France

Waiting for the train to Madrid.

We’re back on the train, which just started rolling, on the way to Madrid – apparently facing backward for the entire trip – following two days in southern France.

Leaving Barcelona on Monday morning, we decided to skip the bakery and coffee on the way to the metro, figuring we could grab something once we got to the main station. We pulled our bags across the Gaudi sidewalk tiles several blocks to the metro station. The trip to Sants station took about 15 minutes, and then of course we had to navigate a series of tunnels and stairs to get to the railway station. There were a couple of cafés there, but we decided we should get through security first. We found our way to the platform without seeing any further options for food and coffee, but we decided we could get something from the café car on the train.

We boarded on time, but the train ended up leaving about 20 minutes late. I almost overheated trying to cram our bags onto the already-crowded luggage rack, but I rearranged the other peoples’ stuff enough that I eventually got most of our bags to fit. Once seated I started blogging, but Gywen and Barry quickly dozed off. I thought I one of us could go to the café car once they woke up, but they never came around long enough to make the effort worthwhile. Once we were in Perpignan we would have about half an hour before we could pick up our key and drop off our bags, and out host had recommended waiting at a nice restaurant to have a coffee on the terrace. I concluded that I could make it until then and looked forward to a nice sit-down meal.

The train trip passed quickly while I blogged. Although I was focused on my screen I did see some nice scenery along the way to Perpignan. We arrived there shortly after passing through a long tunnel into France. We took a taxi for a short ride to the restaurant where the very handsome, non-English speaking waiter informed us they were not serving food until Noon. There were customers enjoying coffee on the terrace, though, and we managed to convince him that we wanted some, too. The coffee helped, although it certainly wasn’t the large satisfying Starbucks-like beverage we’re used to getting at home. That’s not how they do things in France.

Coffee finished, it was time to walk about two blocks to the apartment, where the host Alexandre showed up to meet us with the key. We climbed two flights to reach the apartment which was a very large, bright, uniquely furnished space overlooking one of the city’s famous buildings near the heart of the city center. The apartment had a large common room with three bay windows, a kitchen and office, both with balconies, two bedrooms, two baths, and a laundry room. Alexandre recommended a lunch spot, so we dropped our bags and walked several blocks to the restaurant, crossing the lovely river and passing the historic Castillet along the way. Once seated we waited close to 15 minutes before an English-speaking server was sent to interpret the menu for us. The menu prices were a little high, but the Plat du Jour combinations were reasonable so we made selections from that list. I do think the food was worth the wait. Barry and Gywen both ordered salads with frommage and I ordered a salad with bacon and pate. For the main course, Barry and Gywen had salmon while I enjoyed a delicious tender pork in mustard sauce over mashed potatoes. For dessert, they had wonderful-looking apple tarts and I devoured a rich, flourless chocolate cake with pistachio ice cream. It was an indulgent and filling meal.

On the mini train.

Lunch ended in time for us to catch the 45-minute tour on the city’s “mini-train.” We drove through the streets on the little tram learning about the main sites and a bit of the city’s history. It was delightful being able to get the lay of the land while seated and mostly dry, considering it started raining during the tour. Starting at the Castillet, which was the main gate into the walled city during Medieval times, we drove past a beautiful park, buildings constructed on the site of the former wall, homes build more recently literally on top of the old wall, the Cathedral, the Maritime Court, former convents, the modern arts center, and the very large Palace of the Kings of Majorca among other sites.

At the end of the tour it was raining steadily, so we hung out for a few minutes under the arch of the Castillet while a busker filled the air with some very French-sounding accordion music. When the rain let up a little, we wandered through the streets until we found the massive Cathedral of St. Jean de Baptiste. Somewhat plain on the outside, it was much grander on the inside, although it was dim and solemnly quiet. We explored the various chapels and took pictures of the most interesting features, including the massive organ which we all wish we could have heard. We stepped out the side door and found a small chapel containing a famous wooden statue of the Christ. Beyond that was the famous crypt Campo Santo, which was closed for renovations.

Cathedral bell tower.

Plate by Picasso.

