Mediterranean - 16 - May 28 2023 Barcelona & Gaudi architecture

 This is our last day with Viking, to be spent in Barcelona Spain, a lively city of 1.6 million people. Its a very artsy city with statues, monuments, art work every where you look.  We have Viking's included (4.5 hr) tour callend Iconic Barcelona.  The sun was rising as we entered the harbor at 7am.  There are 8 cruise ship docks, 5 are in use including ours.  Royal Carribean's ship Symphony of the Seas is near, it is 5x bigger than Viking ships.

I still enjoy watching the pilot boats, this one sped by to retrieve a pilot from one of the already docked ships.

Look closely and you'll see the rope drop down ladder.  Its about 8-10 feet above the pilot boat.

Statue of Columbus, pointing toward the harbor, a useful landmark for visitors new to the city.

There are a lot of motor bikes, with specially marked parking places.

Here is Frank Gehry's famous fish sculpture along Barcelona's sea front.  Its hard to get a complete view of anything here.  Either a building or something else blocks the complete view or the bus is traveling too fast before something jumps in view to interfere.

Even the street lights are beyond ordinary.

A famous house designed by architect Gaudi.  God and nature were his most inportant values guiding his work.

This was adjacent to Gaudi's Casa Batllo.  The guide didn't talk about it but it was different too, but not as much as Gaudi's work.

Gaudi's next famouse house was a 5 minute drive away.  There are no straight lines eveything is wavey just like the ocean.  The balcony railings look like seawood.  The original owners that commissioned the work were not happy with the final construction and refused to pay final amounts.  And they sued Gauldi.  Gauldi won the suit.  The head is part of a special exhibition, it is not part of the Gauldi house design.

La Sagrada Familia.  Construction started in 1882 and isn't finished yet, another 10 years maybe.  It is the largest unfinished Catholic church in the world designed by, guess who, Antoni Gauldi.  Gauldi died in 1926, well before the construction neared completion.  It is easy to tell the Gaudi portion, it is much darker and just looks older. There will be 18 towers when finished.

The east facing side is Spring and Summer with fruit, and a cypress tree, with carvings of the birth of Jesus.  Its the happy side.

 The Virgin Mary tower has the 12 point start on the top, just right of center.

The opposite side (west facing side) is Fall and Winter, depicting the death and resurrection of Jesus.

There is a golden Christ just behind the cross, representing the rise from the dead.  It is high , close to God.

There are apartment buildings on the south side of the building,  they will be taken down and replaced with gardens.  A much nicer neighbor to the church.  Although those who live in the apts aren't happy.

After seeing the La Sagrada Familia, we climbed back on the bus to see the old town.  It turned out that we were on our own to explore the old town.  So we walked to the Barcelona Cathedral built from 1298 - 1420, it is 90 meters long and 53 wide.

The walk to the cathedral was via narrow walkways, it was difficult to know if we were even close to the church. That is until we found the main square.

There was dancing and a band in front of the church on the square.

During the walk from cathedral back to the bus, the shops were opening up.  Today is Sunday so they open later than normal, 11 am.  Here is the Espadrille shop.  Nooo prices - that always scares me a little.

Our guide, Gloria, reminded me of  Juliannna Margulies - same smile and mannerisms.

Tomorrow we disembark and head to the middle of Barcelona to find our hotel.