Barcelona III

There are many reasons why Barcelona is now my favorite city in Europe, and the Modernista architecture is not among the least of those reasons. Our third day in Barcelona was spent exploring the Gaudi sights and again eating amazing food and drinking great wine (even the cheap stuff is fabulous over there).

Casa Batllo, Casa Mila, and Sagrada Familia (all Gaudi architecture) were within walking distance of our hotel, so we went to all of those places.

Casa Batllo (Gaudi):We stopped and had some wine right in front of Casa Batllo:

Garden on the corner:Casa Mila (Gaudi):Sagrada Familia is Gaudi's great church. It is not finished and is not expected to be complete for 25 years! It is amazing anyway though.After that, we took a taxi to Parc Guell, which was my favorite thing I saw the whole time I was over in Europe. Parc Guell is a park on the north side of Barcelona that Gaudi designed. It is AWESOME!!

Barcelona II

Sunday morning was Palm Sunday. While we were eating churros and chocolate for breakfast, there was a beautiful Palm Sunday procession going down the street on the Rambla. It was so cool! After breakfast, we went and explored the Barri Gotic (Gothic Quarter). It is basically the old city of Barcelona and it is full of tiny little labyrinthine streets and alleys, old buildings, and beautiful churches and museums. We went through the Placa Real: There are four lamp posts in Placa Real that are among Gaudi's first works: Eventually we ended up at the Picasso Museum. No pictures are allowed inside, but here is a picture of the entrance.

Another beautiful church:

Along the way there were plenty of tapas and good Spanish wine! I especially liked the olives. They are not like the olives here. They are less salty and have an earthier taste. Yum!Near the end of the day, I finally saw my first Gaudi building: Palau Guell. It gave me just a little taste of all the Gaudi and Modernista sights we would see the next day. I love that stuff!

That night, mom went back to the hotel and Amanda and I went out. We tried to hit this shot bar Amanda had heard about, but it wasn't open. We ended up having tapas and drinks two different places, and then we hit an Irish pub on the way home. By then I had gotten used to entering places and saying "Dos vino tinto por favor" (roughly, "Two red wines please" with bad grammar I am sure and even worse spelling). I said that to the Irish bartender at the pub and he just looked at me like I was crazy. They definitely spoke English there.