Barcelona Spring 2007 - Ilaria and J's Photo Page

Ilaria's Page J's Page

Barcelona Spring 2007


(Click on the images for a larger version.)

Once again, Ilaria and I saved money, by taking a little mini-vacation in a cheaper destination rather than flying directly to Italy. Spring time flights to Italy were pushing $1500.


But flights to Madrid on Iberia were around $800.


So at 7AM our short 5hr 45min flight from Boston to Madrid was complete. Here's the beautiful new airplane terminal in Madrid. We didn't stay here long though. We slept on a bench for a few hours and somehow magically woke up just in time to go catch our Vueling flight to Barcelona.


We arrived at our cheap, but nice, hotel in the early afternoon.


Interestingly, the hotel was a hollow circle on the inside


with a bridge stretched across the diameter.


The hotel was on the third floor, and there was a microscopic old elevator to get there (Ilaria and I barely fit in there with our suitcases).


Our room was small but clean.


And we had a pretty nice view from the window.


The only small problem was that holder for the shower head in the bathroom was broken. But neverfear, Iberia gave us free socks to wear on the airplane.


A single sock is all MacGyver J needed to fix the showerhead in place.


I'm sure it's still holding to this day (the sock might be a little musty by now though!)


Here's the best thing I saw in Barcelona. It was actually one of the first things I saw. These drawings are great.


Here's the wrapped-up Catedral Basílica de Barcelona. I've certainly seen a lot of wrapped-up churches in Europe.


One of Barcelona's trademarks are the buildings of the Art Nouveau architect Antoni Gaudí. So Ilaria and I put quite a lot of effort and leg work into finding the buildings he has scattered across Barcelona.


Our first Gaudí building, Palau Güell, was a palace he designed for Eusebi Güell. Unfortunately, it was undergoing renovation.


But you can still see the influence of Gaudí on the roof.


We then headed up La Rambla, the most famous (and crowded) street in Barcelona.


I stopped for a minute to ponder life on the way to seeing


Casa Amatller (left) and Casa Batlló. We didn't have enough time to go inside. But next time, we definitely will set aside time to tour the inside.


Unfortunately, the sun was on the other side of the street so the photos aren't the best.


However, the sun was shining on Casa Milà across the street. I can see why people didn't like these buildings in the 1800s when they were built. They were way ahead of their time. But now, people can really appreciate how unique and beautiful they are.


Ilaria, map-girl, Mogno


still likes traveling with MacGyver J


Next we entered a square


where old men


were trading beer caps. I used to always get in trouble for not throwing those away. I didn't know I could actually trade them for stuff.


In this square,


there was a mysterious man eating one of many bocadillos he would have during his stay in Spain.


The square also contained two tango dancers, which we watched while thinking about Boris and Anna.


We headed off to see Sagrada Família - the most famous building by Gaudí.


Gaudí was hit by a tram in Barcelona, dying before seeing the completion of the church he wanted so much to build. I think I'll dye before it's finished too. I was here in 2000, and it doesn't seem that much has changed since then. The projected completion date is 2026, 140 years after the start. If Boston's big dig is any metric to go by, the building will be complete sometime around 2300?


Around the church the old guys were playin some bocce


and cards.


And what architectural masterwork would be complete without a nearby KFC


and McDonald's?


We walked around to have a look


from the otherside.


I also saw outdoor, public ping-pong for the first time.


Gaudí worked on this church for around 55 years, using mostly his own creativity and on-the-fly ideas.


Therefore, he made few plans for how to complete the building and they've been winging it ever since.


We took the subway from the church to Parc Güell.


Parc Güell is on a hill that looks down upon the city. It was designed by Gaudí.


To get up to the park we had to ride


a lot of escalators.


Once we got to the park, we walked by some nice cactus plants


on our way to the top of the hill. Ilaria got a little afraid near the top.


It did look pretty easy to fall. And you run out of hand rail when you get to the very top (this is when Ilaria decided to come back down).


But it gave a nice view of


Barcelona. You can really see Sagrada Família nicely from here.


I took ten pictures of this house. But I'm only going to make you look at one of them.


Here's a communist (anarchist?) occupied house with an occupying communist girl in her underwear. I don't think their sign is terribly relevant. We don't shoot tomatoes during tomato season. We don't shot baseballs during baseball season. Comrades, please make a better sign before I next return to Barcelona.


Here's the main part of the park, where we found many tourists,


a tropical bird,


and an interesting sign. (dogs in Barcelona are very good at stacking their poop into these nice triangles for their owners).


After the park, we took a fairly long walk to Casa Vicens.


Casa Vicens was the last Gaudí building we visited. There were very few tourists here. This house is a personal residence. That's one heck of a big house to live in.


We took the funicular (a subway-thing that goes up steep hills) to Fundació Miró.


The Miró paintings inside spanned the artist's entire life (not just this typically Miró stuff). Sorry no pictures. So I took a picture of a sculpture on the roof.


Then Ilaria and I took a walk in a random neighborhood where there were no tourists. My favorite part of the Barcelona trip.


It was during this time as we passed many parks for the local children


when I realized that parks in Barcelona have no grass.


Barcelona had tons of these markets where everyone was selling the same thing: random crap.


We walked down towards the beach


passing Christopher Columbus along the way.


He pointed us on our way to


the Barcelona beaches. I really like that statue on the beach. Now let's take a moment to transition here. Let's imagine we are gothic people. That is we're those people that dress up in black all of the time, avoiding too much contact with society, dancing in that gothic kinda way, devoting our lives to


well, the creation of giant bubbles.


I have seen stranger things in my life.


But not too many. Children would run up and play with their giant bubbles.


But they remained true to their gothic bubble code, focusing solely on the creation of the largest bubble possible, without so much as a peep or a smile at the little people enjoying their craft. Now that's true devotion to your calling.


My calling in Barcelona was this chocolate store. It kept calling me, and I'd answer and buy some dark chocolate with hazelnuts or rice inside. Wish I had some now. Very good.


Barcelona has a strange smell too it. Something about the way the city is laid out makes it smell a little like a musty rag - kinda like Venezia, but Venezia has an excuse. Well these guys dressed in green spend their days shooting water out of firehouses to clean the streets. Are they creating or removing that smell?


Someone tried to rob me the last time I sat in Plaça Catalunya. This trip I remained standing.


On our last day in Barcelona,


as we were preparing to leave


we had the pleasure of ending up in


trash sculpture land.


we liked it there, but we couldn't stay long,


so we caught a no-airconditioned no-open-window bus inferno to the Barcelona airport.


Goodbye Barcelona.