We explored more of the quaint city streets and read the historical markers as we made our way to La Loge de Mer, now the home of the city council. I asked a man there where to find the Picasso exhibit recommended by Alexandre, and he pointed me upstairs to the third floor. That wasn’t actually the Picasso exhibit – but there was a gallery there with an exhibit of photographs of Picasso which we fun to see and gave us more insight to Picasso’s personality and his life as a real person (as opposed to my perception of him as a esoteric, dead artist). A few blocks beyond old Court we found the Hyacinthe Rigaud Museum with the Actual Picasso Exhibit, a temporary showing highlighting the two years he spent time in Perpignan as a guest of the Luzerme family. All of the accompanying text was in both Catalan and French, so we mostly had to guess about what we were looking at and what Picasso was doing there. But we saw a sizable collection of nice paintings, sketches, cut and torn paper, and pottery as well as historical photographs and video. The Museum is actually in the former Luzerme home, where Picasso stayed during his visits.

The Museum’s permanent collection was quite large and included an interactive audio/video tour. We walked through, listening to a few highlights from the audio tour, seeing some historic alter pieces, more Picasso works, sculpture, modern art, and many paintings. The core of the collection was work by Rigaud and his contemporaries. He was a very talented 17-Century local artist what became known primarily for his excellent portraits. There was a lot to see, and as much as I wanted to take it all in I started to get a headache and had to resort to a quick walk-through of some of the galleries. I’m sure Gywen was tired, too. After seeing all we could take, we exited back into the rain to head toward home. Nearby we found a small bakery where we purchased some sandwiches and cool drinks. Barry had a mozzerlla and tomato sandwich on a roll. Gywen and I had baguettes that were split down the middle and stuffed with chicken, cheese and mustard. It was tasty, and just what I needed after a long day. I also had a really big pistachio macaroon which I ate too quickly. Barry ran out to a grocery store that evening to pick up food for the next day, while I blogged. We couldn’t find anything in English for Gywen to watch on TV. She retired to read in her room and Barry and I hung out the rest of the evening using the WiFi, staying up later than we should have.

Now we’re back in Barcelone, stopped on the platform en-route to Madrid. Barry had a little cat nap on the way here, but he’s awake now reading about Weimaraners on his computer. Barry and I are enjoying some beers we bought yesterday. Mine is “Dark Owl” from a brewery called La Mandra, and Barry has an IPA from the same place. I’ll have to look that up at some point…

Yesterday morning, Tuesday, we grabbed some yummy pastries and coffee at the shop next to the apartment which Barry and I ate while walking to the train station while Gywen stayed at the apartment until we went back to pick her up. We walked from the Place to Catalogne and the historic Aux Dames de France department store across from the apartment down Av. General de Gaulle to the train station. I believe I heard this street referred to with two other names during our visit, and on the mini-train the guide told us that Dali called this street the “Center of the World.” That’s cool, but the street isn’t, I assume, what it used to be. It was a relatively narrow street lined with businesses, apartments, ethnic restaurants, and a few abandoned buildings, some of them which had once been grand. The narrow sidewalks were lined with Palm trees, so I can imagine the street was once more impressive.

At the station, we went to the Europcar desk and picked up keys to the car we had for the day. We made our way out of the garage and across town to pick up Gywen and the food we had packed for our road trip. We headed northwest form the city toward our first destination, as per usual about 20 minutes behind schedule. We didn’t find the signage pointing to Mas Amiel winery particularly clear and made a couple of wrong turns along the way. At one point, I tried to make a U-turn in the road, but the car didn’t have a great turning radius and I hadn’t yet figured out how to put it in reverse. There was a significant drop-off, so while I sat in the car Gywen and Barry jumped out to push us backward into the road – unable to move us until a nice woman came up behind us and got out to help. She couldn’t get around us, so she had little choice but to jumped out to assist and did so with no questions asked. Finally, we found the turn-off to the winery and drove up the little lane through the vineyard to the impressive new tasting room. We were the only gests there at that point, just about 20 minutes after opening, so we enjoyed a nice relaxed tasting in which the friendly man poured samples of about a dozen wines for us. Behind the counter was a gorgeous view of the vines and mountains through the large picture window, which made the experience even more enjoyable. I think we enjoyed all of the wines, and we bough a few bottles before leaving.

