AFOOT IN BARCELONA

While the other members of our tour group caught their shuttles to the airport, we opted to take a leisurely check out mid-morning.  We caught a cab right outside the hotel for our brief trip to our B&B for the next four nights.  We could have walked, but didn’t want to be schlepping bags through crowded sidewalks.  First, good-bye to the Hotel Colon, and its central location across from the cathedral.  I think rooms go for a little over $200/night off-tour, but if you want to be close to the action, it’s hard to beat.

If you walk to the right past the awnings in the pic above, then look back, this (below) is what you see:  the cathedral looming right across the square.  Our room was back here, down the alleyway to the right.  No view, but it was quiet!

We got to our next lodging, the strangely-named “Close to Passeig de Gracia B&B,” located in the “moderniste” (i.e, laid out in a regular grid pattern as opposed to the sinuous passageways of the older parts of the city) Eixample district.  The entrance is the unmarked, dark opening, and our room is marked above.

The room wasn’t ready, so we left our bags with our hosts, Ivan and Marc, and set out to do some exploring.  There are only a handful of Gaudi buildings in Barcelona, so we decided to knock off the closest ones.  First up was the Casa Batllo (on right, below), with its mask-like balconies.  The guidebooks talk about this being a “skull and bones” façade, but I don’t see it.  This was not an original construction, but was a remodel of an earlier building, and was completed in 1904.  He used ceramics, stone, and forged iron.

Next up was Casa Mila, aka La Pedrera, with its undulating balconies and elaborate ironwork.  This was a large apartment building as opposed to a private residence.

Here’s a detail of the ironwork.  Hmmmm.

We decided to get a late lunch before checking into the B&B, so we went back to its general area and started walking the surrounding streets, reading the posted menus.  One place looked interesting, although the menu had no translations.  A woman was standing by the door, and she piped up that she was a guest and that the place was excellent.  A shill?  Didn’t seem so.  She said the staff would help us in deciphering the menu.  OK, let’s give it a shot.  This was one of the best decisions of our trip.  We thought it easiest to try the “fixed” menu of the day, but even it had challenges:  choice of 7 starters, 6 mains, dessert, and beverage for 16.5E.  Since we were probably going to make this our only big meal of the day, that seemed pretty reasonable.  Boy, was it.

They sat us by ourselves in what looked like the long entryway, with about seven tables and the bar, with a view back to the kitchen door.  A stairwell led down to the main restaurant, but it seems like they had a private function going on down there.  We felt a little lonely by ourselves, as only one other solitary diner joined us on our level.  I was wondering if we were in tourist purgatory and feared the worst.  Not the case.

The waitress tried valiantly, but her English was, if anything, worse than my Spanish.  They brought us something first, along with excellent bread, that we hadn’t ordered, but it was like the chef’s amuse bouche, consisting of prawns (which I ate) and some meatball things, which Loni had (as she’s allergic to shellfish)  From the waitress’ description, it seems the first four starter choices were all “fish,” without any further definition.  Loni opted for a plain salad, as she didn’t want to risk a shellfish surprise.  I forged ahead and ordered a “fish salad,” whatever that might be.  Well, it turned out to be an absolutely beautiful and delicious dish of seared scallops on artichoke leaves.  We definitely need to get a better dictionary to haul around.  The mains were outstanding.  I had a duck comfit with an apple compote, which melted in the mouth, and Loni had rabbit with sliced potatoes and peppers.  We had rice pudding for dessert, as the others all seemed to have the ubiquitous “fish” in the description.  For dessert?  Anyway, it was ALL good.

We strolled back to the B&B and got ourselves checked in and unpacked. The room is a little stark without wall hangings, but was nicely sized with a big king bed.  We also had one of the two rooms with a private bathroom, which is behind me as I take this picture.  That’s a shallow closet behind Loni.

We watched a little TV and about 5:30 went back out to walk to the La Rambla, which is the big pedestrian promenade that attracts huge crowds or, as the guidebook says, “where tourists mix with pickpockets, buskers, scammers, street performers, and locals.”  Fortunately, we didn’t encounter any unsavories, and, really, we never felt uncomfortable no matter where we walked or the hour of the day/night.  Although we didn’t try it, we’re told it’s just as busy as this at 3:00 a.m.

We did encounter this horrific scene playing out.  Oh, no, not the scoot!

These guys were from the police, not AAA.  They attached the sling to a hoist, and some poor soul was out his/her ride home.  Given that we saw scooters and motorcycles parked just about anywhere and everywhere, I can’t fathom what the violation was here. 

