Day out at the British Museum

Warm and Sunny - Barcelona!

The weekend past, Lisa and I finally set foot in Spain, Barcelona was our destination, and we were looking forward to some sunshine and warm rays.

Like many of our trips, our departure from London was delayed (by 45 mins) again and this time thanks to BA.

Going to Barcelona was exciting, a big city, heaps of tourist, and many interesting architecture. Being a big city, pick pockets are a problem, and I had first hand experience with that. When Lisa and I were trying to get on the Metro on our way to the airport, a group of guys decided to block my passage onto the train (they let Lisa on already). As I pushed to get on, I could feel a hand touching my pocket where my wallet is. When I realised what was happening, I backed off and hopped off the train, then the idiots thought 'oh bugger we stuffed up' and parted to make way for me to get on.

After sleeping off our slightly negative start to the trip, the following day, we wondered through the city, firstly to see the Sagrada Familia, a giant temple which is still being built since 1882 (still got another 30-80 years to go). This temple was designed by Antonio Gaudi, a famous architect who's work can been seen throughout the city, and the most unique building I have ever seen.

From there we headed down Passeig de Gracia, a famous shopping strip in Barcelona, with designer labels and big brands. Lisa enjoyed the stroll down this street the most. This lead us to Plaza Catalunya, a huge square which is the city centre of Barcelona.

Then we continued onto La Rambla, once of Barcelona's most famous streets, with a pedestrian footpath in the middle of the road, there were many people and tourist, and where there are many tourist, there are pick pockets. Lucky we didn't encounter any this time. We also went to look Gothic area, where the Gothic Cathedral is located. The architecture would have been quite stunning, however the whole Cathedral was under scaffolding. The area is interesting with many gargoyles looking down at you all the time.

For dinner, Lisa and I ate at a restaurant called Mikel Etxea, which I think was a Spanish restaurant. I finally had a Spanish Paella, a traditional Spanish style seafood risotto server on a big pan. (see below) It was so big, that Lisa and I shared it, and we were both stuffed! It cost us about 32 euros for that. It's been a long time since I've been out and truly enjoyed a hearty meal like that. We had dinner at around 4pm because the restaurants would close soon after, and re-open for dinner from 9 pm, we'd starve by then.

At night, we want to Montjuic to see the famous magic fountain (aparently similar to that at Las Vega's Bellagio casino but not as grand) which has the dancing water with music. It wasn't so magical because when we got there, we waited abut 45 minutes for the show, which I don't think happened that night (we were there at the right time). Maybe the Catalunyan's work on ish time or whenever they feel like time. We gave up waiting , and walked back to La Rambla which took over and hour. La Rambla was nice at night, with heaps of people walking around, and a great atmosphere.

The next day we went up north to see Park Guell, another place designed by Gaudi. It's a public park with some really interesting architecture once again. It was a warm day, and being so high up, we had a beautiful view, looking back at the city, and the sea in the distance. We sat in one of the Gaudi designed benches, and soaked up the sun. It did the trick, because I am getting some colour back into my skin.


We eventually made our way down to the ports, and the beaches, and it was oh so nice to be close to the beach again, to smell and feel the sea breeze, to see the sand, hear the waves, here the chatter amongst the people in the seaside restaurants........ it felt like being at home. In the few hours we had left, we wondered through the small city streets, finding little hidden shops here and there as we passed through an area called Barri Gothic.

We left Barcelona feeling energised, and full of life again thanks to a great weekend basking in the sun, and having good food. Upon arriving at Barcelona airport to fly out, our flight got delayed AGAIN, thanks to BA (we have flown with them 5 times now and 3 times they've let us down, they are now officially worse than Ryan Air in terms of time keeping, but service is still miles ahead). Barcelona airport was huge, luckily for us as we had so much spare time now. Shopping was good and we spent some money, I purchased a suit.... enough said!