Barcelona

After weeks of rain and confined spaces we decided we'd earned ourselves a holiday holiday and headed for the sun in Barcelona. We caught our first every easyjet flight and landed without incident around 2 o'clock. Finding our hotel was easy as it's located next to one of the newest tallest buildings in the area. It glows red and blue at night – so once the sun goes down its even easier to find. (Designed by Jean Nouvel for those architects out there).

We had big plans for the first night but unfortunately we didn't get much further than the supermarket across the road. They have an entire aisle that is just jamon (ham legs) hanging from hooks in the ceiling. We bought a selection of goodies and some local Cava and headed back to the room. It was a gorgeous room and so nice to stay somewhere that feels like a holiday as opposed to somewhere that feels like a world record attempt for longest time spent in a tarago.

Day 2 we caught the metro into town – wandered La Rambla and besides one nasty incident that involved me being locked in a toilet and having to wriggle on the floor to free myself, had a great morning. We saw the markets and found our way down to the beach for a very long leisurely lunch of sea snails (ben ate them obviously not me), some paella and a lot of sangria!

Ben enjoying the market

Colourful market stalls




View from our lunch table

Paella and Sangria - Heaven

Night view from our hotel

The next morning we headed out earlier with the first stop being Park Guell designed by Antonio Gaudi. We walked around for the morning until the grounds and the crowds got to much and we headed back into the town.

Park Guell colonnade by Gaudi

More Park Guell columns and Ben

I really liked the columns

Park Guell

Park Guell



After Park Guell we headed out to see Mies Van Der Rohe's German Pavillion. Which was pretty much the opposite of Park Guell and deserted when we arrived. It was great.

Mies Van Der Rohe Pavillion

La Rambla

Then back to La Rambla for dinner. It was Catalunyan National Day so the whole area was really busy. We finally found a touristy restaurant with tables available and went in for dinner. Unfortunately the girl sitting behind us got her bag stolen from the floor inside the restaurant. It certainly made us a lot more careful with our bags.

After dinner it was back to the hotel where we had some cocktails on the roof.

The next morning we headed straight for Gaudi's Battlo house, paid the exorbitant price to get in and spent a couple of hours having a look around. The house was amazing, so many gorgeous details. If the photos below are not enough I have about 200 more!

Battlo House facade

Battlo House spinal staircase

Battlo House interiors

Roof of Battlo House



We decided we really need to embrace the Spanish culture so headed back to the pool for a siesta in the sun. While I slept Ben scoured the surrounding area for somewhere to have dinner and stumbled across the best street. Basically it was like La Rambla with a big pedestrian mall and lots of coloured lights. But instead of tourists and those awful people who stand still and try and look like statues (my most hated type of busker), there were just locals out for a walk and some dinner. Neither of us are really sure exactly what we ate but it was delicious - and half the price of the centre of town.

Our last full day was basically a combination of all our favourite things to date. Bakery breakfast, tapas and sangria by the harbour for lunch, a siesta by the pool with some mojitos, and supermarket delicacies for dinner - with all the remaining time spent wandering through the gothic district, along the beaches and around all the great buildings around our hotel. Pure heaven.

View from the rooftop pool/bar

Relaxing by the pool