Barcelona

You gotta love Barcelona—the food, the architecture, the history, the excitement that seems to run through the city. We’ve enjoyed them all for 3 days.

We’ve had tapas—probably too many! Picture 1 is just a sample. We’ve had croquettes, Spanish omelettes, tomato bread, tomato salad, grilled vegetables, jamon and lots of fried green peppers. Add a bottle of rioja. Enough said….

We’ve tried to do new things this trip. We tried to visit the Picasso Museum Sunday, but couldn’t get near the place because of crowds. So we’ve wandered the Barri Gotic, El Born, Montjuic and Eixample. Each neighborhood interesting. Fitbit tells us we’ve wandered 24 miles.

And this is earth-shattering! We decided not to lug all the stuff that we could get here—toothpaste, mouthwash, hand lotion, etc. Shopping was an interesting experience. There’s no Crest, no Scope, no Jergens…. It will be interesting to see how the new brands do.

One day we went up to Montjuic (literally, Mount of the Jews). Initially, We road a bus up part way and then climbed up to the castle. It’s an 18^th century typical fortification that was originally meant to protect the city. Until recently it’s purpose was more to repress the people of Barcelona—keep them from rebelling. During the Franco period, if you were sent to Montjuic, you didn’t come back. In the late 20^th century it was turned over to the city of Barcelona and today is a lovely park with wonderful views of the city. Pictures 2 shows a zoom into the Sagrada Familia church, while 3 and 4 are views of the seacoast and city.

Yesterday we ended our walk at Las Arenas shopping mall. Picture 5 shows what it looks like. This is what cities do when they outlaw bull fighting. Picture 6 shows what the interior looks like today.

We wandered the Gothic part of the city today and visited the Barcelona City Museum. Barcelona has an amazing Roman history. Rather than excavating the Roman columns and “bits”, they left them in place and you actually get to walk underground and visit the winery, tannery and home. Picture 7 shows you what it looks like.

Finally we wandered in the Eixample area. This is the Modernista part of Barcelona, where Gaudi is King. You just wander and are amazed at the beautiful balconies and flowing lines of the buildings. Picture 8 shows Gaudi’s Casa Batilo and Picture 9 shows a beautiful apartment building we happened across.

A great three days! Tomorrow we board our ship, the Seabourn Sojourn, and begin the adventure. We wander along Southern Spain, Morocco, the Canary Islands, Cape Verde Island, Angola, Namibia and South Africa. Then we get off for a while and get back on to wander our way to Singapore. We were supposed to make a couple more stops in Africa, but Ebola put a stop to that.

We’re often asked “Don’t you miss your home and family?” Home—no. Home is wherever we are. Family—yes. We do miss our daughter, son-in-law and 2 amazing granddaughters, but I think they enjoy sharing our adventures and we try to make up for it by spending a lot of time with them when we’re home. We do this blog for the girls so that they will appreciate our world and become great travelers (not tourists) themselves. Some day, when our bodies tell us we’ve done enough, we’ll have lots of memories to enjoy.