More Gaudi

Tuesday May 17, 2011                                       Day 321
Roger and I awoke at our usual 8:00. He went out for juice and croissants. Since the others were still asleep, Roger and I walked down to the dock to see if we could spot We Are Water, the final boat in the Barcelona World Race, which came in only last week. The dock area we accessed in December to see the boats was now off-limits. We were unable to locate We Are Water, but we did see Gaes Centros Auditivos, another boat which participated in the race. It was closed up, but we were able to get a couple of photos of it through some fencing. Fourteen boats set out on the around-the-world race on December 31. Only eight of them completed the race.

 We took the metro to the center of town and toured the Gaudi house known as Casa Batlló. It was a magical experience – Gaudi was a genius.

A vase in the Casa Batlló

This is a newell post in the stairwell. Amazing!!

A fireplace, with benches in the recess on each side.

A beautiful transition from one room to the next.

An inner door. It is said there are no straight lines in this house!

Windows overlooking the street at the front of the house.

Look at the ceiling above the light fixture! Everything about Gaudi is astonishing.

A vented interior doorway

Beautiful detail above an interior door.

Another beautiful door

A mirror in one of the rooms.

A view of the back of the house.

Looking down from the roof - note the lovely mosaic pattern.

Detail of the vent stacks below

These are vent stacks - how wimsical!

More beautiful mosaics.

Alicia and Jamie on the roof

Note the wimiscal dragon-back shape of the front facade.

We came upon this fantastical bit of artwork in the street on our way to lunch. 

Alicia wanted to see The Palau de la Música Catalana – the Palace of Catalan Music, and it turns out there was a concert there in the evening, so we bought tickets for the concert.

Ceiling detail inside the concert hall.

View of the stage area.

Detail of the wall of the stage

Detail of the wall in the seating area
with a glimpse of a pipe organ beyond.

The concert was a benefit for the victims of the earthquake in Japan. The printed program booklet was astonishing – it had a double-sized centerfold, which we had to fold into a fan shape. When one looked at the fan one direction, a heart was visible; from the other direction, a circle, presumably representing the sun which is Japan’s symbol.

Program, fan-folded with both the heart and circle visible

Viewed from one side, there is a heart . . .

. . . and from the other side, the sun.

We ended our evening with dinner in a little dive which turned out to serve excellent Mojitos. For some reason I don’t recall what we actually ate. Afterward, Alicia, Peter and Jamie went out on the town and again, Roger and I collapsed in our room with our computers.

Gaudi

Monday May 16, 2011                                     Day 320

We got up early and picked up breakfast at a bakery on our way, then took the subway to the top of Las Ramblas to pick up a Gaudi tour. The tour took us by two Gaudi houses on the way to Park Güell, which was conceived by a rich textile merchant to be a development for other wealthy people, but it was a failure because the commute from the development area to the center of the city was too long. Gaudi did a good deal of public space development of the area, but only two houses were built, one of which belonged to the merchant’s lawyer. Later the city of Barcelona bought the land and turned it into a park which celebrates Gaudi’s work. 

This is a curved bench in Park Guell - note the mosaic back

A tilted wall in Park Guell

A support post - Park Guell

Mosaic lizard in Park Guell

More mosaics in Park Guell. Gaudi bought broken ceramic pieces from local potteries
and used them as the basis for his mosaics.

Here he used broken tea cups on the domed roof - Park Guell

From Park Güell the bus took us to Gaudi’s greatest work, Sagrada Familia. This is a fantastical church conceived by Gaudi and still under construction more than 100 years after its commencement. Some hope it will be finished by 2027, the centennial of Gaudi’s death. Others suggest it will never be finished. Its construction is financed by private donations and ticket sales. It gained status as a church only last fall, when the Pope arrived and consecrated it. 

The ceiling of Sagrada Familia

One of three entry facades to Sagrada Familia.
This one tells the crucifixion story

St. Thomas on the Crucifixion facade of Sagrada Familia

After the tour we returned to the apartment for a 30-minute siesta, then set out to meet the neice of Jamie’s boss for lunch. We arrived about 15 minutes late, but she was waiting for us and we had a lovely lunch of tapas and wine. 

While wandering around the area near our apartment, we came upon a church. As we entered, a choir was singing, so we prepared to leave again, not wanting to intrude on a church service. But the song ended, and a VERY American voice said “Okay, let’s go back to that part where …” It turned out that this was a choir from a Miami university doing a dress rehearsal for a performance later in the evening. The conductor wore a tux and the choir was in suits and black dresses. Their voices echoed magnificently from the high vaulted ceilings of the church. We entered and sat for a while just to listen, leaving only when they finished the rehearsal.

In the tourist area near the church, Roger bought a hat pin. Later, when he took it back to the apartment and tried to attach it to his hat, the stem broke off. 

In the evening, Alicia, Peter and Jamie went out bar-hopping while Roger and I spent time on our computers, then went to bed.

Adios Madrid, hola Barcelona

Sunday May 15, 2011                                  Day 319

We were up this morning looking for an early breakfast. We found a wonderful restaurant/upscale deli (for those of you with New Orleans connections, it reminded me of Martin’s Wine Cellar in Metairie) which offered delicious pastries for breakfast, so we had chocolate croissants and another pastry and a cup of café con leche each. Afterward we selected some lunch delicacies - Roger got a ham sandwich and some short sections of sausage wrapped in pastry - sort of a mini-pig-in-the-blanket. We added a chocolate bar to that and took it all away in a lovely carry bag for the train.