We had asked the server of other good wineries in the area, and he recommended Domaine Thunevin Clavet, just down the road in Maury. Once again in this place we were the only guests, and here we found a very pleasant and chatty woman who told us all about their wines and poured several for us to taste. This place was less scenic, being right on the highway, but it was a sleek modern building. We happened to be there when some of the workers came in just having completed the harvest for the year. Again, we enjoyed much of what we tried and we left with a couple of bottles.

Or next destination was visible from the parking lot – one of the several castle ruins in the area. We drove up the mountain to Château de Quéribus where we opened the back of the car and ate a quick picnic lunch. While Gywen rested in the car, Barry and I hiked to the top of the mountain to the ruin site. Exploring the castle took longer than the walk up or down. It was a fascinating maze of rock and masonry dating to the 1100s originally, and occupied, I believe, until the 1600s. The entrance featured a number of small passages through which you could see and shoot things at approaching invaders at various points along the path. We saw the remains of a barracks, cistern, large hall, main house, oven, courtyards, tunnel, and block house, as well as the vaulted, arched ceiling of the castle owner’s residence. The views from the top were definitely one of the highlights of the site and we enjoyed taking in the views of the Pyrenees, the surrounding vineyards, nearby villages, and neighboring castles. I took us an hour to make the hike, explore the ruins, and take in the stunning views.

View from Quéribus.

Our plan was to visit nearby Château de Peyrepertuse next, even though we decided we probably wouldn’t have time to buy tickets and walk into the ruin site itself. We didn’t make it there. Along the way there is the scenic village of Cucugnan, which boasts a 17^th-century windmill which was central to the local economy when wheat was the main crop in the area. I wanted to just pull up and snap a photo, just to see it, but it turns out you can’t always do that in France. The village, like many others in the area, is built on an illogical hillside and the windmill is at the top. Naturally, the streets are tiny and certainly not built to accommodate tourist traffic. We found a parking spot just about as high as we could go, but then we had to make Gywen get out and walk with us up the hill the rest of the way into the village. We took our time, and along the way we found a tourist shop with postcards (bought some), nick-knacks, lots of books about regional history and cooking, as well as stories, imagery, and merchandise related to the Knights, the Crusades, Joan of Arc, etc. (This is where Barry and I bought our beers... just finished mine).

Further up the hill we found a simple church where Gywen and I sat for a bit while Barry explored a little more thoroughly. Finally, just beyond the church, we reached a large bakery attached to the base of the windmill. Inside, a friendly young guy helped us select a beautiful loaf of hearty wheat bread and some cookies before Barry and I climbed up the penultimate rocks to snap some photos of the windmill. We had a leisurely stroll through the village back down the hill to the car.

Once on the road, we headed south out of the immediate vicinity toward the main Pyrenees range. We took winding roads through towns like Latour de-France – all of them scenic – until reaching a scenic overlook just outside of Ille-sur Têt, where we found nice views of the rock formations at Les Orgues d’illa and the even closer, striking rock formation on the other side of the road. Originally I had wanted to stop and hike at the park, but we were short on time at this point so we were content to take a few photos and move on.

Next we headed to another winery we had picked out in advance, the coop at Vinça. The coop was founded in 1926 by a few dozen families in the area with small farms, and most of the original families are still owners of the coop today. Another couple came in while we were there, but again we had the nearly undivided attention of the very friendly woman in the tasting room. She explained a lot about the wines, the coop, and the area, and she let us taste anything we wanted to. We probably tasted about eight; some were ok, but most were quite good. A number of wineries in the area historically make sweet wines, and we tasted one here that was not made by the coop and was quite good. We bought that and another traditional Catalonian dry red before leaving. And now we’re carting around a bunch of wine.

Eus.

Our final stop of the day was the nearby village of Eus, designated one of the ten most scenic villages in France. Like Cucugnan, Eus was built on a hill – but a much higher one. At the very tope was a remarkable stone church, and naturally we had to go there. We stopped a couple of times for photos on the way up, and at times the low evening light made the yellow stone hillside structures almost glow. Unfortunately, it was fairly cloudy so the light wasn’t as spectacular as it could have been, the mountaintops were obscured, and the approaching sunset was muted. We drove up as far as we could to park, and Gywen stayed in the car as Barry and I walked toward the periodically ringing church tower. We went through a couple of sharp turns and short steep climbs through what qualify as streets in this town, past all the cats, reaching a narrow passage beneath the bell tower. Then we went through an arch under the church steps and around the corner and up to the entrance of the church. It was not 7:00 and the church was closed, but we enjoyed the view from up there.

