Barcelona 11- 15 August

Modern Barcelona

Spires still being built on Gaudi's church

Entrance to Gaudi's church

...yes more Gaudi - apartments

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A famous Gaudi creation - my photo doesn't do it justice - it is very colourful

After Nice we overnighted in Montpellier and then hopped on the 7.30 am train to Barcelona. We have had interesting experiences with the train travel. It is a good way to travel, you see the country and often there is power in the train so you can charge phones and laptops. We paid for first class Eurail tickets, but apart from the train from Florence to Venice where we got a free drink and snack, this does not seem to bring much advantage. At least the French conductors and food service staff have been friendly, we copped a couple of shockers in Italy.

It was about 5 hours to Barcs and we navigated our way from the very busy Barcelona Sants Estacion to our little hostel off Las Ramblas, tourist central Spain. We have paid much less for this room than elsewhere and I have now equated price to the plyboard thickness of the walls. This is cheap and while we have our own bathroom our wall adjoins the 'shared bathroom' for the dormies. On the first night here I had to yell through the wall at the couple in the bathroom to keep the noise down. They were taking the meaning of 'sharing' literally. But then there is free breaky and wifi included, so you win some you lose some.

Have had a day walking Las Ramblas, the Port and surrounding area and done the open top bus tour. I am finding these good value in each place we go as you get a lot of info and can cover a lot of k's in a day (thanks Hillsy for the tips on Barc.). You hear a lot about the architect Gaudi before you get to Barcs, but as in all destinations it is so much better when you see the real thing. This guy lived from 1850 - 1924 and designed some wonderful buildings that are a cross between art and architecture. The thing I love is that they are colourful and fun, not the stale square buildings we are used to. The church that he spent the last 40 years of his life on is still being completed, he knew he would never finish it but left the blueprints and said that 'God was in no hurry'. Amazing for his time he lived till 74 but was was killed by a tram of all things!

Guess who's in Barcs?

At the Port we had a nice reminder of home when we found the SeaSheppard Steve Irwin docked. We booked in and did a free tour in the arv, was a great learning experience about conservation. They have just been touring the Meditteranean to stop illegal fishing of Tuna, particularly the Red Fin Tuna which is endangered and fishers have been illegally netting, out of season in large quantaties by bribing European Governments. Their next stop is Oz on the way to stop Japanese whaling in Antarctica. We were fascinated to hear what the crew go through and how dedicated they all are, all volunteers.

Have been sampling some of the wine and beer. We are feeling a little travel fatigued though and I have had some less than pleasant 'customer service' experiences with the Spanish, so we decided to skip the Eurail and fly to Paris tomorrow. I'm a tad jaded with Eurail, it is not cheap and the booking process and queues are hellish. Yesterday's fun was waiting 2 hours in a queue at Barc Sants (this is tourist central rail station and size of small airport) to get to non-English speaking 'Customer Unservice' agent for her to just keep yelling at me 'Espanol' - she wanted me to speak Spanish then made a half assed attempt at helping me then finished the transaction. UGH, sometimes I miss home!

I booked our Paris accom months ago and am looking fwd to it as the owners have been recommended as lovley people and at least I can understand some French - even if I can't speak it well!

The Tour Bus

Off now to try and get a look inside a Gaudi joint...