Last day in Barcelona

Hard to believe this is our last day.  Again it is a little wet outside so we decide to pass on the hop on hop off bus again and start the day by taking the metro to the Templo de la Segrada Familia.  Today the line is about ½ as long as the other day when we get there, but it is still 20 minutes before it is even scheduled to open!  Unfortunately because of the weather the towers are closed so we can’t go up, so we just did the audio tour and entrance to the Church.  Wow, Gaudi has quite the imagination, it was very interesting but definitely did not feel like a Church with so many people in side and all the noise.  The audio tour actually made it a little better because you could not hear everyone speaking so much.  The cathedral  is still under construction, about another 30 years at least to go before it is complete to Gaudi’s plans.  It is amazing to see now over the skyline of Barcelona, can’t imagine what it is going to look like in another 30 years.  Part of the audio tour takes you outside to explain some of the towers and architecture, but it is now raining so hard that we did not even listen to the whole tour.  At the end we discovered a museum under the cathedral that goes in to more details about the design and decided to go through here too, partly to stay dry, and partly because it was interesting, but again so crowded.  We were at the Cathedral and museum for about 2 hours and by the time we left the rain had let up so we decided to walk back towards the apartment and explore some more.

Waiting for the metro

In Segrada Familia

Segrada Familia

Outside of Segrada Familia

On the walk home we went by the Arch de Triumph, yep Barcelona has one too.  It was very pretty, where in Paris it is in the middle of the traffic circle, this one is in the middle of a park which makes it very nice to take pictures are wander around.  The green space is very pretty.

Arch de Triumph

Headed home and picked up some take out pizza.  This is another place that was recommended in the apartment, they had 4 different kinds made and you choose the slice that you want, we went with one of each, all very yummy.  Take out because we had wine and beer to finish and I didn’t want to waste the 3 Euro bottle of wine!

Check out the cash register in the pizza shop

Siesta time again for Wendy while I clean up a few pictures.  The internet here has been really terrible so haven’t had a chance to upload any more to the blog, I’ll be busy when we get home.  We packed up most of our things for tomorrow morning early flight.

Another Gaudi building

The weather is now not so bad so we decide to head out to see the Magical Fountain light show.  This is a display right out front of the palace very near the Olympic Grounds.  We had not been to this part of town yet, there are still quite a few spots we will not get to visit this trip, but we assume that one year we will take a cruise out of Barcelona and be back again.  The fountain was very nice, done to music and a few lights.  It wasn’t very dark yet when we were there, so it may have been prettier a little later.

Barcelona arena

Location of magic fountain

Looking down at magic fountain

Amazing how the Segrada Familia stands out over the skyline

Magic fountain in action

Decided we would have supper on the walk home.  The walk home is all downhill and very easy except it has started to rain again.  I have picked up a broken umbrella one day on our travels that was rolling around on the street, it has become a laugh for us every day.  I am a little upset tonight as even the claps to hold it closed broke. 

So many beautiful balconies

Walked by the restaurant “Tickets|”, had read about this online. Stopped by to see the menu, but they only take internet reservations, a little out of our price range anyway.  We did watch for a bit through the window to see what they were preparing, google it online, very trendy looking stuff.

Ended up going to a place where a girl on a street corner told us to go and with the little ticket she gave us they would give us a free drink.  We were very surprised when we got there to see that the place was full.  Ended up waiting for a table for about 30 minutes to even get in, but again a fantastic meal.  Barcelona has certainly come through with some amazing food.  From our apartment there are literally 100’s of tiny restaurants to try down all these little side streets, during the day you would never even know they are there the way they are all boarded up, but at night it certainly does come alive!  The restaurant we ate at tonight closes the kitchen at midnight and then it turns into a club at until 3AM, this city truly does never sleep

April 28 Homeward bound

Up at 4:30 for a quick breakfast and off to the airport.  We worried a little about catching a cab at this time of the morning, but Wendy watched from our window in the apartment and saw there were literally cabs going by every few seconds.  Got all the luggage out to the curb and we hadn’t even stopped walking before one stopped for us.  Guess he was glad to get a sober fare to the airport rather than pick up more partiers from the night before. 

We are on the airplane right now from London to Halifax.  Our itinerary is Barcelona – Heathrow, London –Halifax – Moncton.  A long day but we get in around 5PM tonight which will be around 10PM Barcelona time for us, perfect time for supper like we have been used to now for the last month.  We have had a fantastic trip, know how fortunate we are to be able to do this, and really do hope we can manage again next year.  Who knows where next years travels will bring us, but I’m sure we will be off somewhere….  Back to work tomorrow.