 

 

At the foot of La Rambla, where it ends at the harbor, there stands the 1888, 150-ft pedestal and statue of Columbus, the Monument a Colom.  Nearby were the shipyards that constructed two of his fleet, which is about his only connection to Barcelona.  His back to us, he’s  pointing with an 18-inch finger to the right.  Alas, not towards the New World, but vaguely towards Sicily.

 

 

 

We spent another couple of hours just walking around and taking in the flavor of the city.  The older part is quite beautiful, and reminded us a lot of some Parisian neighborhoods, but with more windy streets.  We grabbed a gelato as our evening “meal” and slowly made our way back to the B&B.  Here’s some typical scenes:

Always on the lookout for interesting facades, I liked this one with its relief markings, overlooking one of the many stalls markets around the city.  Also pictured is this trip’s winner for my favorite storefront.

We got back to the B&B about 8:00, completely wiped out, grabbed some fruit from the kitchen, and crashed early.  I was a little dubious about the noise factor, as our 120-year-old windows did not close all the way, and there was substantial car and motorbike noise from the street.  Fortunately, it died down enough so that I could drift off, with the help of an Ambien.  When I talked with our host the next day about the windows, he said they were going to be replaced in a week, and we were the last guests in the room before the conversion.  Hah!  Just my luck.  The next morning we had a breakfast of cereal, bread yoghurt, tomatoes and coffee.  No full English here!  It was more than enough, though.  We met a couple of retired Brit émigrés, originally from Yorkshire and now living on an olive ranch in Malaga for the last 16 years.  He bemoaned the fact that his Spanish still was not very good after all that time.  Probably because so many Spaniards speak English. 

Our first goal this morning was the Museu Picasso.  He spent some early years (1895-1904) here, first showing his work in 1900.  The museum houses some 3,500 of his works that were donated after his death by his manager in 1962.  Note that none of these works was purchased.  If you read that as a collection of 2nd and 3rd-rate pieces, you would be right.  Full disclosure:  other than his early stuff that actually resembles living forms, I can’t stand Picasso.  So, take my criticism for what it’s worth.  We both thought that the whole thing was a waste of time, especially given the l-o-o-o-n-g line to get into the place.

Next up was the biggest city park, the Parc de la Ciutadella (Citadel).  In 1888, this was the site of the Universal Exposition that put Barcelona on the map.  This was nice to stroll around and people watch, but wasn’t particularly stirring.

Wandering back into the city we stumbled upon a huge ironwork building that turned out to be the Born Centre Cultural, an 1871 structure originally built as the main city market.  Today, it hovers over excavations of layers of the city going back to the turn of the 18th century, when much of it was destroyed in a siege. 

Back to the winding streets and another example of why I need to be more judicious in using the HDR (high dynamic range) function of this camera.  HDR takes three shots in rapid succession, blends them for the best (allegedly) exposure in each area of the photo, and produces a single picture.  Unfortunately, if anyone is moving in the shots, the end result shows ghost images.  See the people to the left of me.  No red hat for me, just gray hair.

Don’t have a clue what I was looking up at.  We stopped for lunch in the Born-Ribera area at a taverna, just as it started to drizzle.  Good timing and pretty good food;  we both had salads, and Loni had an entrecote and I had bream.  We then walked all the way across the harbor to go to the Maritime Museum, only to find out it was closed this day. 

We wandered up through the El Raval area and into the courtyard of the School of Farmacia, where we watched a king-sized chess match being played.  The trees were just starting to blossom out, and it was quite a peaceful spot.  Hey!  No red hat???

Next up was the extraordinary Palau de la Musica Catalana, a riot of color and form designed in 1908 by, not Gaudi, but Lluis Domenech i Montaner.  It was intended to celebrate the importance of music in Catalan culture to the ordinary people, in juxtaposition to the more formal tones of the Castilian-speaking Liceu opera house.  Whatever the intent, it’s a gorgeous building on the outside and, we are informed, on the inside.  We didn’t get a tour.

You can see the white busts at the top of the columns; they represent Palestrina (Renaissance composer of sacred music), Bach, Beethoven, and, around the corner, Wagner.  The mosaics adorn the large supporting columns beneath. 

The dude on top with the sword is St. George;  no word on the babe in the wispy dress.

Loni hadn’t been feeling well all day, needing bathrooms here and there, so we decided to call it quits and head back to the B&B.  We again grabbed some bread and fruit from the kitchen, and that was enough to tide us over for the night.