Barcelona - unfinished business

The Spanish smile – as ready as a breeze rippling across water.

 Welcome to Barcelona.  You are forgiven for thinking that you are in a country called Catalonia rather than Spain – such is the regional parochialism.

Not a frenetic pace nor hustle.  A laid back atmosphere and sea breeze.

This is the Mediterranean.

There’s an invisible force-field here that prevents me from doing the tick box tourism routine of writing a “must-see list” and madly rushing around and ticking it off.

Barcelona deserves to be breathed deeply like the sea air. 

My three days here is not nearly enough and I enter into a contract with the place that I will be back.  Nothing so formal as a signed piece of paper – not the way things are done around more – more a handshake…and a smile.  With that, it’s sealed.

Come for a walk with me.  Initially we’re not going far – just to the balcony. This is my view each morning as I do my yoga. 

Sagrada Familia(r)

Charly was brought up in this Barcelona apartment building since he was 4 years old. He is now 28 and has his own apartment in the complex.  The balcony door lets in a familiar sound every hour of church bells.  The remainder of the time are the noises of drills, saws, grinders and general construction.  He’s familiar with it – it has been going on his whole life.  Charly lives one block away and in sight of the majestic Sagrada Familia.

Whether your regard this as the most modern day feat of crowd sourced funding and engineering or the most overrun engineering/building project in the world, Sagrada Familia is something to behold.

Looking almost organic, the stonework looks less like a formula and more like something straight out of a Dr Seuss book.

Ask Charly when it’s due to be finished and he just smiles. He doesn’t necessarily believe the 1^st quarter deadline of this century.  He may get to see it in his lifetime but he’s not holding his breath.

The organic look outside is contrasted by the interior.  Neo- gothic is the closest description – Gaudi’s masterpiece and a jewel in the crown of Barcelona. Commissioned in 1882, 170m tall and still under construction.  The queues outside for tickets start to congregate around 9.00 am and do not dissipate until around 7.00pm (it closes at 8.00pm).  Worth the queue – but I jump it by buying my ticket on-line and entering the cathedral at 9.30 am – before the crowds manage to get inside en masse. 

 
 

Inside – contemporary proof that man has not lost the art of turning stone into something living.  It is majestic.  Having had the privilege of seeing the result of faith built in stone across continents and millennia in my last 8 weeks and 10 countries of travel – this rivals the best.  I have just come here from Istanbul  where I witnessed the Aya Sofia and Blue Mosque.  This one is yet another filter on religion–and breath-taking.

 Somehow this building that is actually more art than architecture permeates through the Barcelona skyline and architectural DNA of the city  Many countries have old and new side-by-side  - a disruption and dislocation of form.  Barcelona somehow escapes that with a limbo that creates a visual Rosetta stone-  translating and traversing from old to new.  Much of that is a formula that Spain has Antoni Gaudi to thank for it.

 As if to add to the enigma, Gaudii’s home (now a museum) is situated in a Dr Seuess-meets nature-type part called Park Guell.  His house is relatively minimalist – almost Spartan.  This contrasts with his other creations though gives more of a picture of the man.  Like some other architects of faith (refer separate post), Gaudi turns his focus outward and chooses austerity for his own comfort.  A renaissance man in approach, he also designed the furniture for each of the buildings and houses he created – taking his queues largely from nature. 

 

His view of balance was that a home should only be 1/6^th the size of the footprint of the land it occupied, the rest dedicated to nature and worship of its form.  I visit each location in that order – Sagrada Famila first then Park Guell and his museum second – and am pleased  that I’ve chanced upon this order.

What else?

 The remainder of my time in Barcelona is spread across some self-maintenance (see separate post on “lets get something straight”) and sampling another sea in the form of the Mediterranean. 

Let’s continue there first.
 

There is a pace and style of the people here that is to be envied.  Along with the ready smiles is a jeux de vivre (sorry, my Spanish doesn’t extend to the relevant translation). 

