Right so a few weeks ago I was lucky enough to travel over to Barcelona with the Fabric team, they were over there filming for a forthcoming DC Embassy edit so I joined them to try and get some street footage after they had finished with their embassy filming duties.
Most of the team were already in Barca staying in the DC Flat however me, Connor and Native Skate Store photographer Johnny flew out a day later and stayed in an apartment just round the corner. The apartment was pretty nice with a double bed which I quickly snatched up and then some bunk beds in the other room. Connor was over that so he decided to take the double sofa bed, as you can tell he made himself right at home in his 80’s styled cut off shorts.
We only got to Barca around 3 so didn’t fancy trying to find the Embassy by ourselves to then find everyone over it and wanting to come back to the flats, so instead we decided to keep it mellow and go skate some famous spots down by the beach.
It was pretty warm which was a nice contrast to the baltic cold we had left over in Newcastle earlier in the day. The first spot we hit was a cheeky little bank next to the harbor. Last year when I was here on a stag do with Mellon he managed to focus some passer by on a bike at this spot, luckly this time Connor got this nice bs smith without damaging any locals while Johnny opted for a feeble.
Just next to these banks were the block ledges most recently seen in the DGK video, Connor got a pretty nice seq but obviously it’s being kept for a later date! After doing the classic skate tourist thing and hitting up Paral-lel we headed back to meet up with the rest of the team and get our grub on!
Can’t beat finishing the session to a sunset like this!
We got back to flat and met up with the rest of guys at the DC flat. They were all knackered so we headed back to ours via some kebab shops, the place looked sketchy but for under 5 euros we managed to get a huge wrap and some juice. Not too shaby!
We all got an early night ready for our first day at the Embassy, which from the rest of the teams opinion sounded pretty rad.
The next day we were all pretty amped for the session and got ready to get the bus to the Embassy. This gave us just enough time to get some coffee and admire Jason’s newly acquired Gothic jewellery.
With a beard and a skull ring you know Jason means business.
So after a brief lesson in style from Jason we arrived at the Embassy. What can I say other than it’s pretty insane that we got such a rad park to skate pretty much to ourselves!
Since we’d missed out on 2 days of skating at the Embassy Connor got straight down to business and started thinking of some stuff to film. Connor’s a modern guy so warming up with a bs nosegrind on the funbox block is no biggie.
I won’t bore you with a day to day, trick to trick account of what went down but everyone managed to film some bangers! I didn’t get much of a chance to take many photos in between skating and filming but there is a couple of Douwe below.
Douwe with a bs tail.
One of the downfalls/advantages of the Embassy is that it’s in the middle of nowhere and because of this there isn’t anywhere to get food bar a really greasy pizza shop. While as you know I’m quite partial to pizza having it every day doesn’t do wonders for the heart especially with my family history of heart attacks!
So Friday was our last day at the Embassy and the day the team had to film all their final bangers and they didn’t disappoint. All there was left to do was to peep the footage and go home!
Just before we left I thought it would be best to throw down a banger to get the team hyped for some street filming. I performed what can only be described as a textbook 5.0 to fakie however my stylish roll away was foiled by one of Finnish DC team. I can only assume he was memorized by my style and skill that he didn’t realise that he was in the way of my roll out, my skateboarding does tend to have this effect.
A big thanks has to go to the DC filmer Thomas Winkle, that guy is at the Embassy before we get there and stays as long as it takes to get the tricks filmed. He was on it every day and was always stoked!
In preparation for a weekend of street skating we whacked out the laptops to search for spots, but don’t worry I had another laptop on the go to watch the footy.
Upon waking up and looking out the window and seeing snow I thought street skating would be off. Luckily the Spainish sun had dried up most of the ground by about midday so we didn’t miss out on too much skating!
The first spot we hit was a bank to step ledge next to some flats on the outskirts of Barca. The spot was rad but we seemed to annoy most of the residents with our radical stunts; we tried filming a few tricks but the constant shouting from an angry Spanish man dressed in what looked like a spandex racing suit put us off.
