So, I’m way past the point of looking touristy – I pull out my guidebook and map at least every other block to figure out where I am. I guess it’s just best to embrace it!
On Monday, I started the day with my favorite . . . chickpeas! Nothing says breakfast like chickpeas, but I figured if they were serving them then it was fine to eat them for breakfast. I seriously love those things and will be trying to recreate them as soon as I get home.
After my delicious breakfast, I decided that I was going to hit some more of the Gaudi sights (seriously, Barcelona is all about Gaudi) and decided to walk instead of taking the metro. The streets aren’t the easiest to navigate since there aren’t any street signs. They just have plaques on buildings so you actually have to turn onto the street and then find a building with a plaque to figure out what street you’re on – kind of an inconvenience if you picked the wrong street and then have to turn around. This, coupled with the fact that I was born with zero sense of direction, was going to make for an interesting day.
Overall I did fairly well and was proud of my navigation skills (more to come on this later). I went to two apartment buildings that Gaudi designed: Casa Batllo and Casa Mila. I didn’t go in Casa Batllo – heard it wasn’t worth the money – but I did go in Casa Mila primarily because it has an awesome room and I’d seen pictures of it in aforementioned guidebook.
While I was touring the roof, I met a girl from Korea who had been studying in Madrid and was visiting Barcelona before going back home. Since we were both by ourselves we toured around together and took pictures of each other so it actually looks like we’ve been there.
Top of Casa Mila
After that I walked back to the hotel area and hit up some souvenir shops. I’m looking for Christmas ornaments but there are none to be found. I’ve hummed “Merry Christmas” in multiple shops while demonstrating hanging something on a tree so they know what I’m looking for. No luck – ugh! One guy told me it was too early for that. Clearly he doesn’t understand that 99% of the people in his tourist trinket shop won’t be here around Christmas.
As I was continuing the search for the non-existent Christmas ornaments, I decided to take a left at a fork in the road right behind our hotel. I’ve walked this was several times but have always taken a right – this time I go left. About a minute up the street I see something that looks like the Cathedral square, the square where all the festival activities took place the day before. I’m thinking that’s strange, why do they have two of these? Then I realize that the day before I took the metro not once, not twice, but THREE times to this same spot. Not only did I take the metro, but I had to change from the red line train to the yellow line train which constituted a fair amount of walking between trains. Also the walk to the metro stop was further than it was than if I’d just walked to the Cathedral . All this to do a big freaking circle to end up just steps behind where I started. Again, I did this not once but THREE times in one day. Needless to say the smugness I felt from navigating the city early was gone. When I told Michelle about it she said she thought the Cathedral was near our hotel, but she took the two trains with me to dinner the night before so I’m not buying it.
That night we went in search of non-Spanish food, specifically Thai or Japanese. We landed on Japanese based on a recommendation by the hotel. Considering it was Valentine’s Day we were expecting a restaurant full of couples. Not so. It was a restaurant full of tradeshow people (the one Michelle’s here for). The food was great but we basically ate dinner with a restaurant full of tourists (many with their tradeshow name badges still on. Really? How hard is it to take those things off?)
Today (Tuesday), I went to a monastery at Montserrat, which means serrated mountain. It’s about an hour outside of Barcelona by train and then you have to take a cable car (funicular as they call it here) up to the top. This has been Catalunya’s (Barcelona area of Spain) most important pilgrimage site for thousands of years. The monastery was started in 1025 and the basilica there houses a black virgin (La Moreneta) that is said to have been carved by Luke and brought to Spain by Peter. Apparently she was hidden in a cave during the Moorish invasion and later discovered by shepherd children. In the early 1800’s Napoleon’s troops destroyed the Montserrat’s building but the monks hid the black virgin and it survived. It’s now in the church and you take a stairway up to see it – it’s in a little balcony up high in the front of the church. People touch Mary’s orb with one hand and hold their other hand up to show that they accept Jesus. I went up there and touched the orb – it was amazing to do something that people have been doing for thousands of years. I also took a discrete picture which I’m sure you aren’t supposed to do, but it was from the side and I promise no one could see me!
Monastery on top of mountain
La Moreneta - the Black Virgin
When I went back to the cable car stop there were only three people there waiting to go down and one of them was the Korean girl from the day before – small world! Once I got back to Barcelona I went to the Picasso Museum (close to our hotel and this time I was smart enough to walk.)
Picasso is from Spain and spent ages 14-21 in Barcelona; this museum has the world’s best collection of his early works. His early works were very different and much more realistic that the paintings that you associate with Picasso today. Picasso gave over 1,000 paintings from his personal collection to the museum. However, since he vowed not to set foot in a fascist, Franco-ruled Spain and died two years before Franco, he never so the museum.
Some fun tips about Spain:
Cell phone minutes: I’ve got a Spain SIM card for my phone which means I have a Spain number. To add more minutes to the SIM card, you can go in any bookstore or grocery store and give them your phone number and the amount of money/minutes you want to put on your phone. They ring it up like you are buying milk. I tried to do this on my own at a grocery store and asked to recharge my minutes. They told me no and someone who was shopping there came and explained to them that I wanted to add minutes – turns out they thought I wanted to plug in my phone.
Credit Cards: If you pay by credit/debit card at a restaurant they bring a mobile credit card terminal to your table. It’s kind of nice because it’s much quicker than waiting on them to take it, run it, and bring it back.
Tips: You don’t tip nearly as much in Spain (or Europe) as you do in the US. Typically you just round up to the nearest euro or leave one euro per person for a nice meal. It’s cheap but the service shows. You have to flag down waiters for service and they never bring you check without you asking for it.
Meal times: Lunch is typically 2pm – 4pm here and dinner doesn’t start before 9pm. I was in a restaurant today at 6:45pm and they were just getting the napkins, etc. ready for dinner. When we left the restaurant at 11:30 tonight it was still 90% full.
Sandwiches: They really love sandwiches –bocadillos – here. Sandwich shops are every few steps, some chains and some part of a local bakery shop. They are typically on a baguette with just ham and cheese or chorizo and cheese. People eat these walking down the street for breakfast or lunch. If you don’t want a pastry for breakfast, then a sandwich is about your only other option.
That’s all I’ve got for now. I’m debating on what to do the last two days in Barcelona – I definitely want to take another day trip but I don’t know if it will be to the beach town of Sitges or the city of Girona.
Hope you are all doing well!
Emily
sallysuesees.com 