This is a tourist town but does not compromise a local feel and places in being so.    There’s something about Europe I sense where tourists tend to congregate to crowds. Like attracts like and this can be found on the waterfront and corresponding (clean and pristine) beaches near the marinas and world trade centre (at the Northern) end of the beach in Barcelona.

Beaches – pristine and sparkling

Let’s head south – after all, I am a farming lad from a sparsely populated country and don’t tend to gravitate to crowds.  I was also immersed from an early age in foreign cultures and tend to seek out the local places and sights rather than those more heavily trodden by foreign foot fall. 

We head south – we can either walk along the coastline (for a leisurely and beautiful golden sand meets crystal sea beachside walk) or fast track ourselves by taking the L4 Metro line in the La Pau direction and getting off at the El Maresme Forum.  I have a 10 trip public transport ticket worth 10 Euro to use up so opt for this method of transport.

There are 10 beaches in total in the Barcelona town area stretching north to south across 4.5km of coastline. The southern most are frequented by locals.  Each is beside the next separated by a breakwater.  While many don’t associate Barcelona with pristine swimming beaches, the world has a lot to thank the Barcelona Olympics for.  These are some of the most pristine, clean and swimmer friendly beaches to be found in a major city in the World. 

 While I need no excuse for a sea-swim (it always recharges my batteries), this is a green script from my Osteopath.  “It will help stretch out your back” (and it does). 

 The second-to-last beach is a nudist beach and I studiously avoid this lest I have some explaining to do later.  I needn’t have bothered.  Barcelona sells bikinis as separate tops and bottoms.  Clearly many of the local ladies are on a budget as attested by all the 3-4 local beaches at the southern end.  Not sure whether it’s my conservative upbringing or my last point of departure (Istanbul), but this amount of natural skin is foreign to me.  It soon becomes apparent to me that this is all quite natural around here and I soon get into the swing of things (so to speak)[no, I do remain with a degree of modesty separating torso and legs].

Each beach has a lifeguard, a marked-out swimming area within a breakwater and (as at September 6  2014) 25 degree, clean, clear and sandy bottomed water 

There are showers and toilets and it’s very swimmer and beach-bum friendly.  The thing that does surprise me at this end of the bay is the lack of crowds. 

Green prescription duly filled 1 km in the water later and I stroll the leisurely walk back to town in 28 degree sunshine, working on my tan on the way.  Life’s a beach!

 

Las Ramblas

Slightly inland from the beach and within “stretching” distance from my newly found osteopath is a labyrinth of culture and (calm) retail aptly called Las Ramblas (the rambles). 

You can quite happily lose yourself in here for hours – soaking up the sights, vibe and shops.  In fact, you don’t even need to buy too much.  This is not the artificial shopping mall – rather a party atmosphere that lets you either explore and find treasures in local designer shops or live life vicariously by sitting outside sipping wine, beer or sangria at one of the local cafes (perchance what I’m doing right now as I write this). 

If art appreciation is your thing, stop off at the Picasso museum - it’s right here.  The Dali museum is a further across town.

 

 

 

Let’s get back to the people

After all, that’s what I find so attractive about this place.  It’s hard to put a finger on it – it’s not the classical beauty of the Italians  or the French dress sense.    I’m lost for a single descriptor ; an older generation might use the word “sassy”.

A burly guy walks past.  Both of his hands are full.  Held as gently as an egg (and about the same size) dwarfed in his left hand is his daughter’s hand.  There’s music in her head and she’s dancing to it; I think it’s a rumba.  In his right hand, a larger package, but held equally tenderly, the hand of his wife.  This turns out to be a pretty common sight everywhere I go.

This is a race that loves life.

 

 

Moving on

Chalk Barcelona up to unfinished business.  I have a tug of war with a boat booked for a week in Portugal.  My flight’s at 7.00 am tomorrow,  taxi booked for 5.15am then on the ski behind the boat for my first set before lunch time.   Who said this was all leisure ;0)