Our Favorite Barcelona Experiences!

                    Mercat de La Boqueria

In my last travel article you discovered why you should make Barcelona, Spain, one of the first destinations of any visit to Europe. Now I want to share with you what you should plan to see in this cosmopolitan city. Of course travel is more than just seeing “things”. As you know from many of my prior articles (I have now written 51 of them, not counting my travel blog) Mary Ann and I often have some very often unplanned travel luck experiences. Whether it is seeing the President of Ecuador, escaping a stampede of animals in Mexico, or sheep shearing competitions in New Zealand, we often seem to have some of these “over the top” events. In Barcelona it was arriving, unbeknownst to us, during the biggest festival of the year. It is called the Festes de la Merce, and is a week long very riotous festival honoring the patron saint of Barcelona. For us this festival resulted in thinking no one worked, and they all were spending all of their time with the paseo (the stroll), as there were literally thousands of people on the streets. We enjoyed this fun with seeing street parades such as the parade of the giants and many of the squares filled with human pyramids, and the Plaza blasting out live music and dancing. Our last two days were after the end of the festival, so we did get a perspective of what normal life was like.

Now on to sharing our favorite “things”:

La Rambla: The strolling boulevard is one of a kind. You experience music buskers; local artists; flower and bird stalls, book stalls; human painted statues; open air restaurants, and at each cross street you can enter the Gothic Quarter (Barri Gotic) on the narrow alleys and streets into the original city of Barcelona. At the end of the street you are at the Port Olympic and Rambla de Mar. The waterfront has been completely modernized and has shopping malls, hotels, restaurants, trams to Montjuic (the Olympic site), trade centers, and a great pedestrian bridge to the boat harbor.

Mercat de La Boqueria: This has to be one of the best food and flower markets in all of Europe. It is about midway down La Rambla and off to one side. It is a huge covered collection of hundreds of fruit, meat, poultry, and every other kind of stand you would need to satisfy your fresh food shopping. It is very photo friendly and there are a lot of little stands to buy fresh food snacks.

Antoni Gaudi: You can hardly go anywhere in Barcelona without experiencing the influence of Gaudi, a modernist late 19th century architect who designed some really crazy stuff. You can see his buildings on the Passeig de Gracia (the shopping boulevard), along La Rambla, the Park Guell (don’t miss this), and the Sagrada Familia church. Even apart from the specific Gaudi buildings and designs, he influenced much of the Barcelona architecture. A building not to be missed is the icon of Barcelona, the Sagrada Familia Church. It is #1 of the tourist stops. It was only partially finished by Gaudi’s death in 1926 and is not expected to be complete until 2030. Good luck!

Barri Gotic and La Riberia: These two neighborhoods are the historic central district of the city. You can spend days wandering the narrow lanes and it is mostly vehicle free other than an occasional motorbike trying to skewer you. These areas contain not only some interesting tourist sites, but also many quaint craft shops. The world’s greatest shopper spent many hours here, while I leaned against walls in the lanes enjoying the people watching. In these neighborhoods you also will find the exceptional Picasso Museum which concentrates on his early works, and the huge Barcelona Cathedral which currently is getting a needed cleaning and is covered with scaffold.

Parc de la Ciutadella: This was an amazing first find for us. A former fortress (Ciutadella) converted into a huge public park near La Riberia and not far from the waterfront. This is where the zoo and the Catalan Parliament are located. I am sure there is no connection there! It is pleasant quiet park with some outstanding fountains and lakes. A good retreat from the busy city.

Montjuic: This is one of several mountains overlooking the sprawling city. It is the location of several major tourist venues which will require more exploration by us when we return again. Located on the mountain are the Olympic stadium and other Olympic venues, the Catalunya National Art Museum, the Joan Miro Museum, the Spanish village and much, much more. You always need to leave some things unexplored giving a great reason for a return visit.

For a complete look at the selected photos of the trip to: http://picasaweb.google.com/mawarren.chelan/Barcelona2009

                              Gaudi Buildings everywhere

(Published in the Winter 2011 issue of the ABA Senior Lawyers Division The Voice of Experience Newsletter)

Could Barcelona be just about the best city in Europe to visit?

                 A beautiful visitor to Montserrat

When you have traveled a lot, many people ask what is your favorite place to visit. This is always a hard question, as rarely do we not like somewhere we have traveled. However, a good test of a favorite is whether we have made a return trip to the destination. A few years ago we enjoyed a Mediterranean cruise and it happened to start with a couple of days in Barcelona, Spain, a favorite beginning of many cruises. At that time we thoroughly enjoyed our short visit in Barcelona, and always thought it would be a great place for a more in depth visit.

This thought became a reality this fall, when we booked a full week in Barcelona. So what makes this city worthy of such an investment in time and travel? The city has all the characteristics of what great travel is all about. It is walk-able and the Spanish citizens enjoy being out on the streets at all times of the day and night, so it is a great people watching place. There are wonderful sights to check out with the influence of the architect Gaudi and the city having been made very clean and safe as a result of the Olympics a few years ago. Barcelona is known for its cuisine so there is great eating and socializing.

Barcelona is located on the northeast edge of Spain on the Mediterranean Sea. It is proud of its Catalan heritage and language and the citizens consider themselves Catalan first and Spanish second. Because of its geographic location the weather is pleasant with very few extremes. Our visit in October had constant temperatures in the high 70’s. You can always enjoy a city in more depth when you conquer the public transit system. Walking into a subway and trying to figure out how everything works is always somewhat intimidating. The subway stop near our hotel was an important one with two lines crossing so they had people who were very helpful in showing us how to buy and use the ticket system. We bought a multiple day ticket so we were good to go all over the city, thus gaining access to many interesting unique tourist sites.

As you know from previous articles, I am a big believer in taking a city tour on the first full day after arrival. Barcelona has two excellent choices with hop-on and hop-off open top bus companies. This gave us the orientation we needed and gave us the options for later exploration. Even without exploring out from the city center there are wonderful things to do in the downtown area. The city center is bisected by two amazing boulevards. The first is La Rambla, which is a pedestrian walk along the edge of the Gothic historical quarter going from the main city square (Plaza de Catalunya) to the waterfront. Thousands of people walk it, sit in sidewalk cafés, and enjoy the ambience of street performers and some of the best people watching in Europe. The second is the magnificent shopping boulevard called the Passeig de Gracia which goes the opposite direction from the Plaza. This magnificent tree lined street rivals Paris’ boulevards for shopping and beautiful unusual architecture. Many of the Gaudi buildings are on this street.

We had enough time on this visit to spend a day on a tour outside of the city enjoying exploration of the Catalunya countryside. Our all day tour started with a visit to one of the famous local wineries, the Torres family estate winery. Needless to say we sampled even though it was about 10 in the morning and brought back some to sample later. Next it was on to the famous mountain area of Montserrat and the remote Benedictine Monastery at the top of the mountain. We arrived at the monastery by an excellent modern cog railway. It is quite a tourist destination and the Benedictines are reaping the benefits of tours, shops, and restaurants. The views from the mountain are spectacular and worth the visit. We then drove around the mountain range on roads certainly not built for 40 passenger buses, and then on to the seaside town of Sitges which is about 50 miles south of Barcelona. This is the summer destination of the wealthy and chic Barcelona citizens. It is a gem of a beach town with great beaches, historic homes, shopping, and beachside seafood restaurants. This is a place you would like to return to for a longer stay.

In my next article I will share with you our favorite Barcelona sites and why you must visit this easy to enjoy city.

(Published in Summer 2010 issue of ABA Senior Lawyers Division The Voice of Experience Newsletter)