Barcelona - episode 4

I've decided that I've got to condense my writing about Barcelona otherwise I'll be going for ever and time is going. On Friday I'm off to London woo hooo and maybe - just maybe - London will put on a white xmas for me this year.

So Barcelona and the 2nd day of our holiday. This day was another bright sun-shining, blue sky day (could I ever have enough of them) and we strode our way to the Plaza de Cataluña to get on a tourist bus ride. This time we got off the main road walk and instead meandered our way through the interesting narrow alleyways to get to the plaza - nope, didn't get lost. However,  finding our way to the right place to get on the right tourist bus once we got to the plaza was a different story. There are 3 tourist bus routes - red, blue and green - and each has it's own route and each one departs from a different place in the Plaza. It is a big plaza! The ticket lasts for 1 day, not for 24 hour period as in San Sebastian, and our plan was to get the red one first to have a city tour and then change to the blue one which would take us to the Park Geull, which was a good plan but first we had to find the right bus. After a visit to the tourist office and wandering around, becoming disoriented - both of us, not just me - some terse words, we got to the right bus and off we went. Tourist buses are such a good way to see a city, I think I've said this before, and from the top deck of the red bus we saw quite a lot of Barcelona. All of the streets we went along are lined with big trees which make for a lovely city but not for taking photos so not many photos at all from this trip but here is one of some of what seemed like hundreds of taxis waiting outside the main train station

  

don't know what this is about!!!

  

seems there always has to be one of these mmmm

  

our first look at the Sagrada Familia and a bit of an emotional moment for Barry. He has wanted to see this place for many years and here it was, right in front of him, well, at the side of the bus actually.

it is a very strange and gigantic construction, more on this later because to visit the Sagrada Familia is tomorrow's plan. 

 Here we are at Parque Guell, just inside actually. We successfully found our way from the red bus to the blue bus, got off at the right stop, turned the right street corners and into the park.

There is now an €8.00 charge which was introduced just 2 weeks before we got there. We thought it was a bit on the high side. Don't mind paying a reasonable price but ...

well. The entry price gave us admission into the Gaudi part of the park and into the little museum there and, as there was a mile long queue we gave the museum a miss. Also, by this time it was early afternoon and we wanted to have a decent wander around and that's just what we did and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. It is a wonderful park. This park was to have had 60 luxury houses privately owned sitting in Gaudi designed grounds and features. It was apparently a dismal failure and only 2 houses got built. Gaudi didn't design the houses but did design the gardens and park features. I was blown away by some of his ideas of design, he was inspired by his observations of the natural world around him as he grew up and in adulthood. I don't have the time to  elaborate on this however for  those of you who are interested there is always 'Wiki' and/or 'google'. 

One of the houses

The pillars to the left of the photo support the flat area which is surrounded by Gaudi's ceramic tiled seating. This piece of flat ground is covered in coarse sand through which rain water is filtered into pipes running down inside the pillars and into huge underground water tanks. This would then have been the water supply for the housing complex and the gardens in the park. It was quite something to see and read about considering he was designing this in the early 1900s. It was impossible to get a photo underneath the pillars because the sheer size of them and the area as a whole. After wandering around under the pillars we made our way up to being on top of them.

Again, impossible to get a photo of the whole of it, or even enough to show the scale so here's this one

It was simply marvelous sitting up here in the sun looking at the people, the view and contemplating just what we were looking at/ sitting on. I found myself thinking about the possibility of building such a seat, albeit  on a much smaller scale, at home. The seat - all ceramic tiles, all curves - has drainage holes through which rainwater runs into spouting running along the other side as in the next photo

 

Somewhere here I read that most of the material he used was recycled material from demolition sites and unwanted factory lots, clay and rocks. the photo below is of a random photographer.

Just joking - random photographer because there's always one, it is of the rock and clay supports for the walkway which runs along the on top of them. Again, all curves. 

The first 3 supports on this stretch had fancy designs but after that time must have got short or maybe, after the woman what else was there! No more fancy designed supports to be seen.

