THE END OF THE TOUR

Now,where were we?  Ah, yes, Barcelona, or Bar-theh’-lona as the locals say, and time for Antonio Gaudi.  Born in 1852 just south of Barcelona, his early years were spent in the family foundry.  Obsessed with the shapes and structures of the natural world, he studied architecture and early on rebelled against the “compass and T-square” school, and focused on hyperboloids and other unpronounceable shapes.  He had some success through the end of the century, but really took off when he acquired an admiring patron named Eusebi Guell, who funded and launched Park Guell, intended as a residential development for the well-off, and on which he gave Gaudi free reign.  After a dozen years or so, the economics of lot acquisitions forced a halt, Guell then died, and the project was transferred by his heirs to the Barcelona city council and reopened as a public park in 1928.  What Gaudi had created, however, was spectacular in its beauty and weirdness. 

Straight lines seem entirely accidental.

Looking from inside the Park, the two structures with the grey and white roofs flank the entrance to it.  They were conceived as the porter’s lodge for welcoming visitors, and were built between 1901 and 1903.  The roofs are clad with trencadis, or tile-shard mosaic. 

The building on the left also doubled as La Casa Del Guarda, or the porter’s residence.  I particularly liked the windows detail.

Upon entering between these two buildings, you are faced with the “Monumental Flight Of Steps.”  I don’t know about monumental, but they are pretty elaborate. 

The stairs lead up to the Hypostyle Room, or Columns Room, about which more later.  Note the walls with mosaic inserts.  Behind that big plant is a brightly colored dragon, or salamander, take your guidebook pick.

A closer view of the mosaic tile walls flanking the stairs.  Amazing these things have lasted over a hundred years.  How long would they survive in any U.S. city, I wonder?

At the top of the stairs is the open-air, but covered, Hypostyle Room, its roof supported by 86 striated columns.  It was conceived as a space that could serve as a market for the estate, but it was never used as such.  The outer columns, along with the roof, slope in an undulating movement.  In fact, virtually none of the columns actually rises straight up, but some lean more than others.  That’s not camera perspective that is making those tilts.  A few of the more vertical ones are actually pipes that funnel rain runoff from the plaza above down to collecting pools and eventually to the fountains below.  Gravity fountains!

The ceiling is formed of small domes and clad with tile shards designed by one of Gaudi’s collaborators, Josep Maria Jujol.  There is color and intricate design everywhere.

On the roof above the Hypostyle lies the Nature Square which was meant for the holding of open-air shows.  According to the guide, the most common events held here were demonstrations of Catalan national affirmation.  The plaza features an undulating bench around the perimeter which also was planned by Jujol.  It was impossible to take pictures just about anywhere in the Park without a gaggle of tourists in the shot.

Including from our own group, “she who must worm her way into every scene,” seen here with our erstwhile local guide.  He’s speaking into his mike, while we all follow along on earbuds.  The only way to go on these guided tours.  You can ramble all over and still hear every word.

We fit our undulating bodies onto the undulating bench, with the entrance buildings behind.  That’s just morning haze from the Mediterranean gumming up the vista.

Side shot showing the Hypostyle holding up the Nature Square.  The square extends off to the right and opens into a fairly large plaza.

One bizarre feature is a portico formed by a long line of buttresses, which hold up an upper roadway above.  It looks like the interior curl of a great wave.

The portico ends in a spiral ramp with otherworldly, helicoidal, ice-cream-cone columns.  Reminds me of a certain West L.A. parking garage I’ve been in.

Gaudi actually built his personal residence on the estate and lived here from 1906 until his death in 1926.  Although beautifully detailed, it is remarkably “normal,” given his wild propensities for curvature.

Gaudi’s masterpiece, of course, is his (still) unfinished Basilica De La Sagrada Familia.  On this day, the last of our tour with Collette, we only did a walk-by of the outside.  We did the inside on our own, later.

Gaudi didn’t even start it.  It was begun in 1882 under Francesc Villar, and passed on to Gaudi in 1891, who started the Nativity  façade in 1893.  Unfortunately, at the time of his death by streetcar in 1926, only one tower of the façade had been completed.  Now there are four, looking like larger versions of the Watts Towers.  Just this year, the powers-that-be for the first time issued a projected date of completion for the entire project:  2026, 144 years after it was started.  Our guide invited us to return in 11 years.  The northeast-facing Nativity façade was the first completed.  It looks for all the world like a bunch of melting candles.  The four towers represent the apostles Barnabas, Jude, Simon, and Mathew.  The three main arched doorways are Charity, in the center, Faith on the right, and Hope on the left.

 

 

 

 

Detail of the Hope portal at left, and the Charity main entrance in the center.  Over the Charity portal is a representation of the birth of Christ.  Hope, on the left, shows biblical scenes including the slaughter of the innocents (what’s that got to do with hope?), and the flight into Egypt.  If you can pick these out, your eyes are better than mine.

