Besides our unfortunate hostel stay, the rest of Barcelona was as great as I remembered. Barcelona is very different from the rest of Spain; the architecture is more similar to the buildings in France, the language is Catalonian instead of Spanish, and the people aren’t quite as friendly. Maybe I like it so much because it reminds me of Paris.
On our first day, after a quick trip to Las Ramblas, where we enjoyed the street performers, we visited a Museum of the city’s history. Did you know that there is an ancient Roman village sitting below the city streets? We learned about ancient clothes washing (they used urine as a cleaning agent), Roman church building, and the production of wine. It was really cool to see the roman ruins, and the museum had a good audio guide, which made it easy to decipher what we were looking at.
After the museum, we ate some dried papaya that we bought earlier at the Mercat de la Boqueria along Las Ramblas. The market was very colorful and had everything from fruit to fresh fish (I mean it was still kicking!) It was quite the experience.
That night for dinner we had a picnic on the beach. Our hostel, even though it was far from the city, was only a few blocks from the sea. It was a good ending to our first day in Barcelona.
The next morning we headed for the Picasso museum. This is my favorite art museum of any I’ve been to. On the walls they have short excerpts about Picasso’s life, which put the art into context. The collection focuses on Picasso’s early work, so it’s interesting to see his slow progression to cubism. If you’re ever in Barcelona, this is a must see.
After the museum we went in search for lunch. We were hoping to find some cheap paella, but we didn’t have any luck. Instead we found ourselves walking along a nude beach! It was quite the shock. I had never seen so many naked people in my whole life. After finding our way out, we rode the tram to La Sagrada Famila, the famous cathedral designed by Antoni Gaudi. It’s amazing how huge it is, and how much detail is crammed into the architecture. I noticed things, like a Christmas tree in the middle of the façade, that I didn’t notice the last time. We didn’t visit the inside of the church, because it was a whopping 9 euros a person, we decided we’ll have to go back when it’s finished in 2020.
At this point we were starving and decided to try out the Spanish McDonald’s. We ate our entire meal off of the euro menu and spent only 7 euros, it was quite the deal!
On Monday we did a lot of walking. We started at the Arc de Triomph, which isn’t as big as the one in Paris, but it’s still fun to see. Afterwards we headed to Las Ramblas where we finally found some decently priced paella. It was delicious! It’s basically Spanish rice topped with seafood. It was definitely worth finding.
We walked off our lunch by climbing Montjuïc, the site of the 1992 Olympics. We visited the stadium and also found some amazing views of the city. It was quite the climb, and it definitely wore us out.
On the way back down, we stopped at Poble Espanyol, what I thought was going to be a mock Spanish village, kind of like the one in Plymouth Massachusetts. After paying a 6.50 entrance fee, I found it to be way less than I expected. It was basically a mall built inside of some old buildings. It was a rip off. After all of that walking we headed back to the hostel ready for bed.
The next day, before heading to the train station, we visited Parc Guell. It was designed by Gaudi to be an ideal living community. Unfortunately the project failed but today it makes a great park. There is tiling everywhere and odd tunnels and pathways. It’s a fun place to have a picnic.
Barcelona is great place, and I hope to have the chance to go back again someday.
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