From here we left the Gaudi stuff for a while and went out into the 'Park Ordinary' and on up to the top of the hill to get a panoramic view of the city.

Made it to the top of the hill and then to the top of the rock structure on top of the hill on top of which  stands the obligatory cross.  This is really high up and rather narrow so it took me a little while to stop clutching at the seat and get up for a decent look around. It's certainly a wonderful view.

 

 I think that the tree-lined street on the left is La Rambla where we walked the day before.

The Sagrada Familia in the centre - so, so huge and still not finished. The middle steeple will eventually be as high as the highest crane.

Finally, we made our way down from the top and ambled through the park to have a look at what this house was about

 The house wasn't about anything but the walk through the trees was lovely and we then found ourselves outside Gaudi's house. Not that it was his design but that he'd lived here and had designed what was in it. After some discussion we decided to go in so payed another entrance fee. Barry wasn't impressed by this but I was keen as having had a taste of his designs I was keen to see more. Well, it was certainly worth it and again, impossible to get on film. Everything he designed has curves, no sharp edges and is made to fit with the human form - furniture, door handles, toilet seats 

fancy furniture

We were ages in here and finally it was time to go. One last photo taken after we left the house and it was here we got an idea of what the gardens would have been like if they had been completed.

oops here's another. It's a little blurry, not your eyesight at all. 

after this we went out of the park and down through the streets to get the bus back to the plaza, 

from there we went wandered through the little streets back to the apartment to ditch some of our stuff and then to find somewhere to eat. This time we went in the opposite direction and after much deliberation, poking our noses into different places, reading their menus, moving onto the next place we decided to go back to the first place we'd looked at and had a really good dinner accompanied by a couple of beers. I know that we are not the only people who so this! 

Instead of just walking back to the apartment the way we'd come we decided to go a different way - just along a bit and turn a corner and then along and then .... well, where were we?? 

It's not often that Barry is unsure about the right way to go but lucky for him this time I had a good idea of which way to go which happily for us turned out to be correct. We were so relieved to be in familiar territory that we headed to our local for a nightcap and then to our home away from home, away from home, away from home.

 The next morning, Saturday, we woke up and got such a shock - it was absolutely pouring with rain, just bucketing down. Crikey it was wet.

some photos

I just have to show you some more photos taken along the way throughout our day

   some pretty fancy boots. The cheapest pair are €238.00

 

   a fancy building down near the harbour

    

more fancy buildings, an 'interesting' statue and another huge open space.

 

    a couple of people sitting about

  

 there are some amazing things to see looking upwards 

    the tops of buildings

seagulls on the whale thingy 

   

well, well, look who's here

  another fancy piece of architecture 

some curious looking hats

 el fresco dining is fabuloso!

  

and lastly,simply standing still -  the hardest working person on La Rambla, if not in the whole city. 

 and that's it for the 1st day. All in all another damn fine day 

Barcelona - episode 3

... to get to the beach we wandered through typical narrow streets (photo below) in old part of the city called Barceloneta

It wasn't a very long walk and before long we got to the other side of Barceloneta and then across a very wide street onto the sand. This fabulous building sits on the point between the harbour and the beach dwarfing some would be surfers if only the surf would arrive.

What a wonderful beach - long with a good decent width of sand between the road and the sea and not many people on it. We wandered along in no hurry to get to the end. It was hard to believe that over the road lies the great metropolis of Barcelona. I'm certain that it will be very different in the summer and that probably it is one vast stretch of people both in and out of the water. Here's some of what we saw

  More would be surfers. There were many more people sitting on surfboards, on a very flat sea, than  there were on the beach

   

More people sitting about. These chairs are built onto the sand. Wonder if there's a queue for them in the summer

    and  then for those for whom the need to 'workout' is too much there's the seaside mini-gym  

   

eventually looked up and away from the water this is what we saw ahead of us.

We did get up close to  the whale thing, we never did decide what it represents nor did we find any info about it. It's made from copper mesh (I think) and looks much better from a distance than up-close.

