Mary: Gaudí, will you be mine?

Happy Valentines Day, friends and fam!

This past weekend I was in Barcelona with a few of the girls I have met here—Kirstin, Kristen, and Rachel—and when one typically thinks Barcelona, (Bar-TH-lona), one thinks warm, sunny, beach town. In my optimism for this fantastical Barcelona, I packed no jeans, only leggings, no sweaters, and simply my leather jacket. COLD! Colder here than it was in Madrid, with highs in the low 40s. I’m such an idiot! Although the trip was wonderful, I so wish I had prepared better for the weather—it would have made the trip that much better.

Anyway, we arrived by plane at 8 A.M. on Saturday, took the bus into town, and met up with a friend of Kristen’s from home. She took us down Las Ramblas, the ultimate party and pickpocket street—also where Kirstin and I booked our hostel. The first thing we come to is this HUGE food market, called “Mercat de Sant Josep/La Boqueria.” EVERYTHING: chocolate, fruit, nuts, candy, vegetables, meats, etc. Now, the Spanish, as made evident by the pig legs hanging everywhere, are not as prude as Americans about their meat. Lamb heads with googly eyeballs stared at me from behind glass cases. Un-skinned rabbits hung gruesomely from ropes. No dogs, though, so that was a relief.

Further down Las Ramblas is Columbus Square, near where, apparently, Columbus is buried. (Remember my Seville post?? Every Spanish city believes they hold the dear remains of ol’ Columbo). And then you find the beach with its shopping malls, clubs, hotels, restaurants, and yacht clubs. Really pretty and sparkly. But cold so I didn’t get into the beach spirit. I want to go back in the summer! Who’s with me??

Kirstin and I were able to get into our hostel early, so everyone decided to siesta before doing some sightseeing. Hostel was nice and simple: an old apartment building. We had our own room and our own bathroom, and both the room and the showers were toasty. However, it wasn’t five minutes of lying on my bed that the support planks of my bed gave in and dropped to the floor. It’s official. Too many patisserie visits. So my sleeps weren’t as productive as I would have hoped, as my butt was almost touching the ground while my back and legs were raised up. You win some, you lose some!

Saturday afternoon we visited Gaudí’s unfinished temple: La Sagrada Familia. I knew absolutely nothing about Gaudí prior to this trip, and now I’m almost certain he is one of my favorite artists of all time. This temple was incredible. One side looked like it was modeled in more of a gothic-style—but kind of a mock gothic, because there was some uneven-ness about it, like he was making his own twist to the gothic-style. And the other side was much more stylized. One side (the gothic side) represents Christ’s birth, and the stylized side depicts Christ’s crucifixion. The inside is incredible. I’m glad Brandi Stanton insisted I pay the money to go inside! These tall pillars everywhere and cool-colored stained-glass windows—Gaudí intended to make the inside look like a mystical forest. Bummer we couldn’t climb the towers to the top, though. Apparently the view of Barcelona is really great from there.

An interesting little Gaudi fact: a car killed him as he was walking on some street. People didn’t realize who he was, so he was given a “pauper” funeral and burial with little to no attendance. When people realize their mistake it was a major embarrassment!

After La Sagrada Familia, we went back to our rooms in order to shower/get ready for the night, which we planned to be BIG! Napped a little more, we left to go eat around 9 P.M. We went to some little diner-ish place for dinner, nothing special, but we were able to pre-game at Kristen’s friend’s apartment, which was really fun because that is something we are not able to do at our host families’ houses in Madrid! At about MIDNIGHT we left to go out in the town. We got to a famous Barcelona bar called “The Dow Jones.” Funny, because it’s an American theme. There are screens all over the bar set up like the stock market screens, except these screens list drink names. As one drink grows in popularity during the night, the price goes up, so you want to order something else in order to get a cheaper drink. At random points in the night, the lights turn off and a red light blinks with a loud alarm, letting you know the stock market has crashed! Then every drink is dirt-cheap! Fun. We had really weird shots there.

We had planned to visit some nightclubs afterwards, because Barcelona nightclubs are some of the most famous in the world, but people were either too drunk or too tired. On the long way home on the metro, (I made some direction mistakes), Kirstin threw up on the metro. Not fun. But it happens to the best of us! It was a relief to be back in our broken beds by the time we got back to the hostel.

The next day we went to Gaudí’s famous park, “Park Guell.” By far my favorite sight I’ve yet seen in Spain. A sandy, eclectic park filled with Gaudí’s architectural designs. The best part was his swirly bench that rounded a nice viewpoint of the city. The viewpoint was not my focus however, but the tiling designs on the bench were so beautiful. Random colors, shapes, pictures, etc., covered every inch of the bench. I wish I could give a better description but hopefully my pictures will help. I literally walked around the benches two times because I found them so amazing.

After that, we found a crummy lunch place, (I swear, no one I travel with appreciates food like I do. I would be more than happy to stick out my hunger in order to find some yummy food places, but my travel-mates could care less! From now on, I’m doing research), and then we made the trip to Montjuic—a spectacular view of the whole city, as well as the beaches and the ocean. We went at sunset so that made the pictures really pretty.

I was pretty disappointed I didn’t get to go to the Picasso museum, but next time. We eventually went out to dinner at 11 P.M., true Spanish-time, and had wonderful tapas. I was happy to have at least one good meal. A famous tapa I think I have failed to mention is over-easy eggs mixed with noodles or rice. I like mine with tomato sauce because I think otherwise it lacks flavor, but people love it here!

Monday morning Kirstin and I snagged some breakfast from the food market, (kiwi and coconut juice mmm), and got on our plane home! Travel went so smoothly, thank goodness. J

Today is the inevitable Valentines Day. Haha. Planning on getting some major chocolate and churros tonight and pigging out! Hope everyone has a nice one. Thanks for reading my blogs—I know how wordy they get.

As always, missing and loving you.

Mary

Las Ramblas Food market!

Next to the spices--that one is for you, Andy.

I kiwwed da wabbit!

Barca Beach!

La Sagrada Familia, gothic side. Forgot to mention: the plans state the cathedral will be finished in 2030! These predictions of completion change almost yearly. As said in a previous post, "manana manana."

Stylized side.

...

Forest-esque pillars and ceiling.

A turtle just for you, Gin!

Dow Jones what uppp

Me on Las Ramblas! Always, always buzzing. Either with late-nighters or early-morningers.

A famous street-show in Barcelona--the human tower! See the little kid to the right?? He gets on top! So scary. Youtube it, apparently there are towers with way more people than this!