OK, I’ll help you out.  Here’s a crop of the central column of the Charity, with Joseph standing on the left and Mary, with head down and hood falling over her head, cradles the infant.

Finished with our morning walk-by of the Sagrada, we walked back to the bus.  Spot Loni?

The bus was going to drop some of us off at the hotel for a free afternoon, but the rest of us would stay on for the side excursion to Montserrat, a Benedictine monastery high in the sawtoothed mountains west of town.  On the way out, we got a nice view of the port area of downtown Barcelona.

and, panning more to the left, the rest of the city, with the Sagrada wispily stretching up along the left horizon.  That bullet-shaped building on the right is the Torre Agbar, home of the Agbar water company, a skyscraper with a design similar to the Gherkin building in London.  This place is spread out.  When we were on our own after the tour, we walked nearly the whole city.  One day, according to Loni’s Fitbit, we covered 18 miles!

Our destination is up by those fingery peaks.  Montserrat means “serrated mountains/cut with a saw,” take your pick.

The long climb up.  Our driver was a master at negotiating small roads;  this one is a veritable highway to him.

A monastery has been on this site since the Middle Ages, but was destroyed by Napoleon’s forces in 1812.  The present structures date from the late 19th century.  Thousands of honeymooning couples flock here each year seeking the blessing of La Moreneta – the Black Virgin of Montserrat (more later).  Although we drove up, there are two funiculi (?), a lower and an upper.  The lower brings you to the main buildings, the upper goes w-a-a-a-y up to the hermitage of Sant Joan (left and right, respectively, below).  Arrow points to the crossover point of the upper funicular.

The monastery buildings proper are to the right of the above, and the entrance is through a big stone archway.  Through the archway you can see the roadway leading up to the plaza and the principal buildings.

The setting from the main plaza within the monastery’s walls, looking back towards where the entry arch is.  You can just see the top of the upper funicular at upper left.  There are only 80 or so monks still in residence, plus some nuns.  Those seeking a bit of the ascetic life can rent a cell for a while and contemplate their navels in peace (well, at least after the tourists leave for the day).

A small portion of a 15th century cloister was preserved, featuring delicate columns.  The statue on the right is St. George, patron of Catalonia, and is done in the same modernistic style employed by the sculptor who did one of the other facades of the Sagrada Familia (which we’ll see later).  Quite a stark contrast to Gaudi’s curved works.

The huge rocks do loom over everything.  Reminded me of the U.S. southwest. 

Through the projecting building on the right, above, lies the focal point of Montserrat and the pilgrimages that come here – the basilica and its Black Madonna!  We had to go through there, down a long passageway, and into the Atrium of the basilica with the façade facing us, virtually invisible from outside the walls and flanking buildings.  Since there are twelve figures, I’m gonna guess that they represent the apostles.

We entered through a side passage and joined a very long queue waiting to see the statue, murmuring our way past beautiful mosaics and sculptures.

After a lot of stairs, low archways, and meandering corridors, we reached the object of all the pilgrimages – La Moreneta, the Black Virgin.  They keep the line moving, so I didn’t have much time to compose a shot.  But you can see the darkness of the face and hands (and the infant), hence the sobriquet.  The statue sits behind a sheet of glass. However, her right hand is holding a sphere (which symbolizes the universe) and it sticks out through an opening in the glass.  Supposedly, it is tradition for you to kiss or touch the Virgin's hand whilst opening out your other hand to Jesus.  Oh blech!  Shades of the unsanitary Blarney Stone. I didn’t see anyone try it.

The statue is carved of wood, and the face is black simply because of darkening over the centuries.  From historical accounts, it was lighter when newer.  The statue sits in an alcove that is visible from the basilica below.

Unfortunately, there were always people standing in front of it as you can see in the opening.

Anyway, it’s a spectacular basilica.  When you exit, you are funneled through the “opportunity” to purchase and light a candle to commemorate your pilgrimage to the Madonna. 

And, spectacular is the name also for the lofty setting of this place which, on the one side not flanked by the mountains, falls off sharply to the valley below.

To the right of this gap is another cliffside, with even more remote outbuildings that take a mountain goat to get to.

On our way back to the bus, we got a hundred-mile view.  Sure looks like Arizona!

This being our last day of the tour, Collette puts on a fancy farewell dinner.  Unfortunately, this one was held at the hotel and the kitchen just wasn’t up to the task.  The food was pretty mediocre at best.  Don’t ask me what this was supposed to be.  It was inedible.

Regardless, Collette overall did a splendid job, and a good time was had with all our instant friends.  That’s Nadine, our guide, sitting with our driver, whose name I am embarrassed to say I have forgotten.  Carlos comes to mind, but . . .  He was Portuguese, not Spanish, and apparently many of the contract drivers come from there for some reason.  In the morning, most of our companions will transfer to the airport for flights home.  We, of course, are staying four more days in Barcelona and then will fly to Lisbon for our second tour.  Good-bye to a good gang.