May 5 - Barcelona

The Geese at the Cathedral

Today we arrived in Barcelona and it was time to disembark. It was about the smoothest disembarkation we’ve ever experienced. Our trip wasn’t over though because we spent the day and night in Barcelona.

Our tour guide Jose Soler and his driver Valeriano from Pepito Tours picked us up for our Barcelona City Highlights Tour and transfer to our hotel. We were with our 6 friends and it was truly amazing to see Jose and Valeriano manage to get all our luggage and carryons in the van. They must be expert at jigsaw puzzles.

Our tour took us first to the Gothic quarter of the city, one of the oldest parts. It was drizzling lightly but that didn’t deter us from visiting the Cathedral. We saw the courtyard of the building, which includes the Well of the Geese. The residents are 13 very plump geese. Tradition has it that there are 13 because that was the age of St. Eulalia when she was martyred. The Cathedral is officially the Cathedral of the Holy Cross and Saint Eulalia.

As we wandered through the quarter we came to a building which contains a massive column, part of the remains of the old Roman city which was once on the site. It was unexpected to see such a huge thing inside a building.

Our next stop was in the Eixample district where we saw the houses designed by Gaudi. The fanciful colors and architecture were quite beautiful to see. One in particular, the Casa Battlo (known by the locals as the House of Bones) was especially stunning with its tiled roof and unusual balconies.

From Eixample we headed up the hill to Parc Guell, the park that lies above Barcelona and also includes designs by Gaudi. The park is a World Heritage site and includes interesting walkways and columns all designed to look like elements of nature. Many of the columns are built to look like tree trunks with spreading branches above. The area was to have been a residential complex, but only two houses were ever built. The structures that are there include lovely mosaics including a beautiful fountain at the main entrance to the park.

Our final stop was the Sagrada Familia Church, another of Gaudi’s works. The church was begun in 1882 and is not expected to be completed until 2026, though it will be dedicated by the Pope in November, 2010. The building is an amazing thing to see. When completed it will have 18 towers and three distinct facades representing the Nativity, the Passion and the Glory. We were able to go inside the building which is filled with scaffolding and where workers were busily working to complete the interior. It was awesome seeing the sparks from welders cascading down from the great heights of the nave. Below the building is a sort of museum where we could watch craftsman making models of architectural features yet to be completed. Perhaps the most intriguing thing we saw was a display of the system Gaudi used to calculate stresses to be borne by the columns. He constructed a model upside down constructed with strings with sacks of sand hanging from them to visualize the stresses. Next to the model he had a mirror placed to reflect his model right side up. I confess that I was confused by the thing and could only surmise that he was a genius who didn’t think the same way most of us do.

After checking into our hotel, the 1898 located on La Rambla, we set out on our own. Our first stop were some delicious tapas for lunch. We went back to the Gothic quarter to spend more time exploring the little streets and to visit the Cathedral again. Our final stop on the way back to the hotel was La Boqueria Market. It’s one of the largest markets in Barcelona and was wonderful to wander through. The variety of seafood, meats, produce and spices were wonderful to see.