Blogs from Spain, Europe - page 1385

Maybe, it´s the connection to South America but I arrived in Madrid and loved it immediately... and that was at the train station :) Gorgeous city, full of the tiny winding streets, massive plazas, cafes, ceverezias, shopping and surging locals that I expected to see in Paris. Arrived at 7am, dumped my bags and headed straight to the Prado. Discovered it was international museum day and they were all free, so 10 hours later, I had conquered the Prado, Reina Sofia and Thyss Bon and my eyes were falling out of my head. The Prado had an astonishing collection of classical art and it was just big enough to enjoy without being overwhelmed. Full of students and Japanese tour groups, people set up painting imitations of the masters etc. The Sofia was my favourite, being Modern ... read more

El Camino 2005 Important instructions: press "first journal, next journal, previous journal, last journal" to scroll thru the various reports and pictures Vigtig henvisning: tryk paa "first journal, next journal, previous journal, last journal" for at blaedre igennem de forskellige reporter og billeder Wichtiger Hinweis: auf "first journal, next journal, previous journal, last journal" druecken um durch die verschiedenen Berichte und Bilder zu blättern. Durch druck auf "!eMail Alert" und Eingabe der eigenen E-Mail-Adresse kann man automatisch Bescheid bekommen, wenn ein neuer Bericht vorliegt in the middle of May my wife Carina and myself (Peter) intend to walk the 900 km from Saint Pied du Port at the french / spanish border to Santiago do Compostela at the Atlantic coast and further to "the end of the world": Cape Finisterra. We are both in the be ... read more

Granada........Well, I got here on my 22nd birthday, and because 11 is my magic number, and 11 times 2 is 22, I knew it was a special day in my life. I arrived in town with Krista McClean, and Jorden Reid, and I ended up making a series of great companions. I ended up meeting up with and befriending this group of friends from Oz. Its quite a long story really, But people like Linda, Hellen, Jess, Dave, and that curley hair dude that had my sweater for a while, will always be in my memories. We all had some great times all over Spain and into London. They are all scattered all over the world now though... But Granada was good to me. I worked at Oasis, a youth Hostel. I did some cleaning there, ... read more

Wednesday I had some free time so I took off to La Sagrada Familia, the main attraction of Barcelona. Here's what my Lonely Planet guide has to say on the subject: If you have time to see only one sight in Barcelona, this emblem of the city, and the work to which Gaudí dedicated most of his working life, should probably be it. It takes up a whole block of l'Eixample, has its own metro station and is the most talked about and visited unfinished building site in the world. After more than 120 years, the church is still only half complete I am quoting Lonely Planet how very wanderlusty of me. Gaudí was an architect and an über-Catholic and a tortured genius. He built a lot of interesting things around Barcelona but Sagrada Familia was ... read more

We saw something cool today (as if that doesn't happen every day): there was dancing in the square in front of the main cathedral in Barcelona. There was a band there and they looked quasi-professional. They had cor anglais (I think; they were double-reeded) and some sort of mini-euphoniums. The dancers were older people, but they looked like they just came out for the fun of it. After it was all over (about half an hour), there was a procession involving two statues of Mary carried on platforms. One was on a cart pulled by two oxen (Sorry Dad, not Simmentals) and surrounded by pillars that were copies of the towers from the church that we saw on Friday. There was also a band that rode on horseback. I couldn't imagine keeping a horse under control ... read more