We were totally happy ambling along enjoying where we were and the beautiful day when we suddenly realised, duh, that we were in fact walking beside THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA woop woop yahoooooo - what else was there to do but go and put our feet into it. A young lady coming along the beach obligingly agreed to take the photo so in we went - she took more than1 and more than the 2 we thought she'd taken - I reckon she did a perfect job.

    here we are waiting ...

    

    .... and here we are in the Medeterranean Sea for the 1st time EVER. Well, up to our ankles,   anyway

    

 'one more photo' the young lady said so we stayed, unaware of the bigger wavelet ( is there such a word) coming up behind us.

  

and now we are up to our knees in The Mediterranean Sea. ha, what fun!

 It was fun and the 3 of us were laughing and laughing, just quietly I think she was very happy to have got the last picture. When I got my camera and  said thanks to the young lady she told us that she doesn't understand Spanish because she's German and that her parents were, right at that time, enjoying a great holiday in good ol' NZ. We had a laugh about that - what were the chances, eh!

For those of you wondering why 'only up to our knees' I tell you that it has to be a much hotter day before I get my togs on and get all wet. 19/6/2010 was THE EXCEPTION

We eventually got to the end of the beach and I just had to take one more photo

  I don't have any idea how long we spent strolling along here but as you can see, by the time I took this photo the daylight was on its way out.

We had arranged to meet Sumir, Sergio's friend who we meet in Zaragoza, later in the evening so after our wander along the beach we found our way to the metro and back to the apartment, just love the metro, because Barry had to get some work done and I was feeling the lack of sleep the previous night. Barry worked while I dozed on the couch. Such arrangements must be enjoyed when the opportunity arises. Work done by Barry and renewing doze had by me we set off to find the bar where we'd find Sumil. Not so easy this time but with the help of a few text messages back and forth got to the right place and had a really nice time with Sumil. I can't remember exactly what the muddle up was but we ended up at the wrong end of the street waiting at a 'restautant' which has the same name as the bar which Sumil had told us to,go to. We thought we'd got something wrong because we were definitely at a restaurant and not a bar. We must have looked a bit odd walking around in circles looking at street signs and then peering into places but in the end we got to the right place, thanks to cell phones. Unfortunately for us, maybe fortunately for Sumil, he had another thing to go to so he went off to that after we'd had a beer and walked around the little streets while he pointed out various places of interest. Another totally enjoyable couple of hours thanks to Sumil's  hospitality and generosity. 

We were in part of the old town and therefore 'tourist city' so we headed back to the area where our apartment was so we could eat for local prices rather than tourist prices. Then home to bed.

For the unbelievers - here he is - working

Barcelona - episode 2

It's a beautiful day

I've started writing this between classes on a very beautiful winter morning. A frost lay on the ground and ice was on the cars which had spent the night outside and now the air is crisp and clean, the sky is blue and the sun is shining down on Azpeitia - I just love this kind of weather. This morning the teacher I work with in 2 classes every 2nd Wednesday morning told me that I do very well in her classes, she is very happy with me. It's a good boost to my confidence and it was very nice of her to tell me this, and of course, very nice to hear. It is indeed beautiful day!

Now - Barcelona. 

There is so much to say about our time there I could probably write pages and pages of stuff and then there's the hundreds of photos that I could post as well. However, I'll try to do quite a bit of weeding as I go. Is there such a thing as 'too many photos?"

After some deliberation and procrastination and browsing through all the photos, again, I've decided that I will do this as a day by day account. So here goes.

Day 1 - woke up  rather  late due to not getting to sleep until the early hours of the morning to a bright and sunny morning. After our breakfast of croissants and coffee/tea at a little cafe just around the corner from the apartment we set off to find Plaza de Cataluña and then wander down La Rambla. With the help of maps we found the plaza no problem at all and it was great to be wandering along taking in the sights, sounds and colours along the way. We felt very excited - our first foray into this exotic city and we hadn't got lost. 

