4th January - Day 2 Barcelona

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Hello there,

We awoke to a day that was bitterly cold and we discovered the city via the tourist bus route and had a great day to see the highlights and touristy things that everyone comes here to see.

Must mention we have breakfast here included in the price and it was great - we asked for boiled eggs and we got perfectly boiled eggs - they don't eat those here - usually pastries, cheese and cold meats for breakfast so the eggs are not normally the done thing!

Some of the sites we saw was the Gothic quarter which included the original medieval Roman walled city of Barcelona dating back thousands of years ago, World Trade Centre, and then on to the Olympic area where all the facilities were and still are from the 1992 Olympic games, National Museum of Catalan, the old Spanish town, then into the Barker (not related I don't think!!) which is the home ground of FC Barcelona which leads the National League in Spain in Soccer.

We got off the tourist bus and ventured into the hallowed grounds and went into the massive 2 story department store which sells only Soccer memorabilia - it's absolutely amazing the stuff they sell there and how fanatical the fans are about their team - it was full of them and apparently like that on most days!! Photo of moi by the hallowed flag of SC Barcelona in the memorabilia shop within the stadium grounds - they must make a fortune there - anything you can think of has the club insignia on it - even pencil cases!!

From there we went back to Catalonian Square where we checked out the local cuisine for lunch. We then embarked on the second part of the tour to the newer parts of the fore shore which was developed from industrial areas for Olympic accomodation and subsequent upmarket commercial areas. The outstanding feature of this tour was that we passed the Gaudi Sagrada Familia which is world renowned which commenced building in 1880 and is still being worked on to this day. Continuing on with the trip back to Catalonian Square it became very evident that Gaudi's particular architectural influence was featured throughout the city with hordes of tourists lining up to visit the places he designed. Having identified today the places we would stop and actually visit on the 2nd day of our bus tour.

We love flying by the seat of our pants and we've even learnt a little Spanish.... and can say a couple of words or so in Spanish - actually bought some things from a shop and had the transaction all done in Spanish - was feeling quite good about that.

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Photos

Soccer Stadium
Lyn next to the official flag of the Barcelonian Soccer Team - in the Stadium memorabilia shop - along with thousands of others!!