Barcelona, May 2016

Ola amigos!

Husband and I have just returned ( roasted and baked) from our trip to Barcelona and Madrid. We were joined by friends in Barcelona who left for France after and we made our way to Madrid. I am grateful to be travelling so much around Europe. I am grateful too for sunny skies, perfect weather, good food and for friends who made this trip so much better!

Here are some photographs of my trip to Barcelona, minus Gaudi for that will make for another post!

Sunny skies and a gorgeous beaches, whats not to like? As our taxi driver famously said....this is where the beach starts and goes all the way up to France! I should have asked for his name.

 

Where there aren't tourists, there are old people sitting outside, on the benches, soaking up the sun!

Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau 

 Barri Gotic, or the Gothic Quarters, center of the Old City of Barcelona, and my favourite part of the trip! Many buildings here date from the Medieval Times and are breathtaking! Many of course may be much later additions to the city, made to look old, but then this is what makes history more interesting!

Catedral De Barcelona, when you go spend sometime sitting outside, on the steps listening to music, played by many talented street musicians.

There were beautiful street performances at every corner! This man was playing El Condor Pasa by Simon and Garfunkel, it is the song I play to reset my systems, every now and again.

The gothic curches were as beautiful from inside as they were from the outside. So tall. They were all functional and we managed to catch a church choir in progress too!

So many building facades were beautiful and so varied, with etchings and relief work and mosaics and colours. We need to bring this kind of craftsmanship back, the shiny glass and steel buildings will not make for very happy blog posts, and will certainly not tell you which city I am talking about!

The city was densely populated with one building after another and tiny Juliet Balconies. There we very few individual houses. Barcelona did have many plazas and all the cafes were pouring out to the streets and open squares.

The nighlife is buzzing in Barcelona with many night clubs by the beach overflowing with Sangrias, Mojitos and Tapas. Food was generally good everywhere, however I have had better tapas in London and no other city beats the London food scene in my humble opinion.

Find some of Gaudi's work in my next post! See you later. Oh and we went for a day trip to Sitges, beautiful!

Love,
Kanika

Psst...no, Zara and Mango are not around the corner, at every corner, this mind is a funny little thing :)