June 26 - July 3, 2015 in Barcelona

Six Nights in Barcelona, June 26 – July 3, 2015

After a few days in Michelstadt, Germany we flew to Barcelona and arrived there early in the afternoon. We found our host’s recommended Aerobus from the airport into the center of town. Our apartment was just south of Plaza Catalunya, so we exited the Aerobus there with our rolly bags and made our way out of the south end of the Plaza, down the Port de L’Angel, a large pedestrian shopping street. Our place was on Santa Anna, a quiet smaller pedestrian street across from the pharmacy sign in the photo below. 

I had texted our host Mario and he met us at the apartment’s front door.

Our Barcelona apartment was up four flights of very tight, circular stone stairs, 

but it was modern, light and open. It was one large room with a living space and a low wall separating the bedroom and a door into the bathroom space with a shower. It was small and in a wonderful location. We could walk out and turn left onto Las Ramblas and from there walk all the way down to the port with its somewhat confusing statue of Christopher Columbus.

or we could turn right to de L’Angel and walk two blocks to the Cathedral with its wonderful Cloisters. 

Our first night we walked to the Cathedral 

and into Barri Gotic 

for a reservation I had made via TripAdvisor before we left, at L’Antic Bocoi Del Gotic restaurant. We got there when it opened at 7:30 or 8 pm and we were the first people there. Most people do not eat until at least 9 pm in Barcelona. On this night, it was good to be first because they sat us at the best table at the end of the restaurant at the window with a view of the square below.

We loved Barcelona, named for Barcino whose name graces the square near the Cathedral. 

One of the highlights was the Spanish Guitar concert we saw at Palau Musica. We had booked tickets in advance and found the “Palace of Music” was just a few blocks from our apartment. The interior is wonderfully decorative and the best way to see it was to see a concert.

One of the low lights is that I narrowly avoided being robbed while shopping at one of the markets on Las Ramblas. People had warned us that pick pockets were very aggressive in Barcelona. At one market stall, a man next to us asked a question of a vendor, while his female partner tried to take the wallet out of my purse. Luckily, I felt something and was able to hit my wallet out of her hands and reclaim it. 

We saw many of the Gaudi designed buildings. The first was the Palau Guell, a residence for the Guell family 

with its central worship or concert hall with many small skylights. 

My favorite was the Sagrada Familia cathedral. 

Gaudi designed it around 1880 – 1900, but much of it is only being built now. The stained glass windows, for example were designed and installed since 1999 by a Barcelona based artist.  

We got tickets to go into the Nativity towers. There is an elevator going up and the view of the city is very good. The way down, however, is via a tight spiral stone staircase. Some of the openings as we went down were a bit terrifying, but the views are great.

One of the areas further east from Barri Gotic was El Born. We walked there one morning to see the church Santa Maria del Mar. This is a view of it from another characteristic Barcelona street of stone with apartment buildings and shops on either side and vegetation in pots along the sides or in the balconies. 

There are great restaurants and shops near by. We had tapas for lunch here. 

We walked back to our favorite gelato place near City Hall and the government buildings called Gelaaati! Each flavor was made in the morning and the range of options and intensity of flavors was staggering. We really had to try something every day to get a full sense of the place. 

One of our other favorite ventures was the Joan Miro museum. One of our days in Barcelona, a Swiss friend of mine who lives in Girona came to visit us by train. After she arrived, we all took the “vertical” metro up to the “mountain”, Montjuic. We visited the Joan Miro Museum, which is the largest collection of his works in the world.  

Further up the road from the museum at the National Palace/Museum of Catalan, there is a set of waterfalls down to the street level of Plaza Espana. We loved the view down 

and then the view back up from the bottom. 

From there, we walked back to the Parallel metro stop where we had started and had dinner at a place I had reserved from home, Café Manilla.

It was one of our favorite meals while in Barcelona on our last night there. Onto Paris.