To help segregate the non-food pics (generally anyway), the Spain blog was split into 2 bits - here's the second bit!
The first day we arrived in Spain, we made a bee-line for St Josep La Bocqueria market:
Walking through the streets of Barcelona:
Standing in the Placa de Sant Jaume:
I think this was near the Museo Picasso in El Born
Inside the Museo Picasso
Just off the square by Santa Maria del Mar:
The 'other' Arc de Trionf:
The roof bar of our hotel, "ME Barcelona". The first day we landed in Spain, we opted to take it easy and stay in Barcelona to recover from the jet lag which we had. Hotel ME Barcelona sits along the Avenida Diagonal towards the East side of Barcelona in a quieter area of town. The same architect who designed the French National Library, Dominique Perrault, ME was a pretty chic and modern hotel without being outrageously expensive. Rooms were finished to a slightly lesser quality than other top notch hotels, but overall a very decent stay and only about 10 minutes by cab to most of the main attractions.
Hotel lobby:
On the second day, we headed to El Celler de Can Roca restaurant in Girona. The restaurant moved here from its old location (about 100m away) into what is a perfect blend of Japanese post-modern architecture and subtle earth tones of 'La Torre'. About an hour and a half drive from central Barcelona, getting to the restaurant was part of the fun!:
The next day, we took a road trip to Axpe/Atxondo, in the middle of basque country between San Sebastian and Bilbao for lunch:
The old converted farm house which houses the epicly epic Etxebarri restaurant:
The surrounding countryside in Axpe... We're in Riojas territory here!...
The main church courtyard:
Road signs in Euskara - the basque language..one of the more mysterious languages in the world with no currently known language roots.
After lunch, we headed further West and found ourselves in Bilbao for non other than Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Bilbao.. too bad there was no sunset that day or it may have been a truly spectacular sight!
Just outside the Bilbao Guggenheim:
Leeann standing next to Jeff Koons' "Puppy"... doesn't really look much like a puppy close up to be honest.
Public transport Bilbao style
While we were in San Sebastian, we stayed at the Astoria 7 Hotel, a Hollywood themed hotel which was both modern and very well priced, situated near the main roundabout of the city... we got to stay in Mel Gibson's room:
The lobby restaurant
Breakfast of Jamon Iberico and sunny side up eggs - magnificent...
Alfred Hitchcock
The "Library":
Walking towards the Parte Vieja part of town of San Sebastian were the endings of a street parade..
Leeann looking for something in Parte Vieja
The Santa Maria del Coro Church:
Streets of Parte Vieja:
Along the riverbanks outside the Hotel Maria Cristina. Opposite is the Kursaal and the Gros District of San Sebastian is to the right:
The Kursaal up close:
The Hotel Maria Cristina along the banks:
Kevin Looking a bit fat:
Cathedral Catedral del Buen Pastor near to our hotel
One of the old streets as you walk from the Cathedral Catedral del Buen Pastor
The area near the town hall of San Sebastian.
After a quick 2 night trip to San Sebastian, it was time to head back to Barcelona for a couple more days of sightseeing. We landed back into Barcelona 2 nights before we were to leave and decided to stay at the Ritz Carlton Hotel Arts by the Marina to the South of the city. The hotel would have been much nicer if it weren't overrun with hundreds of tourists attending the world GSM conference (or something like that) making the lobby more like a madhouse. Designed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, Hotel Arts sits in the ultra-modern category and with the service to match.
The views from the hotel are stunning though. The first night we got put into a normal deluxe harbour view room but for some reason they upgraded us to the club floor for the second night which wasn't so bad.
A walk along the marina:
The Hotel Arts is the tall building on the right and the Gran Casino is the Guggenheim looking thing at the bottom left
The first evening we got back late so we headed out to Maremagnum to have a stroll around the main marina area just South of La Ramblas and the El Born area.
On the way back to the hotel:
Above the casino:
Lobby of the Hotel Arts:
The next day was back to the market again to buy some food to take back home!
Our trip to Barcelona was mainly to have a look at some of Antoni Gaudi's art nouveau architecture. Often considered as one of the most prominent names of gothic architecture in Spain, he actually came about much later in the gothic era and eventually developed his own "gaudi" style. He was considered to be a bit too 'flashy' at first and only when Eusebi Guell, the industrialist, in the 19th century and thus this led to the Parc Guell one of his later works to be built in the early 1900s.
The main entrance... reminded us a bit of a gingerbread house:
One of the creepy tunnel facades built into the Park:
The park was originally built as part of a residential site, but over the course of the 14 years it took to build it, the residential site never really got fully materialised. The Doric columns underneath the main terrace:
The main terrace:
A view off the main terrace:
Bird's nests built into the secondary terrace walls:
The house at the top of Parc Guell:
From the Parc Guell, we headed back into the main part of Barcelona to see the most impressive piece of architecture that we have seen for a long time. La Sagrada Familia began construction in 1882 as one of Gaudi's most ambitious construction which he worked on for the final 15 years of his life. As of now, the church remains incomplete due to the intricacies of the design and the scale of the construction, and the expected completion date is now set at 2026.. almost 150 years after the first stone was laid.
Although a bit unsightly, the cranes have been part of Sagrada photos for as long as I can remember and to me seems as though it is almost a part of the church...
One of the carvings by the front entrance of the church:
The interior windows:
A view of the facade:
The massiveness of the interior structure:
Pure gothic madness on the main entrance door:
More intricacies found above one of the windows:
One of the secondary halls:
Moving on from La Sagrada Familia is one of Gaudi's smaller works, the Casa Mila:
Stopping by to check out the fresh produce:
Picking up some goodies!
And then heading back to the hotel:
A view from the room towards the fountain and main roundabout:
Looking out towards the harbour.. The casino is the bottom right:
As if the city didn't offer enough architecture, Barcelona's El Prat airport is... although a totally retarded design in terms of immigration followed by a complete lack of any shops.... had an ultra post-modern approach to architectural design, which is of no surprise considering that Ricardo Bofill was the architect. He also did JPM's HQ in Chicago, Shiseido Building in Tokyo and the Cartier HQ in paris..
This is what we mean by RETARDED. Once you go through the 1st security check, international flights are diverted left towards gate areas "D" and "E". Fair enough. But all the shops and food you see down below are in gate areas A-C, an area which you can't get through as there are different immigration counters for D & E, a fact which was only pointed out to us once we had cleared customs....so no last minute food shopping. how sad..
We had a lot of worries about safety and pickpockets hyped up by our friends prior to going. Perhaps we were fortunate on this trip to not have encountered any and to be able to see some of the most impressive sights in the world and taste some of the best food we have had for while.
A couple days in Barcelona is well recommended but we would also suggest checking out the Basque country because honestly we didn't spend anywhere near enough time in that region and we are usually pretty brisk in our travels!
Anyway, the details:
Hotel ME Barcelona http://www.me-barcelona.com/
Hotel Arts (Ritz Carlton) Barcelona http://www.hotelartsbarcelona.com/
Astoria7 Hotel San Sebastian http://www.astoria7hotel.com/
We rented our cars through Hertz and it was cheap and painless. Just make sure you get a GPS unit which works!
