SPAIN
2009
Day
18 May 26
Wednesday - Our Last Day
BARCELONA
Our last day in Spain.
We ate earlier this morning then walked across the street and looked at
the boats. It was another beautiful
day.
From
there we walked to the Palau de la Musica Catalana where we had reserved
an 11:00 tour in English. The concert hall was designed in the Catalan modernistic style by the architect Lluis Domenech i Montaner .
It was built in between 1905 and 1908 for the Orfeo' Catala, a choral
society founded in 1891 that was a leading force in the Catalan cultural
movement that came to be known as the Renaixenca
(Catalan Rebirth). It was
inaugurated February 9, 1908.
The façade has two colonnades on the
second-level balcony of the main façade. Each column is covered uniquely with
multicolored glazed tile pieces in mostly floral designs and is capped with a
candelabrum that at night blazes with light.
Above the columns are large busts of
Geovanni
Pierluigi da Palestrina, Johann Sebastians Bach, and Ludwig van Beethoven
on the main façade and Richard Wagner on the side. The top of the main façade is a large allegoric
mosaic by Lluís Bru that represents the members of the Orfeó Català, but it
is impossible to see it clearly from the narrow street below.The
concert hall of the Palau, which seats about 2,200 people, is the only
auditorium in Europe that is illuminated during daylight hours entirely by
natural light. The walls on two sides consist primarily of stained-glass panes
set in magnificent arches, and overhead is an enormous skylight of stained glass
designed by Antoni Rigalt whose centerpiece is an inverted dome in shades of
gold surrounded by blue that suggests the sun and the sky. It was really
beautiful, but sadly no photos were allowed.
We
had made 1:00 luncheon reservations at the Casa Calvert before we left home.
Casa Calvert is in a building designed by Gaudi.
We were rather early so we walked for about 45 minutes around the
neighborhood which was quite interesting.
When we were seated, we were the only guest in the restaurant.
More came in later. Next to
us was a young lady with a small child who ran a toy truck around on the floor.
It was rather annoying since this was such a fine eatery, and we were
going to pay big bucks for lunch. She
finally feed him, nursed him and finally took a nap.
We had crab croquette with crispy “things” for a start.
My wife had a steak and I had sole with eggplant in the middle.
They brought the bill in sort of a little box.
After we left, I realized that I had forgotten to leave a tip.
I sent a note with a tip in the mail from the hotel.
I hope they got it.
We
walked back towards the hotel. My
wife had read about a neat Cava bar that was near the Picasso art gallery.
We found the bar and had Cava and a few snacks.
There were several gift shops nearby that sold tiles and ceramic gifts.
We finished buying our gifts for our family.
We stopped at another store bought some inexpensive jewelry.
After
a nap in the hotel, we went up to the roof terrace for drinks.
(the picture on the right is our roof terrace from the street) It
was warm and sunny but there was a breeze. Again
the bartender wasn’t up there. My
wife went down to the desk and put in our order.
When they finally brought it, my Jack Daniel turned out to be scotch but
I drank it anyhow.
Tonight
was the final soccer game with Barcelona playing Manchester United in Rome for
the championship. From the
roof terrace we could hear music and some talking coming from near the sea
coast. So we walked down two
blocks to the monument of Columbus at the end of the Ramblas.
Thousands and thousands of people where walking down the Ramblas headed
to the area where the music was. We
understood that there was a large screen area where people could watch the game.
We walked over near a bridge over which all of the people were walking;
carry their flags, horns and refreshments.
We decided not to walk closer. Our
hotel was having a special celebration dinner, but no one was there so we walked
down the Sailors, the outdoor café were we had lunch the first day.
We had the same waiter who remembered us.
They had a large television facing the outdoor café.
We had tapas – omelet, mushroom, meatballs and white beans and a
dessert. Barcelona won just as we
finished eating. The town went
wild. We walked back down to
the Ramblas and watch the hordes of people walking back up the Ramblas from the
area on the water. They
were rather orderly. They had closed
the Kolon Street in front of the hotel for a while.
There were a lot of people going by on the side walk headed to the
Ramblas. After while they
opened the street and for half the night cars went up and down the street
honking with people leaning out the window waving flags. We knew that we
wouldn’t get much sleep that night.
The
next morning, we called a taxi to take us to the airport for our flight home.
We had a couple hour layover in Madrid.
We arrived home safely. It
was a wonderful trip. We would like
to do part of it again and see some of the churches we missed on the tour.
We especially loved Barcelona.
