Barcelona Days 4 & 5

We've covered alot of ground in the last two days.  Yesterday was highlighted by several Gaudi themed stops in Barcelona.  Gaudi was a master architect in Barcelona in the late 1800's to early 1900's.  He had a style all his own that borrowed heavily from nature and science.  Our first stop was La Sagrada Familia, a gigantic cathedral, now basilicca, that is still under construction.  This place was started in the 1880's and still probably has 50 to 100 years of work to do before being complete.  We've seen a couple of giant cathedrals on our travels, including Notre Dame, and this one tops them all.  The photos below are OK, but nothing can do this place justice,

 We then set off for two more Gaudi inspired destinations.  The first was Las Casa Mila, which was a Gaudi designed apartment building.  Again this was full of cool geometry coupled with flowing, organic shapes.  The best part was that we got access to the crazy rooftop, and on a sunny day after alot of walking, this was a great place to fire off alot of pictures and to rest in the Spanish sun.  We then toured the attic of the building which is actually a very thorough and modern museum of all of Gaudi's works and then a large apartment that is restored and furnished in detail to an early 1900's lifestyle.  This was actually a really cool visit.  The photo below is of the roof top detail, full of crazy vents, chimneys and meandering rooflines. The photo shown just above is of the Sagrada Familia from the roof of Casa Mila (La Predrera).

Our last big stop of the day was at the "Block of Discord" where there are three buildings that each try to outdo each other in a very outlandish way.  We snapped some photos but were pretty burned out after this.  We then spent the afternoon meandering back to the hotel, snacking and sampling local beers along the way.  It'll be pretty hard to return to winter in Wisconsin after a day like that.

Today we arrived safely in Madrid via high speed rail, if my math is right we were going 180 miles per hour at top speed. We left the train station and after our initial forced march in the rain and in the wrong direction we got back on track. It’s easy to get turned around here. We then got to our hotel, a late lunch of gyros and then visited the Prado museum. This is probably the best collection of art from the European masters, probably a better museum than the Louvre in Paris. That being said, after you see about 500 paintings you kind of run out of steam, it’s a shame. We then stopped for beers where they traditionally give you a little appetizer plate with each order, so that was our dinner. We finished it off with little doughnuts that you dip in a mug of chocolate sauce – the boys will love this once we figure out how to make it for them.

Should be sunny tomorrow and we’ll get oriented to the city. We’ve also arranged for a guided tour with Stephen Drake-Jones, Chairman of the Madrid Wells Society.  We'll have a 3.5 hour tour including stops for tapas and drinks for tomorrow night, should be a proper Spanish evening. Rick Steves (the travel guy on PBS) recommends this guy in his guide book, so he should be awesome, I spoke with him a few times today and he sounds like a blast.  He said that he's not a tour guide, he's a retired historian and he's pretty good.  At least he's modest.  That being said, he must be a good guide to be a British tour leader in Spain!!!

Stay tuned!!!