We returned to the hotel, packed, paid our bill and walked out for the last time. We made our way through subway to the train station and kissed Madrid goodbye. 

On the train we heard a couple of young guys behind us speaking English, so I leaned back and asked where they are from. They are from Canada but have been living in Tuscany within walking distance of the house where Frances Mayes, of Under the Tuscan Sun fame, lives. 

We arrived in Barcelona and made our way to the Barceloneta subway stop and headed for the apartment Jamie rented for five of us. Alicia called while we were on the subway, just to check on our whereabouts. It took us ten or fifteen extra minutes to find the apartmnet once we got into the area, but we finally managed. 

An odd thing happened on the way from the metro to the apartment – we were walking along and a guy behind us called out to us and pointed out that there was something spilled on my back and on the suitcase I was pulling. He offered a mouchoire and some water to help clean it off, but I pulled a tissue out of my own pocket and we indicated that we had water ourselves. It was too much to clean up in the street anyway, so we thanked him and moved on. I wondered if this was one of those tourist scams, where strangers move in to help us out, then lift my purse in the confusion of cleaning up. If it was, it didn’t succeed, as we declined all help and moved on. There did not seem to be anyone else around to help the guy out, so I don’t know for sure.

It turned out that someone had thrown some of the contents of a bottle of makeup onto me, sloshing it onto my sweater, my purse and the small rolling suitcase I was pulling. It cleaned out of the suitcase and the purse quite well. I will not wash the sweater until I return home. The more I think about it, the more I believe we were the target of a tourist scam. Why else would someone toss liquid makeup onto my back?

It was great seeing Alicia, Peter and Jamie. We relaxed a bit, then walked through lower Barcelona to a funicular which took us up trhe side of a mountain. It terminated at a gondola called Telefuerico Barcelona, but it closed about 15 minutes before we arrived, so we explored the area instead. Alicia checked on a geocache site and we located it. She logged it, then we enjoyed the view out over Barcelona, then returned to the funicular and back to the harbor area of the city. 

A huge brass cat in the street

Alicia, with Barcelona spread out behind her

View of Barcelona from an olympic venue - note Sagrada Familia to the left in the back.

 We settled on a dinner location and took the subway to get there. It is Sunday evening, however, and the place was closed. We settled on a small nearby restaurant, which turned out to be better than we expected. Then it was back to the apartment and to bed.

We had a struggle getting our computers connected to the internet. Alicia and Peter brought my new computer, but we never got it connected. We did manage to get my small one connected, and Alicia got her cell phone to connect, but Jamie had a struggle with her cell phone, and Roger never did get his computer connected.

Impressions of Madrid:

Ice! They have ice and serve cold drinks. Pardon-moi - I earlier stated that there are no cold drinks in Europe. I was wrong - there are in Spain!!

Warm weather - beautiful weather. Even the rain did not spoil our trip, as we did not get wet from it, and our day’s excursions were already over by the time it hit.

Three or four Spanish languages, including Castillan, Catalonian, and a couple of others. Most signs were in two or three languages.

An Egyptian temple in Spain??

Saturday May 14, 2011                               Day 318

I did my back exercises before we left the hotel, then we left for breakfast, and the metro. We arrived at Plaza del España, then walked to an Egyptian temple. The temple was donated to Spain because that country sent its master stonecutters and masons to Egypt to help rescue several archeological sites which were otherwise doomed to be flooded by rising waters behind the Aswan dam. This particular temple was one of the doomed artifacts. It constitutes one of the few works of ancient Egyptian architecture which can be seen outside Egypt and the only one of its kind in Spain.

Hieroglyphics inside the temple.

View from the rear of the temple west across the countryside beyond Madrid

Near the temple was a splendid rose garden, and we spent an hour or so educating ourselves about the difference between hybrid tea roses, floribundas, and other varieties. There was a lagniappe of an orchid show inside an atrium in the garden, so we strolled through it enjoying the vast variety of orchids as well.

An amazing pair of trees in the park near the rose garden

Water lilies in the rose garden

View of the rose garden

An arbor ran about half way around the garden

Near the gardens was a gondola called the Telefuerico Madrid, which took us across the river to nowhere – the terminus was in a wilderness area at the edge of a park, a kilometer or two from an amusement park, but there was no transport. We bought a round trip ticket, so after wandering around a bit, we returned to the origin. When we got on near the rose garden, we told the operator we wanted an English version of the narration, but we didn’t get it. On the way back, however, we did. It was actually pretty stupid – I wish we hadn’t bothered, as it is easier to tune out the foreing language than English.

We ate lunch, then took the metro to Royal Palace, where the king does not live, but which is used for state occasions. We wandered the area a bit, and bought Roger a hat pin. As we were checking them out, we saw another tourist about our age, also wearing a hat, admiring the pins. His wife rolled her eyes at us, or perhaps just at me!

Rain had been threatening all afternoon, so we returned to hotel, arriving just as the first drops of rain began to fall. We spent the latter part of the afternoon in the hotel, dozing and surfing and writing and reading. I was not as tired as yesterday, probably because we did no museums today.

In the subway were several women and a few men
 dressed in some sort of native costume

The rain really served to cool things down – we made sure we had our sweaters on as we left the room for dinner, although during the day it had been quite hot. We ate dinner down the street, where we shared a pitcher of sangria and had to stagger home. In the restaurant, we met a couple in the restaurant from Toronto - he is a native of that city and speaks French, she is a native of Mexico. They are in Spain for 10 days’ vacation. Obviously they had no trouble with the language.