I did not think it would take me this long to blog about our trip to Spain and Portugal. After spending the week in Moscow, we returned to Novorossiysk on Friday, the 20th of September. The small, daily tasks of life in Novo add up very quickly, and seem to fill my days. Ryan has made a few culinary challenges that I have been busy conquering. Nothing major in the term of challenges just individual items that I will post about later. Throw in a couple days of the water going out and causing extra stress. No worries, I type this post as one of the culinary challenges "set" in the freezer (any guess what it could be), and the water is currently working. All is well in Novorossiysk.
We flew into Barcelona on a Friday evening flight, and were there for the weekend, flying to Lisbon late Sunday night. No travel agent for this trip, I was the planner of events. The week before we arrived in Barcelona, I purchased all our tickets for the sights online. Allow me to insert a small announcement, if you travel, please, please, please go to websites of places you plan to visit. If they give an option to purchase online, PURCHASE ONLINE!! It amazes me the amount of people that choose to stand in the extremely long lines at the ticket booth, when others (myself) purchase tickets online and walk straight to the entrance, no waiting. Of course I realize if everyone purchased online there would be a long line at the entrance, but I know only a handful of people read this blog, so considered yourself enlightened.
Sorry about that small announcement, turning into a paragraph. Back to Barcelona, and most importantly Antoni Gaudí. I do not know how to explain him, his designs are incredible, unlike anything I have seen before, yet I am compelled to believe his mindset may not have been the most logical. Regardless of logic or reason, what he did was a feast for the eyes, and I enjoyed it.
I am no expert on architecture or design, and I cannot explain his concepts, but I will allow the photographs to show what Gaudí did throughout the city of Barcelona.
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| Exterior of La Pedrera - Casa Milá |
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| Rooftop of Casa Milá. |
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| My first glimpse of La Sagrada Familia. |
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| Exterior of Casa Batlló. |
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| Interior |
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| Exterior of La Sagrada Família. |
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| Interior. Beautiful, colorful stained glass. |
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| We took a tour of one tower, elevator ride up, small, spiral staircase down. |
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| A trip to Park Guëll. |
Other than the Gaudí houses, and La Sagrada Família we did not do much else. We strolled through the small walking streets, enjoyed gelato, and Ryan found an adorable (not his choice of adjective) cafe where we enjoyed a relaxed meal of tapas and sangria. At times I enjoyed the afternoon siesta, when the shops closed and the streets quieted, other times in angered me when I wanted to do a little shopping or visit a small cafe for an afternoon sweet treat. Ryan did a bit of research Saturday afternoon and found a nearby movie theatre that showed English movies. I know, it sounds crazy, we travel to Barcelona and go to the movies. Remember, we do not get to go to movie theaters in Russia, so when we travel, if the opportunity arises, we go. What movie did we see? Elysium.
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| Enjoying tapas and sangria at a little cafe. |
The weekend in Barcelona was the perfect start to our trip, and fulfilled one of my travel destination dreams. I think a weekend was the perfect amount of time for us to see and do what we wanted, others may say it was too short, but we had Portugal calling our names!
The pictures are only a small glimpse of our sightings. To see more pictures from Barcelona,
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