[Barcelona | May 7th – 11th]
Laura and I made it to Barcelona late on a Wed night. Our flight got in early and the woman renting the house to us had not yet finished cleaning so we went on the hunt for a tapas place. Fortunately, we found one not too far off from our house. All of the food was pretty good. Tapas were generally composed of ham (prosciutto), and usually fried with some kind of bread. After we had our late-night dinner we went back to the house to get settled. After this we decided to do some exploring…we found ourselves out until 5am! Needless to say this had a big impact on our productivity the next day.
The place wasn fairly nice overall, the location was awesome because we were able to walk pretty much everywhere we wanted to go. We did unexpectedly find out in the evenings to come that we would not have a full night of rest during our stay there. Turns out we were across the street from some garbage bins. At about 3:00 every morning the trash trucks would come around to empty these bins. They would clank through the streets and take their sweet time shaking the bins. It is one of the most unpleasant ways to be woken up in the middle of your deep sleep.
The next day we hiked up to Park Güell to see the Gaudí park. We we both quite tired from the night before but we were glad we made the trek up there. It had beautiful views of the city and ocean beyond. All of the Gaudi stuff was really awesome to see as well. Pictures never do much justice but it is amazing to look at what he created and wonder where he came up with the concepts.
We had a productive second day despite our lack of sleep. We got up early and went to visit Montjuïc. We had read that there was a hike that would bring us up to the castle, which turned out to be more of a simple walk. We instead ran all of the steps at the castle to make up for the lack of the hike. We ate our breakfast at the top, again with a nice view of the city. While we ate we people-watched. There was a big group of older Asian tourists who were having their own little mini photo shoot. The group was mostly women with a couple husbands along for the adventure. I think they took about 100 pictures at the top of the stair alone. It was hilarious to watch them stage and rearrange themselves. Every time they would take a picture they would yell, “Ready! Set!”.
After this we made our way to the markets downtown. There are a number of markets around the city with just about anything you could possibly want. The first one we walked through had mostly clothes and textiles. The second, and more well known market, is La Boqueria just off of La Rambla. This is an amazing market! They had all kind of food and when we first walked in we were greeted by a stand of fresh juice. They had all kind of flavors like Orange Mango, and Pineapple Coconut. We walked around staring at all of the food and finally were able to make some decisions about what to have for lunch. We had some yummy empanadas as well as the traditional dish paella.
After this is was beach time! We found our way to the water and just sat and enjoyed the sun and the view. The was was a beautiful blue but it was a touch on the chilly side! This didn’t prevent us from going for a swim however. After we had gotten our beach fix we went out for dinner. There is a popular tapas place that had really amazing food. The nice thing about tapas is they are all small plates so you can order a wide variety of things to get a little taste of everything.
After dinner we went to see another house that was designed by Gaudí called Casa Batlló. We were able to see it both when it was light out as well as at night. They did a nice job of lighting up the house at night to accentuate all of the unique qualities. After this we walked to see the Magic Fountain at Montjuïc. There is a fountain and light show that is choreographed to all kinds of music. It was primarily 80s ballads when we watched it. It was definitely an entertaining ending to our long day.
On our last day in Barcelona we planned to do the last touristy thing on our list, Sagrada Familia. After that it was another relaxing afternoon on the beach. Sagrada Familia was already crazy busy by the time we showed up at 10:30 and we ended up having to buy tickets that we could not use until noon. It was all worth the wait though. This was by far one of the coolest churches I have ever seen. I generally like visiting churches because I find them architecturally interesting, but they usually have a looming cold feeling. Inside the Sagrada Familia it feels a little bit like you are entering another world. There is so much brightly colored stained glass that it was like being inside a kaleidoscope. Gaudí created all of the columns inside to be the trunks of the tree of life. The church is still not fully complete, even though construction began in 1882. It was less than a quarter finished when Gaudí passed away.
Overall Barcelona is a beautiful and unique city! I am so happy I had a chance to make it to Spain. And now, we have 7 more days of sunshine and beach time!
Devious Owl 