Barcelona - Day 2

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I awoke this morning to the soothing sound of the bells at La Catedral de Barcelona and a massive hangover. I somehow managed to keep count of the tolls well enough to realize it was 11 and we needed to get up and pay for the next night. After showers and lunch, we headed to Barcelona’s Arc de Triomf to take some pictures and have a walk through the park to the see the cascading fountains and go through the zoo. The fountains were absolutely gorgeous and were a welcomed surprise in comparison to what we’d expected. And the park was full of birds, gardens, families, affectionate couples, and more outdoor cafés.

Our hangover having not subsided one bit, and being pretty tired, we decided to skip the zoo and hop on a double decker tour bus in order to “still see the sights while having someone else drive our drunk-asses around instead of walking” as Nick so eloquently put it. We were able to travel to different parts of the city, see many of Barcelona’s sights, learn a little of the history, enjoy the architecture, and take a few pictures. It was a good idea on Nick’s part and made the necessary sight-seeing much easier on our weary and dehydrated bodies. The tour climaxed with a drive past the Museu Nacional de Art de Catalunya and the Olympic City from ’92, which were both on the hill in Barcelona’s west end and offered an absolutely stunning panoramic view of the entire city. Nick and I weren’t able to get any decent pictures, but we promised ourselves we’d return.

After heading back to the hostel for a nap and a shower, we went back to La Rambla to have our final tapas meal of the trip on a café in the median while we people watched. For those who aren’t familiar with tapas, it’s a Spanish style of dining that consists of small appetizer-sized portions of a number of dishes. The idea is that everyone tries a small portion of every dish. It’s a great way to eat because it’s relatively cheap and the flavors of each of the dishes vary quite a bit, so the tastes stand out much more. For our last meal, Nick and I ate garlic bread, albondigas (Spanish meatballs), fried Calamari, crab legs, and cheese salad. The food was great and we left the restaurant completely stuffed. The dinner-time crowd that walks along La Rambla is great, consisting of a good mix of late shoppers and early nightlife goers. It made for some great people watching as we ate.

From there we went to a place called the London Bar, which was a favorite hang out of Hemingway when he visited Barcelona, and which were told would also be a good place to try our first absinthe, because they would walk us through the process. And it IS a process. It involves dipping a sugar cube in the liquor, setting it on a fork at the top of the glass, lighting it on fire, and allowing the sugar to melt into the drink. Once it’s melted down, it’s mixed with the liquor and water is added to dilute the concoction, and it is consumed “con mucho despacio (very slowly)”. It tastes like bitter black licorice and burns on the way down. The buzz is quick, but mostly pleasant. And no, I didn’t hallucinate. In fact, I think the hallucinogenic effect is a wives tale. Although an Irishman I met the night before told me that more than three will get you so drunk you might as well be hallucinating. All in all it was a good experience and definitely something I’d made certain I’d do before I left Europe. After a few more pints at Molly Malone’s and a serious discussion about how another night of heavy clubbing would impair our abilities to sight-see and travel tomorrow, we decided to call it an early night.

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Photos

Rooftops
a sample of some of the architecture

Art...
a performance art piece on La Rambla