BARCELONA!!!

Writing that makes me think of the Freddie Mercury song from the '92 Olympics, how about you? Sorry this is so late but here goes. Barcelona was our vacation from our vacation. After a relatively easy transfer, flight and taxi ride, we arrived at our apartment. Eventually we were greeted by someone from the rental company. He didn't speak much English so we worked our way through the agreement and basic information about the city in broken Spanish, English and sign language. Finally, we cut him off from trying to tell us more, he left and we settled into our apartment. It was much smaller then our Paris one and didn't have basic necessities like we were used to but we made it our home for a week quite easily. The apartment was situated about 5 blocks from the Sagrada Familia, within walking distance of the heart of the older section of town and only 2 blocks from a Metro station. We had 5+ days in the city, so we could take our time seeing everything and fall into the swing of a Barcelona day. Most days we woke up between 8-9, fixed a breakfast including jamon (Spanish ham,) cheese, some fruit, cereal for mom and croissants for rest. Yes, I got to run to the patisserie and MW got to have Nutella every morning. After that we would head out for some wanderings, find some lunch and back home for a siesta. A few days we headed back out for some food, but most days we had dinner back at our little home. We enjoyed scouring our neighborhood for little shops for our supplies; we found a wine shop, yes it did just sell wine and cava, there were a few carniceria's and cheese shops and a great little bakery/sweets shop. Here are the highlights of trip.

Food - The food in Barcelona is very good, though from I can tell we really didn't eat Catalan food. We had paella one night, tapas for lunch most days and had a lot of fun shopping for the home cooked meals. We found a fantastic place for tapas on the first day, thanks to the research by the W's. It was so good we went back for our last meal out also. For our meal that took the place of Thanksgiving for us, CF & I ran to the carniceria and watched the butcher save the jamon right off the leg hanging over the counter. We both thought that it was a great experience, one you can't have around here. However, the most fun was shopping at the world famous La Boqueria market, right off La Rambla. We knew we wanted to make a big dinner but we had limited supplies at the apartment so it had to be relatively simple. We hit the market in the middle of the day, during siesta, so about half of the stalls were closed. We wandered around checking out the meat and fish, waiting for something to grab us. We narrowed it down to fish and then stood in front of one the many fish stalls to contemplate, thinking we should get something local or exotic. Finally, we decided that we all like salmon the best from the mystery fish we could translate. CF order 4 salmon steaks, so the young girl hauls this huge mostly whole salmon onto the chopping block an proceeds to hack of 4 huge steaks, it was quite a site. We ended up with a kilo of salmon. Then on to the veggies. The asparagus looked fantastic, so that was easy, we also picked up dill, cucumbers and tomato for a sauce for the salmon. We also picked up some prepared lentils as a side, some anchovies, olives and cheese. The market trip was an amazing experience and would be a fantastic way to shop but unfortunately, that is another thing that we can't do around here.

Architecture - Everyone knows about Gaudi, he was truly an inspired artist with an extreme eye for beauty. We visited his Parc Guell, a place designed to be a late 19th c. high class subdivision but it never got off the ground, only two houses were built and the owner eventually donated the property to the city for a park. It now contains many walking paths and the Gaudi museum. What Gaudi did leave behind are the bench park that functions as the roof for what would have been the open air market, two fanciful gate house and the famous tencadris iguana that is the second symbol of the city. The first symbol of the city is the Sagrada Familia, the unfinished cathedral designed by Gaudi. It is open for exploring and the admission is one of the sources of funding, they do not accept any government subsidies, hence it being under construction for 120 years and counting. The interior of this church is going to be amazing, very light and airy but the outside is what attracts so much attention. Three of the sides will each tell a story from Jesus' life, the nativity, the passion and the glory. Two of the sides are finished and the detail is great but the whimsy is what gives this building it's uniqueness. There are large, colorful fruit sculptures, pillars resting on the backs of turtles and a seated bassoonist. We also toured Casa Batlo, a home designed by Gaudi for a businessman. This is the building that people refer to as the dragon house, since the roof looks like scales and the windows look like a mouth with the bones of the eaten holding it open. Other then Gaudi's work, there are many other architecturally interesting buildings to behold as you wander about the city. All you need to do is look up.

That is Barcelona in a nutshell. For the pictures from the trip click the "Check the photos out!" link on the left.

The trip was really wonderful and I believe all of my hard work planning it paid off. I feel a little guilty not putting more work into the day to day itinerary suggestions but it was fun to make it a group effort. It was fun to share may favorite place with my friends and more fun to explore someplace new with them. I will say that the exchange rate really hurt me though. I tried not to take it into consideration too much and have a good time but looking at the depleted bank account makes me wonder if that was a good idea. Europe may be off the docket for vacation next year, maybe somewhere south of the equator with a more favorable exchange rate.

Thanks for reading.