Barcelona, Spain
Trip Start
Apr 11, 2006
1
23
26
Trip End
??? ??, 2007
Barcelona,
Spain
Friday, October 13, 2006
Went to Barcelona for a conference of Meredith's that was taking place in Mallorca, an island in the Mediterranean Sea east of the Spanish mainland. We drove from Aussurucq to Barcelona, which took somewhere between five an seven hours, and found our little hotel ("pension" - kind of like an older version of a hostel but typically with private rooms). This place was a bit of a disappointment, especially since the beds (two different-sized single beds set up next to each other) took up basically the entire room.
Barcelona is absolutely beautiful. The architecture and layout of the city are both typical of the Spanish towns we've visited, in that the buildings are very often four to six stories high, featuring all sorts of ornate detail work and being laid-out to create fantastic pedestrian spaces. Street trees are important, as is public art. The city is fairly easy to see on a bicycle, though it isn't perfect: traffic can be heavy and fast (this is Spain), and one-way streets and other peculiarities make navigation a chore in places. The subway system seemed pretty good, as did the bus network. I'm not sure whether there was a light-rail/tram system.
The city's beaches are very accessible to the heart of town, and they seem to be well used. I have heard that the water quality of the Mediterranean, especially along the mainland coasts, is not so great, but that didn't seem to stop lots of folks from swimming. No real waves to speak of, from what I can remember.
Similar to the Basque Country, (Pais Vasco in Spanish), Barcelona is situated in Catalunya, another of Spain's historically and culturally separate regions that (I think) would also like its independence. In the middle of the 20th century, the Spanish dictator Franco imposed severe restrictions on the expression of anything having to do with these unique and interesting cultures, and there were many atrocities committed in the name of nationalism.
Part of our bike tour around the city focused on these problems of the city's history, and it was extremely interesting to hear about the changes that happened with both the rise and fall of Franco. Other highlights of the tour included Barcelona's own "triumphant arc" and a stop at Gaudi's famous cathedral, which is projected to be completed sometime in the 73rd century as far as I can tell. What a bizarre building. I recall vaguely that years after work was started, the architect's plans were either stolen or lost in a fire, and they hired a new person to recommence work after lots of idle time. This to me was a mistake: the building now resembles a Star Wars scene.
Other activities that Meredith and I had fun doing were going to the Roman ruins of the old city and visiting the contemporary art museum, which is a great building, but I can't remember the quality of their collection. Sorry for the loss of recall.
The thing about Barcelona that stuck out to me the most was that it was incredibly packed with tourists, even in October, and hot. I couldn't imagine the combination of much increased heat and numbers of visitors that one might find in July! While I wouldn't hesitate to go back to Barcelona, I think I would pick carefully what time of year that might happen - probably December or March would be great. No Ronaldinho sightings.