La Rambla - can't say that we all that impressed with what we saw although we were mindful that we were well outside the tourist season so we reckoned there were a lot of things missing but, on the other hand there weren't masses of people either. Given that we'd been warned many times about  this area being rife with pick-pockets there were probably less of them as well. I have to say that we had no problems of this kind during our stay. For those that don't know, La Rambla is a wide street which has shops and what-not along both sides plus a wide pedestrian walk-way down the middle of it with stalls etc on either side and big trees along it as well. It is 1.2 kms long and runs from the plaza down to the harbour and the enormous Christopher Columbus Monument.  It's divided into sections, 3 I think - souvenier shops, florists then food and drink. We did certainly enjoy the walk.

   Plaza de Cataluña

   La Rambla, well, a little part of it.

The Boqueria Market is off to the side, part of the way down La Rambla, and we had a great time in there. It was AMAZING!!! Such a huge, incredible variety of food.  We bought a couple of apples and felt very 'local like' but then I gave into temptation and bought some caramelised nuts and paid top dollar, should that be euro, that's for freakin' sure. I didn't want to take them but, as the seller quite rightly pointed out, I'd asked to buy them. By 'pointing out' I mean he just kept shrugging his shoulders and flapping his hands about. Lesson learnt - be sure of the price BEFORE saying I'll buy. We made sure to enjoy every last crumb of them., laughing about being so foolish as we wandered down to the Christopher Columbus Monument and the harbour.

  

  The entrance to Boqueria Market - there were a lot of people in here.

    mushrooms

   many different kinds of nuts. This isn't where we bought the 'gold plated'ones

   

an impressive deli

    Shellfish, prawns and such like

  

    Cod comes in many different ways, shapes and sizes.

   so many varieties of meat, ham, salamis, chorizo etc 

    Dessert

    followed by sweet stuff - in any and every shape and taste too, I imagine.

    The,above photos so just a very small selection of the whole thing - it was well worth the visit.

   Christopher Columbus Monument standing in the middle of a very wide open area.

   the harbour with the gondolier - the ride we missed out on

we went under the monument to the tourist center and then, armed with info re tourist bus rides etc we ambled along the harbour to find somewhere to have lunch, conscious of the fact that anywhere here would cost us tourist prices. Around the further aide of the harbour we came to a string of eating places but they all have touts outside so every time we stopped to peruse the menu we got talked at by some guy telling us "go in, go in blah blah and blinky blah". we hate this so unfortunately for them the only affect they had on us was to move us along to the next place to,have the same thing happen again.

Finally we came to a place where the young women outside was very friendly and chatted rather than try to get us to go in. Barry had time to spot 'rare steak sandwich' on the menu so in we went. We also spotted this beside the entrance

Slowly we became aware that we were in fact in an Irish pub!!! It's named after the boat race 'Fastnet!' I think that Irish pubs  are like Mc Donald's - they're everywhere! I can't remember what I had to eat but I do remember that Barry's rare steak was anything but, more like overcooked schnitzel. It wasn't overpriced so we were happy about that.

Happy with food, and of course the compulsory lunchtime beer, in our stomachs off we went again. This time to find the beach ...

13 - 18 November in Barcelona - the story begins

and now it's Sunday night and the first of December - officially summer has arrived in NZ -  coincidentally, so has Barry! I hope summer  weather has arrived for those of  you in The Southern Hemisphere and you enjoy a long hot summer again this year. I guess it's officially winter here although nobody is talking about it. 

It's time I backtracked to our time in Barcelona,  Wednesday 13th -Monday 18th November. Goodness me, that long ago -  oops. So much for good intentions. Here goes - we had a good length of time thanks to the generosity of the teachers who told me to have Thursday and Monday off and a timetable which meant we could leave Azpeitia on Wednesday afternoon and not be back until Tuesday morning Yay. 