We tried filming round the corner afterwards but the police turned up and kicked us off. Regan wanted to give a big ollie a couple of goes so me and him risked filming it. I wasn’t particularly stoked on taking the risk as Mark had explained that one of the times he was in this area previously the police had arrested Sidewalk photog Leo Sharp and put him in jail for 2 days. Being a nervous and anxious little man the thought of being potentially orally penetrated in a Spanish prison made me quite concerned. Thankfully Regan being the seasoned professional that he is got the trick within about 2 minutes while the rest of the crew chilled around the corner.
Most of the filming for the day took place at the banks that Mikey Taylor made famous in DVS ‘Skate More’. Most of the guys got some footage there and we only left once the temperature had dropped so much that it looked like it might start snowing again.
Manny also took us to a weird sculpture which he’d filmed a trick on for his Crossfire edit. You have to climb up then throw your board down for a quick run up and then you have to face the large drop after you’ve landed your trick! Both Connor and Regan got some footage and photos and some lovely bails!
One thing which stoked me out was that McDonald’s sells chicken wings in Barca! Manny hit that shit hard! Still it’s no Dixy chicken mega mix burger and they also weren’t up for giving me tick like the Newcastle Dixy does.
Our last day of street skating seemed promising as the sun was blazing and everyone had managed to get up pretty early. Johnny claimed his mate had found a brand new double set with banks going the sides of it. As it’s hard to skate new spots in Barca we thought it would be a good idea to try and find the spot. So 2 hours later we found the ‘spot’, imagine a huge double set with no run up and an essentially a wall with a rail on top down the side of it. While we were pretty gutted about wasting loads of time we did luck upon a rad spot around the corner. I’ve seen this spot loads but never known where it was, basically it’s a long bank with various step ledges inbetween it. Jason wanted to film/shoot something on it for an advert so he started warming up with this tasty tailslide.
If you want to see what he shot check out his advert in the new Sidewalk, it’s sick! Til then here’s a picture of him pushing towards the ledge, it’s even in black and white so you know it’s classy.
Haunting.
Jason being the gent that he is offered to get me a crepe for filming him as he thought it had taken ages (It hadn’t), never one to shy away from free food I took him up on his offer. I went in hard with the Milka crepe, smooth and brown just like me…
We bumped into this legend of a dog down by the beach, we were casually walking by and he/she spotted Douwe’s shiny Fabric board. The dog then proceeded to grab the board out of Douwe’s hand and ride it along the beach front! If that wasn’t crazy enough it actually tried to do an ollie, I have never seen a dog do this. I think it might have been my highlight of the trip
Manny had been wanting to skate a handrail at Fontana the whole weekend so it was the next port of call, the spot is pretty sick with a small bank to do tricks into before and then a 12 stair rail. The only problem was that we only knew the metro spot not the location, we assumed we’d be able to find it pretty easy, we assumed wrong. Basically Fontana is a pretty heavy residential area with lots of side streets and similar looking roads which made searching quite hard. We thought the best plan would be to split into groups and try and find it, me and Jason took one route and the rest of the guys went another. While me and Jason wandered around for about a hour with no skate spot joy we did manged to find some over sized treats! The only thing which could have topped them off would have been an over sized glass of chocolate milk.
Thankfully the other guys managed to find the spot and hit us up with some directions.
The spot was rad though it started to get dark within about 10 minutes of being there which hindered skating the rail a bit! Even so Douwe put a crazy NBD down the stairs, just wait til you see the footy! After that everyone was suitably stoked so we went back to the apartment to get some grub.
Some of the guys didn’t want anything fancy so they hit up Burger King, however the rest of us decided to try out one of my eating recommendations. Last time I came to to Barca me and Nicola had eaten in this place and it had was tasty and well priced, yet again it didn’t disappoint. Being greedy and hungry I went for 2 main meals, the first being baked cheese and crackers and the second a lovely piece of hake. Suitably satisfied there was a little room for some ice cream from Burger King and then I was ready to call it a day.
The next day we didn’t have a huge amount of time before the flight so I took the opportunity to get some presents and also annoy Jason by trying to get ‘arty’ shots of him.
So all in all the trip was rad and hopefully people will be stoked once the Embassy edit comes out!
Hopefully the weather will start to pick up soon so I can start updating more regularly, until then put your feet up and have a hot chocolate, you know you want to.
Brown Sugar.
Wut Up Wit Dat 