Barcelona tennis open

So all the rain yesterday cancelled so many of the tennis matches that there were extras played today.  We tried to figure out what our tickets would get us in to.  Wendy assumed we would just be able to get into the quarter final matches which wouldn’t start until later in the afternoon.  

Started off the morning with a walk along the port, it is a little overcast, but nothing too bad, so hopefully we will get to the tennis.  Did a loop around to where we had dinner last night so we could see the Post Office building in the light.  Explored a few of the little back streets, always lots of fun.  Worked our way back to our apartment and went to the Columbus Monument which is right outside our apartment as we had read there is an elevator you can take to the top for a nice view of the port.  There is also an information booth inside the monument; we asked if they knew anything about the tennis, of course they didn’t.  Plus the elevator is closed for repairs for about a month, guess we’ll miss out on that.  Back to the apartment and I found a chat going on that looks like our tickets are good for all matches today so off we go.

 

Maritime museum

Columbus monument

Port Authority building

Post office

Inside post office

Love these little streets in Old Town

Andre pulling the big cats tail

Very easy for us to find the tennis club.  The metro is right outside our apartment, and it is on the same metro line we need to the tennis.  Information had told us to take a bus when we got off, but it was so close to walk we skipped on the bus.  We pass by another house that Guadi was involved in, it is so easy to spot them now.  Arrived at the tennis at about 10:45 and the first match had just started on Center court.  This tournament is clay court, so many of the top names in tennis aren’t here, only the ones that specialize in clay court, or I guess are getting ready for the much bigger French Open. They are still finishing the round of 16, there are 4 courts in use, on center court you have a reserved seats, all the other courts it is just free seating.  First match we got to see Rafael Nadal.  Our seats were fantastic, this is not a huge stadium so really every seat would be good, but we were really surprised with how close we were as we had bought tickets about ½ way up on line.  All of those little habits that Nadal has before he serves is really funny to see in person.  Because of all of the delays from yesterday we actually got to see Nadal play and win 2 matches.  All together today we watched 5 matches, we were there for 7.5 hours.  Another highlight was we saw Canadian Milos Raonic win both of his matches as well.  We actually left part way through Nadals second match as he was winning easily and moved over to a small court where Roanic was playing another Spaniard.  Needless to say Raonic did not have much of the crowd with him.  By the third set Nadals match was over and the Raonic match moved to a tie breaker and there was not a seat left to watch, when we got there I don’t think there were even 50 of us watching.  It was very exciting, going to the 3^rd set tiebreaker, glad Raonic won, but we didn’t cheer too loudly.

 

Entrance to the Barcelona open

Center court

Nadal waiting to receive

Massive Canadian serve!

Preparing the court, they do this after every set

Preparing the court between matchs

On the way home we took another direction to go by the Royal Palace, which is now a museum.  Took a few pictures outside, then walked around the gardens a little, then were told we needed to leave as they close at 8PM.  

Gate to Royal Palace

Royal Palace

Caught the metro home, picked up a bottle of wine, this one cost 3Euro, I figure it is about 40% higher price here than in Javea, but I did get it at a premium tourist location.  Making plans now for dinner, so much to choose from, only requirement is I do not get us lost in the dark.    

Supper turned out to be amazing.  We ended up at a Vietnamese place that we found in the book in our apartment that was recommended.  This was a tiny restaurant, that maybe should have held 30 people but had 40 packed in, with a wait list on a board.  We lucked out and arrived just as 2 people were leaving the counter so we got to jump the line as no one else was outside and ate there.  Here they give you a sheet of paper with the menu on it and you just write down the quantity of everything you want.  First problem was we didn’t know anything on the menu except edamame beans which Wendy loves so we put down one of that.  The waitress came by and we just asked her to pick a bunch of good things for us as we aren’t familiar with the food.  How delicious, we had 3 different kinds of dumplings with pork, veggies that we dipped in different sauces.  We also had Peking duck, and the beans.  Everything is home made, they had a very tiny kitchen with 4 chefs working that you could watch right at the end of the counter.  This place was a gold mine, somewhere you would never go into if it wasn’t recommended.  When we left at 11PM there was still a wait list of 15 people and they had written at the end No Mas, no more being taken.  I only wish we had somewhere to eat like this in Moncton.

Vietnamese restaurant, wait list on chalk board

Here is part of the menu we got to choose from.....do you know what any of these things are.  We really are not sure what we got, but it was delicious

Our delicious supper

Outside Vietnamese restaurant