We went by bus to San Sebastian and then by train (not the super-fast one) to Barcelona. Due to delays along the way we arrived in Barcelona about an hour late. No idea what the cause of the delays were but we'd be trucking along and then slow down, sometimes we'd stop completely. This meant that we got to our rented apartment at least an hour later than expected which didn't seem to bother the owner who was waiting on the street for us. Hans is his name and he is great, very welcoming and has lots of info about places to see and places to eat etc. The apartment had 2 bedrooms, everything anyone could possibly need, no TV but who needs one, 3 balconies, kitchen, sitting room, good coffee. It was after 1am by the time Hans left us,  we'd got sorted and got to sleep so it was a slow start to our first day. It was a fabulous blue sky, sunshine day and so was Friday but on Saturday morning we woke up to find grey sky, cold temperatures and pouring rain  - this was to stay for the rest of our time in Barcelona, unfortunately.  Fortunately the metro was about 1 minute from our apartment but, disappointingly, the metro was how we got about for most of the time so we didn't get to do a lot of walking about the city exploring the back streets which is one of the things we both really enjoy doing.  We did do some, but not a lot, and then the rain would suddenly arrive so we joined everyone else and became part of the umbrella brigade. Sometimes we got soaked anyway. The cold, wet weather also meant we didn't get to sit out on any of the balconies supping our vino and watching the people go by. However, the metro was a great way to get about. I loved how easy it is to use and we that didn't have to wait any time  at all for one to come along once we got to the right platform. Getting to the right platform did take some time on a few occasions, no fault of the metro system, more that we had to read all the maps  and info to make sure we got on the right  platform to go  

in the direction that we wanted to go in and not the opposite one. Our training with the London Underground stood us in good stead, although the Barcelona Metro was nowhere near as crowded as the London Underground, possibly it os a different story in the summer. Good exercise too with some long stretches of corridors and lots of stairs. 

We were very organised and had written a 'to do' list on the train journey and we did do most of the things that we wanted to do despite the weather. We had the benefit of Emma and Brit's recent experience, maps and guide books, in Barcelona and also tips from other people as well. Thanks heaps people - you know who you are xxx

What we didn't do was the gondala ride across the harbour - yes, it would have been as scary as hell but what a blast; see the Santa Maria del Mar church, the Picasso Museum,  and the roof of La Pedrera which is apparently the best part of it.  Both the gondala ride and the roof of La Pedrera were closed because of the weather and we missed out on the Picasso Museum because we got there on Sunday afternoon the queue was miles long. It was cold and wet so we decided to give Picasso a miss and later Barry discovered that there is free entry to this museum every Sunday afternoon so that's why there was such a long queue. 

What we did do:  Plaza de Cataluna; wandered down Las Ramblas, had been warned about pickpockets; wandered about the  Boqueria Market -  should have been aware of tourist prices; walked along the beach - feet in The Mediterranean Sea; Tourist Bus rides (2); Park  Guell and our 1st look at Gaudi stuff; Sagrada Familia; the Hiberian Bookshop;  Plaza de España and the  Magic Fountain; Hospital de Sant Pau and the walk from there to the Sagrada Familia; La Pedrera (more Gaudi ) - so all in all not too shabby a visit.

 

The view from Barcelona train station platform where we waited for our train

   

waiting ... waiting .... waiting

  

not sure if this is the way the train will go or is coming from

   The door to our apartment building. Our place was on the first floor, thankfully, because there is no    lift in this building

 the view from one of our balconies. Under the marquee like structure along the middle of the street is 

a huge market. One of the things we really liked was that our apartment was not in a tourist area so for one thing the price was good and also that all about us were the the ordinary shops, bars, restaurants that local people use and this market is part of the local scene This is a temporary site while the old market buildings are refurbished. We would love to be able to come back when the market is back in its proper home because the building looks amazing, just a short walk from here. The market is called The Mercat de Sant Antoni. Sant Antoni is the name of the local area?

 It was impossible to get a decent photo of the whole building because it's enormous and is a building site with barriers, hoardings and work sheds all around it.We thought that  it looks amazing and would love to see it when the market is operating here again.

  

A tiny little part of the Sant Antoni Market. It was easily as good as the famous Boquiera market which is on La Rambla - there will be more about this one another day 

 Sometimes there's work to be done.

So ends the first episode of our time in Barcelona.