Our first night in Barcelona we spent drinking L’Ovella Negra (The Black Sheep), a massive drinking hall with fantastic pitchers of Sangria for six Euros ($5.40). The next night I went to my first euro dance club Jamboree.
I pet this camel’s nose. He didn’t spit on me like a French man which was good from a laundy perspective, but bad for potential comedic value.
A fountain designed by Gaudi, Barcelona’s most famous architect.
This is the Sagrada Familia a massive and extremely detailed church designed by Guadi. It was rather freaky.
Another view of Sagrada Familia. Every facet was completely different.
The church looked like 50 other buildings combined with all their contents glue gunned to the exterior.
Me in the castle over looking ‘Lona and the Med.
Some dudes were assulting the castle in mountain climbing gear. Shortly after this shot they got some hot oil dumped on their asses for their troubles. Castle folk ain’t down with extreme sports.
A hazy view of Barcelona. I took a gondala down the hill after this with a 300lb German woman. She and both were nervous about the workmanship of Spanish cable makers.

Morella

After three days of Catalonian liver abuse we decided to head to the small mountain town of Morella.

It’s perched on a mountain top in the middle of nowhere and the entire town is enclosed in an ancient stone wall. The castle sits in the center at the peak and makes you realize that if you were alive during the era of castles and you owned a castle — that would be cool.

The serf’s view of the lord’s manor. The whole in the side was an explosion from the Spanish Civil War.
Homemade panarama shot of the view from the wall. The valley was really empty and the entire landscape was “stepped” by the Moors to create level ground for farming.
MikeD uncharacteristically taking a smoke break after sleeping in.
After we conquered the town, we pretty much had to spend all are time watching for invaders.
Our hotel was right on the wall and had a great morning view.
The streets were narrow and steep and were exactly like you picture medieval towns to be which is why Morella is a large tourist attraction in the summer.
After we conquered the town, we pretty much had to spend all are time watching for invaders.
Adjacent to the castle gates was a massive gothic church that I unfortunately didn’t take any pictures of. We did pay 10 cents to have some electric candles turned on for our loved ones. This is me outside the church in my first authentic cloister.

After that we went to Denia and Cadeques. We celebrated my 28th birthday with absinthe. Drove a lot more…and I never scanned those pictures.

I was Super Guy, defender of Ladies. Emma was a Rocker. Kevin was a Super Freak. Joy was just a pretty blonde. We buzzed the parade and then bar surfed home.

Hike Statistics
Date(s): 10/6/2001
Route:From the AT parking lot in North Adams, MA, by the Mt. Williams Reservoir on Pattison Road, following the AT to the peak, backtracking and descending to Thunderbolt Trail to parking lot in Adams on Thiel Road.
Distance: 7.1 miles
Elevation Change: 2491 ft. from parking lot at 1000 ft. to peak at 3491 ft.

From the email that spawned this hike:

Date: Mon, 10 Sep 2001
This is the latest update for our Fall camping trip. We are definitely on for the weekend of October 5, 6, & 7. Because different people in the group have different amounts of equipment, I was thinking we could car camp, but do an 11 mile throught hike on the AT over Mt. Greylock on Saturday. This means we get exercise, see lots of fall colors, but still can bring tons of beer. Erik and I did a similar trip in the Catskills this weekend and it worked out great.

 

	Jerry and I talking about camping.
	We drank tequila and Squirt until it seemed like a good idea.
	I bought a tent.
	Matt made super gorp. It's Peanuts, M&M's, and Lucky Charms
	Proud to be American.
	Notice the chili on the grill for the dogs. Erik is holding tequila,
	You can't tell, but it is raining. Really, really hard.
	Peak #1 above North Adams.
	The pictures do not begin to capture the colors.
	Near the top.
	This is the view from the top of the ridgeline we hiked. I put in arrows identifying the peaks.
	Turns out there is a road to the top. We are dumb asses.
	Erik taking a picure of me taking a picture of him taking a picture of me. We are through the looking glass, people!
	The Thunderbolt Trail. Beautiful…but deadly.
	Real sleet and snow.
	The lake before we left.

Links:
Trail Distances
Gorp Guide to Greylock