To our surprise most of the shops and things were open on Good Friday. Amanda and I looked around at the mall, had a wander up La Rambla, and generally hung about.
The first thing you notice on La Rambla is the crazy busker statues that are up and down the street. The costumes are elaborate and look like they'd be impractical in extreme temperatures.
Here are a couple we saw:
One of the first things you notice about Barcelona is that most of the 'landmarks' were created as part of the city's revamp for the 1992 Olympics, including this
And this...
The Spanish sure do love their monuments. The entire city is littered with them (most of which I have no idea what they're for).
Near the waterfront, at the bottom of La Rambla there is a statue of Christopher Columbus. He seems to be pointing out towards the water - it was put up to remember him setting off towards 'The New World'. Unfortunately he's actually pointing in the wrong direction, but never mind.
The waterfront is very pretty:
Amanda and I sampled some real Spanish Paella for dinner and then headed back to the hostel to find the boys had had a few too many beers and causing havoc in the hostel bar. We gently encouraged them to head off to the clubs, and hit the sack for an early night - it was going to be a big day on Saturday!
EASTER SATURDAY
Rebecca, Amanda and I got on a hop-on/hop-off tour around Barcelona, and saw some amazing stuff. The architecture of Spanish favourite 'Gaudi' is all over the city, including in 'Parc Guell' which was where he lived. Here are a few of the crazy things he designed -
Casa Mila (La Pedrera)
La Sagrada Familia
La Sagrada Familia is this huge cathedral, started in 1882. It was left unfinished at Gaudi's death and construction halted during the Spanish Civil War in 1932. In 1940 construction started again (so the photos are all littered with cranes) and they expect to be done by 2026 (yes that's another 18 years!). All the construction is funded by donations and by the entrance tickets of tourists - no government or official church people are paying for it. Randomly, the Executive Architect is actually a Kiwi, called Mark Burry.
The design is incredibly detailed and very grand - there are three facades and will eventually be 18 towers. To look at it, you could stand there for hours. For starters, its huge. And you can walk right around it and see close-up literally hundreds of little features that Gaudi has designed for it. There is so much to look at and its not even done yet! It was very amazing, but the line to get in was so long that if we had gone inside we wouldn't have seen anything else of Barcelona!
We saw a few other bits and pieces too, like
The Building that doesn't reach the ground
and Spanish Starbucks!!
That night, we went to a Flamenco show and had Paella for dinner again (but at a different place).
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