Picasso plus parks

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Our last day in Barcelona - though we do have a few extra hours en route home.

We spent it at the Picasso Museum. Picassomwas a student in Barcelona where he got to know all sorts. His first painting in a Paris exhibition was originally titled The Brothel. He was asked to change it so called it Las Demoiselles d'Avignon but the joke was on them because Avignonis the name of the street where the art school is which was frequented by the prostitutes was called Calle de Avignon! The Barcelona museum doesn't have many the great works but it does have a great sampling of his various periods and the full collection of Las Meninas, Picasso's awesome reinterpretations of a Velasquez work of the same name. We really loved those and I was so glad I had read up on it and could appreciate the complexity and skill of both the original ( which we will see in Madrid) and Picasso's response.

After a lovely long siesta we completed our day with a long walk in the Parc de la Ciutadella where the locals go to walk, row on the lake and enjoy the fountains, monuments and playgrounds.

Then we rounded off our last day in this fantastic city with a chicken paella. Yum.

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