Yesterday, nearly wore me out! We got up early, had breakfast at our hotel and then quickly walked to the metro station where we traveled from Plaça d'Espanya to Diagonal, off Grand Via, to see La Pedrera. La Pedrera is a architect's paradise. Essentially an apartment building, it was constructed from 1906-1912. The brochure I picked up claimed it to be the zenith of his work. The outside facade looks like a series of waves for each level and all of the windows and balconies are composed of curved lines and lips. Basically, it looks organic or smooth and flesh like but, of course made of stone. Ironically, the roof is probably its best known feature. The chimneys are each uniquely designed and covered with tiles and glass. After starting with the roof we moved down to the attic (which sounds weird to say!) which was made of brick parabolic arches circling and interconnecting across the building. They had several models of Gaudi's work there. Moving down again, we got to see a restored apartment of what a typical bourgeois (wealthy middle class) family would have lived at around the time of the early 1900s. The interior was nicely decorated in the art nouveau style and even had a maid's quarters. It made me think of Downton Abby. :)
La Pedrera
We got out of La Pedrera at about 10:30 and then a few of the girls wanted me to chaperone them around the town as we shopped a bit during our free time. The girls came up with a sound off to help me better keep track of them. It made me glad that I teach such good kids that want to make my life easier. . .not go off and get in trouble. We visited El Corte Ingles (a department store), Desigual, H & M and many, many souvenir shops and stands. I got to do a few fun things to and the girls obliged. We shopped at Diesel for a bit, had some tea and granizados at Bracafe (a nice vintage Brazilian cafe that has been poorly named), and visited St. Joseph's Mercado (fancy farmer's market).
For lunch we stopped at this place called Que Pasta? It had a cool concept at its core. 1) Choose your type of pasta. 2) Choose your type of sauce, and 3) Choose a cheese topping. I had fusilli pasta, carbonara sauce and Parmesan topping. They put in a Chinese to go box and with a drink it only cost 5 euros or so. Not bad! And it tasted good!
We did some more shopping after lunch but eventually wore ourselves out and crashed at a city park east of the Gothic quarter. We laid down on the grass underneath a shade tree and enjoyed people watching for an hour or so. I took a couple of cat naps.
On our way back to meet the rest of the group at the Hard Rock on Plaça Catalunya, we saw a flea market outside the Gothic cathedral that sold all kinds of old European cool junk. They had old records, books, maps, medals, European currencies, etc. Normally, I shy away from flea markets because they are filled with old American junk. But European junk is different. :)
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