Friday in Barcelona

We started Friday with an informal visit to the University of Barcelona with the Student Affairs at Sea grad students. We met on the pier and grabbed the shuttle to town. It’s only a 5 minute ride but due to construction you can’t simply walk there….

We grabbed a metro up to the University station. We stopped for coffee (yea!) Café Solo (single espresso), Café con leche (same but ½ and ½ with steamed milk). Good coffee.

We were not able to arrange a visit in advance. Everyone was having a long weekend following a Wednesday night festival. But the main building was open, some of it, and we got to see some beautiful parts. The internal courtyards were especially peaceful and nice. We saw the “heroic stairs” and the library. A guide on another trip told us that the government was intentionally spreading faculties around the city to improve neighborhoods. That having a faculty in a neighborhood created book shops and coffee shops and changed the nature of neighborhoods for the better.

After out informal tour we split up and Kathy and I headed for Parc Miro. We were looking for the Miro museum (Foundation Miro) which it turns out is not really near the Parc Miro. But, we did get to see the beautiful new stadium under construction. Very Islamic influenced architecture.

We then caught the metro to try to find the vernicular which would take us to the top of mount Montjuïc. That turned out to be easy, the vernicular is part of the metro system and the vernicular deposited us a short walk from the foundation/museum.

The museum was fun. I didn’t care much for his art, but Kathy liked it.

Then we headed back to the Sagrada Familia. We felt rushed through the first visit and besides spending more time there we wanted to take the elevator up one of the towers. It was well worth the return visit. That place is really awe inspiring. They currently plan to complete it in 2025. They plan to add 10 towers to the 8 already completed. 4 more representing apostles, 4 for the evangelists, one for Mary, and the tallest to represent Jesus.

After our visit we tried to find a restaurant that had been recommended. On San Rafael. We were walking toward it and getting into a pretty sketchy neighborhood. I said let’s go one more block which we did. The neighborhood was worse. Kathy suggested (firmly) a retreat. We did try to reach the restaurant from another direction with similar results. So… we went back to a nice place we had seen, next to an art school in a quiet plaza. Had a really nice meal there.

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