The drive back to Perpignan was fairly quick and uneventful. We dropped off Gywen and all of our acquisitions from the day at the apartment and went on our car-return adventure. I had googled the closest gas station, and as we drove past I was frustrated to see that it was closed. We pulled over and looked up other options. The next closest station was in the parking lot of some sort of superstore, so we zig-zagged our way through town to get there. This was an unattended station, and the pump wouldn’t accept our credit card because it requires a signature in Europe. Nearby was a kiosk where one can insert money and get a ticket with a number to key in to authorize the pump for the amount of the bill used. But the pump keypad had no English instructions and no “enter” button which one might intuitively push after entering a code. Somehow Barry finally stumbled across the correct menu and selected the correct steps to allow the pump to credit us for €10, and we filled the car with Diesel. (First we had to Google the French synonym for “Diesel.”) Then we dropped the car at the train station and walked back to the apartment, where Gywen had begun to worry that something had happened to us.

By this time – a little after 9:00 – we were pretty hungry, and we forced Gywen to walk a few blocks down the street in search of food. We had seen some crowded looking places when we drove by, so we thought we might find something good in that direction. We first came to a place that had a decent crowd and a nice menu of tapas and paella, which they advertised as being served until Midnight. We forged on to check out the other places, which turned out to be crowded bars, although one of them had nice looking tapas. I decided on paella, so we circled the block back to the first place. Upon arrival, they told us we couldn’t order food because it would take over an hour and essentially the kitchen was closed (at 9:30) because they only had one chef that night. So much for the sign on the wall advertising paella all night. The man there recommended we go to the Italian restaurant which was actually across the street from our apartment. Back we went. We sat outdoors there, which was pleasant aside from the cigarette smoke coming from every direction and, later, the street crew that showed up to cut up the street in front of the restaurant. We had a friendly server who was a former baseball pitcher, and we filled ourselves on nice salads and a tasty pizza with ham, sausage, eggplant, and mushrooms. I wasn’t done though, because I didn’t think I should leave France without ordering a crepe. I got one with chocolate and Garnd Marnier flambé (which never actually caught fire), and I do not regret it.

We drug ourselves back to the apartment and utilized the WiFi for a little while before falling into bed, thankful that Wednesday morning would not start so early.

Getting There, and Two Days in Barcelona

Third day into the trip, and now that I’m sitting on a high-speed train to France, I have time to write. The train isn’t moving yet, but we should be leaving any minute now.

The trip started off well enough, although Rufus didn’t want us to go. He laid down in the yard with his belly in the air, limp as could be, so  Barry had to pick him up and carry him to his pen. We left home about 20 minutes late, but Gywen was waiting at the curb with her bags so we made up some time picking her up. Barry bought some new headphones in the Indianapolis airport before we zipped through security and stopped for a quick bite at Harry & Izzy’s – shrimp cocktail and Bloody Mary’s. Gywen added soup, Barry had a salad, and I had some amazing filet sliders.

Sunset over the Atlantic.

The flight to Atlanta was fine, and we switched terminals to get on our flight to Paris. On that flight we got dinner and I watched some animated Story Corps stories… alternating between uplifting and really sad war stories. I lightened the mood by watching Baywatch before mostly falling asleep for the remainder of the flight. It wasn’t a particularly restful sleep, but at least I could doze. At one point Barry pointed out the beautiful sunset over the Atlantic.

We arrived in Paris early in the morning, and apparently about 11 minutes ahead of schedule. We were almost at the far end of the international terminal, for we walked quite some time before getting to a spot I recognized, where we quickly used the restroom and headed down the escalator to the main section of the airport. We kept following the signs for the F2 terminal, finally getting to the security checkpoint. That line took a while, but at least we kept moving and we didn’t have a major hold-up. On the other side of security was a mess. The Border Patrol lone for international visitors extended beyond the snaking stanchions and double back on itself in front of the entrance for the European visitors. On our side, out of 10-12 potential lines, there were four officers checking passports. The line was NOT moving. There were some airport workers directing traffic, when they felt like it. By this time, our flight was boarding. We asked a woman if we should stand in that line if our flight was boarding, but she seemed unconcerned and said she guaranteed we would make our flight. I asked for her name, and she covered her name badge and made up a name, and then told me if there was a problem I should come back and find her.

