Barcelona
Wednesday 7th October 2015
Wake up at a reasonable time and head off to find a place for breakfast. This turns out to be the Orangutan Cafe very close to our apartment. It is one of the Fair Trade coffee shops specialising in special origin coffee which are the best we have had for some time. The accompanying pastries are very tasty if doing little for our waistlines.
We meet Stefania who brings along some essentials missing from the flat and then we set off to explore the city. Starting with the nearest ‘ Top Sight’ we visit La Catedral which is increasingly overshadowed by Gaudi’s La Sagrada Familia. Nevertheless this poor relation which was begun in the late 13th century and took 6 centuries to complete should not be overlooked with its extravagant northern- European Gothic styles.
Couple of hours are spent walking up and down the famous La Rambla pedestrian thoroughfare and stopping off at one of Europe’s great produce markets, the Mercat de la Boqueria with its astounding array of foodstuffs. We do little to line the stallholders’ pockets when we splash out on two small plastic cups of fresh fruit. The Head Barman at Bar Pinotxo in the market ,Juanito, has become a legend and has been described by a leading Barcelona food critic as’ the true spirit of the market’. The long queues at his stall bar testimony to his popularity.
As we have time on our hands before we do the tour of Museu Picasso at 3.30 we walk down to the fine Basilica de Santa Maria del Mar which with its simplicity and lack of gilded chapels stands in stark ( and welcome) contrast to La Catedral.
Picasso Museum is world-class gallery that traces his development as an artist and dedicates much of the exhibition to his formative years. What is most surprising to Gail and myself is the traditional nature of many of his paintings during his early formal art education and the subsequent variety of his later more avant-garde works. I am trying to be kind as the meaning behind some of his later offerings is completely lost on this old Philistine!
End our first full day in this fabulous city at a great tapas bar where we meet a lovely elderly ( my age ) German lady and a young German guy and English girl off a German Navy vessel. ( Not the elderly lady who was merely enjoying travelling on her own!)
The evening ended on an amusing note when the heavens opened and North African umbrella vendors appeared from nowhere to offer us their wares. One such fellow came past us about 10 times with same spiel and we almost bought one from him to reward his persistence. However, we resisted the temptation and we got back to the flat relatively dry.
We are quickly learning that these vendors are very resourceful guys and in addition to the brollies are flogging, with considerable success, the ‘selfie sticks’ for smart phones. Personally, if I see another selfie stick I would like to stuff it somewhere where the sun doesn’t shine. I’m with Kate Blanchett who recently bemoaned this selfie stick epidemic.
Cheers
The Obese Ferret
2geonomads 
The Picasso museum is one of the few things I do remember from my 1998 visit. In particular the painting of the old fisherman he did at he age of 14. Up until then I’d assumed he was simply incapable of doing a decent painting. Now I realise he subsequently simply chose not to.