The sun was shining and I started with a stroll up La Rambla. Sunday walkers, tourists, and human statues were out in abundance. The wide boulevard brought me to a pretty intense market, La Boqueria. Fruit, meat, seafood, sheep heads, anything that a normal palate desires was available. I wandered and wondered for a very long time.
Boqueria Market
Boqueria
Legs of hanging ham
Yup, it's an octopus
Hungry?
My fruit salad
An easy sunny saunter brought me to the Eixample and Gaudi's modernist apartment buildings. Interesting but not totally my style. I prefer something a bit more classic for apartment buildings. Alas, his vision is infectious and I wanted to visit Parc Guell during the daylight. I made the pilgrimage up and up and soaked in the bizarre landscape. Tourist watching was great.
One of Gaudi's many apartments
Up up to Park Guel
The wavy benches of park Guel
Gingerbread house
Lonely musician playing from the heart
The gate guard
I made my way down from the park and to the closest metro where I connected to Placa d'Espanya at the Northern end of Montjuic. Montjuic is enormous (as I would later discover) and I didn't have much of a plan for it. I knew there were a few museums, an Olympic center, castle, and a graveyard. After wandering around aimlessly for an hour and not seeing a single thing that I had set out to see I decided to consult a map. That is when I realized just how big the mountain is. I had barely made any progress. The map and sheer determination finally got me to some buildings, including the Catalan Museum and the Olympic Stadium of 1992. I ended up on the East side of the mountain just in time for a cloudy smoggy sunset, yum. "Just up this slope behind me and I will be at the cemetery!" I thought as the sunlight was slipping quickly away. After a stiff ascent and an abrupt stop at a cliff's edge I realized that I was quite far from my destination. Why did I ever put that map down?
I was forced back down to sea level in a part of Barcelona that was not on my map, very far from my hostel. I came across signs that pointed towards the Barcelona city center, the seaport, or Montjuic. The male in me said "no way you are backtracking!" the realist said "you have no need for a freight boat" and the optimist said "it can't be that far can it?" An hour later, after being offered sex by a few prostitutes, I found myself on the shoulder of a Spanish freeway, car and truck headlights whizzing by at 120km per hour, wishing I had jumped on that cargo boat. Again, I was too stubborn to turn back. I stuck it out. Two kilometers I walked along that death river of steel and glass. It makes me smile now to think of the thoughts that must have been going through the drivers' heads. "Another skinny white American boy terribly lost on the freeway...when will they learn?"
Honestly, I completely forget what this building is
National Museum of Catalan Art
Olympic monument (or something kinda like that)
I made it safely (surprisingly) back to my hostel, checked out, and grabbed my backpack. I caught the metro to the train station and dumped my bag in a luggage locker. I didn't feel like lugging around all night, I would be back at 3:30am to pick it up before my bus left at 4:00am. I had a great time wandering around the city at night for the last time. New apartment buildings, old narrow streets, medieval buildings, all basking in the cool night air.
I stopped into an all-night cafeteria and ordered a "bomb." It is a baked potato with the insides taken out, mixed with meat, stuffed back in, and smothered in a creamy spicy sauce. Weird but wicked! I stayed for a while, reading a copy of "For Whom the Bell Tolls" which I had picked up in the Eixample and watching shift after shift of street cleaners come in to enjoy a beer and a sandwich. The time approached and I got up and caught my bus to the train in order to collect my bag and get on the airport bus...goodbye Barcelona, thanks for having me.
Bomb
Street cleaner posse
Eerie glow of nighttime Barcelona