It was obvious it would have taken another hour to an hour and a half to get through that line, so after about five more minutes I walked to the front and asked another woman if we should continue to stand in that line while our flight boarded. I was persistent enough that she took pity and we jumped ahead, with about 5 people in front of us. Still, the officer was in no hurry and it took us forever to get through. The “nice” woman reassured us that it wasn’t a far walk on the other side; the gate was just at the top of the stairs. Not true. Once we finally got TO the stairs, we had to take a left past a long line of shops to get to the actual gate area, and our gate was the last one. By the time we got there, the plane was still there but the gate was closed and we could not board. It took us just over an hour and a half to get from one gate to the next

We found the AirFrance counter, where the unsympathetic agent booked us on the second flight out later in the day – the next flight out was already overbooked by 10. We had a four hour wait until our new flight, but he refused to give us a meal voucher because the delay “was not the fault of the airline or the airport.” Regardless, we found a café and grabbed a quick bite.

Upon arrival in Barcelona we were supposed to stash our bags with the apartment management company and then visit the Picasso Museum at 1:00. With the flight delay, I called the museum when they opened and changed our entrance time to 4:45. I read for a while, and then shortly before boarding Barry and I got some pretty nice chair massages. Finally we boarded, and then we sat on the plane for about an hour and 10 minuets while they changed a tire on the plane. My frustration and anxiousness increased by the minute.

When we finally landed in Barcelona, I felt rushed as we made our way to the ground transportation with a sense of urgency. We took a bus to Plaça Catalunya, which was quick and efficient, and we saw some interesting sites along the way including Plaça Espanya. I got the sense that I was going to like Barcelona, although I wasn’t exactly relaxed. From the bus,w e took the Metro two stops to La Ramblas, which looked lovely, and found the spot to drop our bags and pick up the apartment key. I kept trying to rush the woman who checked us in, but her English was not excellent and she insisted on going through every step of check-in and explaining how all of the keys worked. It was now past 4:50, and I finally got it across to her that we were supposed to be at the Museum in about 7 minutes before our tickets would be no good. We took off walking up the street toward the Museum, but it was clear we wouldn’t make it, so Barry finally prompted me to call them again. Now our 4:45 entry was switched to 5:15 and I could stop worrying about missing it. About 5 minutes later we arrived.

The walk was interesting, even if I couldn’t enjoy it. I felt like our vacation had a “soft opening.” We were there, but I didn’t feel like I was on vacation yet. Nothing but worry from the time we landed in Paris until we got to the Picasso Museum 11 hours later. But the walk through the Gothic section of the Old City was nice. Lots of crooked little streets to look down, plenty of tempting looking shops, stately municipal buildings, and lots of people. Very European, obviously. The street to the museum - one long straight path - changed names twice, and I couldn’t properly pronounce any of the street names to the poor woman on the phone at the Museum. But in the sense of the changing street names, at least Barcelona has something in common with Bloomington.

The Picasso Museum was nice – beginning with some incredible portraits and landscapes he painted as young as age 13. He really was quite talented. The collection progressed chronologically through different stages of his life, often corresponding with a change in residency. I really enjoyed some of his sketches and drawings, which I thought often showed his sense of whimsy and humor. I was struck by how he could capture a form with amazing accuracy with a few simply strokes of the pencil. The works moved into the Avant Gard from the time he lived in Paris, and began to take on elements of pointillism and expressionism. We saw a number of works from his Blue Period, and a few from the Rose period, before reaching a display of works from 1957, the year he spent making 40 interpretations of the Velázquez painting Las Meninas. He was really into the Cubism at this point, and the works were colorful and fascinating in their variations. What an obsession. Shortly before leaving we saw a collection of his pottery, which was brilliant and, I guess, revolutionary.

At Correfoc.

We left the Museuam as it was closing and headed back to pick up our bags. To my delight, we ran straight into the little devil’s Correfoc, or Fire Run. A highlight of the festival la Mercè, this parade featuring and intended for children and young people is a procession of costumed people, drummers, giant spinning sparklers, and loud firecrackers. The marchers delight in spraying the onlookers with sparks, and we had to duck a few times to shield ourselves from direct hits. We took this in for a while, getting our fill before crossing through the parade to get back to our luggage. As we approached the place, we encountered a Gigantes parade coming directly at us. This parade featured a series of small bands – one quite mariachi-like, and another heavy on trombones – and giant figures with papier mache heads representing various characters like knights and royalty. This was a lot of fun, but the parade was a bit stalled, maybe because of the other parade, and we finally got back to the office in the midst of the chaos and picked up our bags.

Casa Battló.

A short Metro ride later and we were in the Eixample, the neighborhood of our apartment, which dates to the early 20^th Century and features a grid of wide streets and boulevards. We exited onto the street directly in front of the Gaudi masterpiece Casa Battló, lit up beautifully for the evening. We walked about three block to find the apartment where we discovered that the “second floor” was four flights up the stairs. We sent Gywen up in the tiny lift with the bags while Barry somehow figured out how to open the door. I had already failed that test. We were all starving by this point, so we quickly turned on the AC, opened the windows, dropped the bags, and headed back out to get some dinner.

A couple blocks away we found a sit-down place that might have been a little more expensive than we initially wanted, but it was a nice Don Quixote-themed place that was comfortable and relatively quiet. We ordered a much-needed bottle of Cava and shared a number of diches including two salads, some shrimp, and a baked sea bass. Satisfied, we made our way back to the apartment to get settled in and to stay up a bit too late utilizing the WiFi.

In the time it took to write this recap of the first two days, the train made it to Perpignan. I’m now getting back to writing after a full day here. We’re exhausted. My feet are tired. We are crashed at the apartment, where the TV only carries programming in French and the trash has not been emptied. It has been raining off and on. Barry ran out to the supermarket – I think to get wine – so I hope the rain holds off.

Our second day in Barcelona started with us leaving the apartment about 18 minutes late and grabbing take away breakfast on the way to Casa Batlló. This is one of the most famous homes designed by the Modernista master Antoni Gaudi, and one of the three Art Nouvou homes making up the “Block of Discord” on Passeig de Gràcia. I expected the home to be funky. I did not expect to find such a brilliant, innovative, intentional, and functional design. Excellent use of light. Thematic consistency. Sculptural details. Human-centered design. Excellent craftsmanship. Color and beauty. Creative solutions to air flow. Elegantly concealed water tanks and rainwater drainage. Nods toward sustainability. I was in awe at every turn, and actually felt very emotional experiencing such architectural brilliance first-hand. Adding to the tour was the “enhanced reality” audio-tour. We could look at the devices in each room and see what the house would look like with period furnishings, moving windows and doors, additional fixtures, etc. The tour was time well spent, and they had a really nice gift shop where we spent some cash, but not nearly as much as I could have.

Following the tour, it was Festival time once again. We headed into the Old City to Plaça de Sant Juame, just between where we experienced the Correfoc and the Giant’s Parade the day before. As this was going to be one of the highlights of the festival, it was extremely crowded. Lots of good people watching, of course, which was true across Barcelona. Anyway, there were thousands of us trying to get up the narrow street between the Metro station and the square in front of city hall. There was a constant stream of people leaving the square (a surprising number of them pushing baby strollers), but almost too many people to move forward behind those exiting. We continued to press our way forward for 10-15 minutes until we finally reached the entrance to the square, at which point there became a lot more room to move around in spite of the massive crowd. When we arrived there were a couple Giants dancing in front of the municipal building, and a concert band was playing while dignitaries sat on the city hall balcony. An announcer spoke in Catalan, and when the band played an anthem or a “Catalana popular song,” many people in the crowd sang along. Several chants of “Votarer” broke out, along with other patriotic chants calling for the upcoming vote for independence. There was a lot of energy surrounding the upcoming vote and the Spanish government’s push to stop it. Shirts and flyers promoting Democracy, Catalan flags on buildings, flags worn as scarves, hand symbols… Everyone is pretty fired up about it. The Canadian expat we spoke with said she’s not leaving her apartment on the day of the vote, because she expects things to get crazy.

Approaching Plaça de Sant Juame.

Finally, the main event started: The human pyramid display, or the Castillers. From a small street next to city hall, individual castiller teams were introduced and built single towers 4 people high, then moving them to the front part of the middle of the Plaça. It was impressive each time, but the final team actually ran to the center of the Plaça and elicited huge cheers from the crowd. But the best was yet to come, when the teams began, simultaneously, to build pyramids 8 people high. Each time, the smallest person climbed to the top and over the next level before immediately sliding down the other side of the tower. I wanted more – I would have loved seeing them stop there to stand upright. Is that too much to ask?

Before that event wrapped up completely, we moved a few block to the north to the front of the impressive Cathedral to catch some of the traditional Sardana dance. There were two large circles of people in the street with hands joined, doing the steps of the dance. We watched them go through the dance a couple of times and, although I hadn’t been paying close enough attention and Barry said he hadn’t figured out the steps, I was just about to go join them when the dance ended.

View from the lunch table.

From there we walked around a bit – more then Gywen would have preferred – to find some lunch. We ended up seated at a café just outside of the Royal Palace where we selected a set menu of shared tapas that came with a pitcher of Sangria (described on the menu as a “Litter of Sangria”). It was a large assortment of good food – more than we could finish. It was lovely just sitting, with shade, good food, drink, and people-watching.

Lunch!

View from Montjuic Castle.

After lunch, we took the Metro to the Funicular up Montjuic, then took the Cable Car to the Castle at the top of the mountain. At the top we found the Circus portion of la Mercè. There were lots of families there, and dogs, and stages with solo performers, and some people in papier mache big heads, and food trucks. Barry and I walked the perimeter of the very large castle and on the back side we discovered the docked cruise ships and the port. We watched the port operations for a while, which was of interest to me after having recently read Door to Door. We walked past the crowds of people lined up to enter the castle and met up with Gywen at the cable car station. We took the scenic ride back down the mountain with a nice couple from Minnesota and then took the Metro back to our apartment. We crashed there for a bit (and approved time sheets). Gywen stayed in for the rest of the night, but Barry and I ventured out again for the evening.

Slightly refreshed, we ventured back out to the Metro to head down toward the beach. We got off at the Barciloneta station and followed the crowd down the impressive street of restaurants toward the large, brightly lit Ferris Wheel. We stopped for Gelato at the first shop I saw, a promise I had made to myself when we left the apartment. When we reached the beach, we found a large crowd of people waiting for the finale Fireworks show of le Mercè, scheduled to begin at 10:00. We walked down the beach toward the jetty and finally found a few square inches of wood to sit on facing the jetty. A guy came by selling Mojitos, so I made an impulse buy of two over-priced and watered-down drinks to “enjoy” during the show.

Going back down the mountain.

The fireworks were impressive, with multiple cannons and typically many simultaneous explosions of dazzling color. It was fun to hear the entire beach-front react to the most impressive fireworks. My favorites were some that left a bright orange trail as they spiraled up, then exploded into thick showers of orange sparks falling gently to the earth. As good of a show as it was, Barry and I were surprised to see some flubs – and so was the rest of the crowd. A couple of tubes must have fallen over, as at least two exploded on the ground. It was certainly impressive to see something that large light up the sky from the ground, but also a little worrying. A couple others shot off over the water and exploded from the surface beyond the Jetty. All things considered, it was a fun show and a memorable experience.

Gin selection at Lime House.

After Fireworks, we walked to a wine bar Barry had discovered online and had some nice regional wines and amazingly delicious tapas served up by a friendly wait staff, with free Wifi, a lively soundtrack and a dancing barkeep. They also served us free shots of a caramel flavored vodka that was as good as candy. We had a great time at le Dissent, but finally moved on to check out the highly-recommended Lime House bar. It was funky, with some Modernista flair, but the kitchen was closed. They only took cash, so Barry had one IPA from Scotland and I had a yummy drink made with Vanilla Gin and lemonade (more like a lemon Schwepps). We were out of cash and it was way too late, so we headed back to the apartment and crawled into bed.