Today we moved apartment, in fact we moved up the street 500m to our new digs for the start of the tour of Spain.  A word of caution for the new traveler; get on line to Google Earth and check out the neighborhood where you are staying and check the translator for different uses of the words in other languages.  Sauna has other meanings in Spanish.  Let me just say that there were a lot of male callers to the establishment at the back of our apartment and they were very loud, possibly drunk and looking for satisfaction.  It was a long night.

After we booked in we went for lunch at La Fontan where Lou had bean stew and I had pork cheeks and an amazing cheese cake.  We also had Sangria.

We then set out for the Royal Palace.  Unfortunately no photos were allowed inside the building.  It has 2800 rooms and is now only used for official functions. They owned a tapestry making factory in Belgium because they ruled it at the time and hence most of the walls didn’t need to be painted as they were covered by tapestries or beautiful silk wall coverings.  The tapestries here, we believe, were better than the collection in the Vatican. There was a tremendous amount of gold leaf on the walls  and the frescoes were amazing.  There was a lot of Italian influence because Spain ruled Italy at the time and could send the best painters and designers over to decorate the palace. The other thing that was striking was the amount and different types of marble used in the rooms.  Sometimes it was four or five colours in one room. We also saw four Stradivarius; two cellos and two violins.

The royal church over the road

The square inside the palace

The entrance ceiling

View over the hunting gardens

Up late again today and I was so stressed that we were up late that I forgot the camera.  After a late  breakfast/lunch with sangria we got on a Hop on Hop off bus and saw the sights of Madrid.  Most of what we saw we covered in the next day’s blog so don’t feel you have been left out.

Ken

Up late we started the day with a visit to a great seafood restaurant for breakfast, okay really lunch.  Grilled octopus and saffron haddock, not your normal breakfast fare but it worked for us.

We then set out to find the Royal Palace and instead found the Naval Museum.  A friend, David Nicholls told us about this place and we were glad we found it.  It was obvious, though, that the Spanish Naval Community held a grudge against the English however we loved the displays even though we couldn’t read any of the information. I can say that I am glad I wasn’t a sailor in those days.

We then set out in search of an English book shop.  We found it.  It is a shame that we have weight constraints on the way home because this is a great shop with some very old and rare books which we would have loved to buy.

It was then home for a pizza and red wine and a quite night reading because I can’t understand what they are saying on the TV.

Ken

Hey trip on a very quick train.  The top speed was 300kph – very smooth and comfortable.

Not much to report but it was funny watching Louise get a hair cut from a hairdresser that didn’t speak English. She didn’t get what she asked for however it turned out okay.

Ken didn’t say what great hands this guy had.  He washed my hair before the cut.  Oh my goodness what a great scalp massage.  I don’t what it is about Spanish men and their hands.  First of all the waiter and now the hairdresser.

Great digs for the next couple of days.

Cheers

Today we joined a tour for Montserrat.

The tour guides are young and carefree but very informative about the history of Barcelona.

For anyone who has been to Barcelona the Gothic Quarter was walled and that is where the city finished.  It was difficult for Barcelona to grown economically as they lost 40% of their population with the black plague. The industrial revolution in the 19^th century aided the recovery of Barcelona and bought a lot of people from the country to the city.  However, this put enormous pressure on a city that now had 9 times the density of population as that of London.  No sewerage, pollution from the factories and apparently was a living hell.  The life expectancy of the working class was 24 and the upper class 35.  After 10 years the people could not stand it any longer and finally permission was given to get rid of the wall so that the city could expand.  Apparently, there was a clever town engineer who planned the growth of the city.  He used the grid system for the streets but a different in respect he planned the streets north east and south west to catch the sun and the breeze as the streets were very narrow and the buildings about 4 or 5 stories high, thus connecting the Mediterranean to the mountains. The industrial revolution created wealthy people and there was a great deal of land.  These people started to employ architects such as Gaudi and others to create palaces for them.

Then came 1930’s when Franco became the leader and until his death in 1975 the country once again was not a good place to live.  1978 there were general elections and democracy was restored.  1986 joined the European Union and in 1992 held the summer Olympics.  Barcelona took advantage of this and used the opportunity clean up getting rid of the shanty towns and factories from the coastal area.  They now have 5 kms of beach which each year 90% needs to be topped up with sand dredged from the sea. They also widened the roads and improved the public transport. Barcelona is now a very clean and enjoyable city to visit and I would say to live in too.

Mont Serrat is a mountain range that looks like a saw blade pushed up from the surrounding plains.  As can be seen from the pictures the mountain peaks look like a dragons back.

Legend has it that some young shepherds in the year 880 heard music and saw lights coming from a cave on the mountain. They saw it for four Saturdays in a row. Drugs were not used at this time so the local people believed them. So the local Bishop set out to explore the area to see if there was any reason for this phenomenon.  In the cave they found a statue of a Black Madonna. They thought this was pretty cool, me, I am not surprised because I had seen the paintings and icons of the early Greek Orthodox Church and I think maybe there was a bit of colour in the early Christian Church that we don’t want to recognize today. However, Black Madonnas have a reputation of giving good luck to the touch. The Bishop thought that he could improve the coffers of the local church by displaying the statue, so, he sent some people up to bring the statue down from the hills.  Problem was, the further they went from the cave the heavier it got until it was too heavy for anyone and anything to carry it so they had to return it to the cave. The legend doesn’t explain, though, how the statue was moved to its present location in the church.

A monk heard about this and got the local hermits together and formed a monastery in the 12^th century.  They were also on the pilgrimage trial and they made a lot of money out of the travellers as they passed through and admired the statue providing hotel and medical services and they made and sold liquor, which I had to buy. Then along came Napoleon who destroyed the monastery out of spite.  In the 19^th century it was rebuilt and they did well..  While not being as ornate as some of the churches we have visited it is certainly grand.  It has, one of the few paintings that show Mary as an old woman rather than the young woman most pictures portray. It also has the statue of the Black Madonna. The monks also run a school for young choristers. Sadly they we on holidays and we didn’t see or hear them perform.

They also had a museum/art gallery with donated art works. There were art works by Monet, Picasso, Renoir, Degas and Dali.  There was also a Cariaveccio, however, it was out for a photo shoot. This is one of the most amazing collections I have seen.  They have all been donated.

The natural landscape was fantastic and we would have enjoyed more time to explore it.

Cable Car

Boulders

Part of Church

Church Entrance

Alter in church

Aged Madonna

Black Madonna

Artist view?

The cross is where the original Madonna was

Picasso painted this at 13

Against the mountain

Great view

Awe inspiring

Great Back drop

Sculpture is called Stairway to Heaven, a few people fell off and died hence the fencing

We then set off to a winery come castle.  This winery has been in the same family for 36 generations passed on to the oldest son in each case.  The original owner of the castle made his money from pottery and it was said that you could walk from the castle to Barcelona and not step off his land. Today the family runs a winery and olive oil farm apart from a few hotels in Barcelona and other stuff. We had a great lunch of four courses, with wine.  We then went for a quick winery tour and had some more wine tasting and cheeses.  It was a soggy trip home.

View from castle

This is a salt mine

On the way home we dropped into a Tapas bar that Louise wanted to go to and we walked straight out when we found it didn’t serve Sangria. We then walked around the local restaurants and ended up at our usual place for Tapas, Sangria and desert.

Big sleep in today and our only plans were for the Hop on Hop off Bus.  Breakfast was at our usual, La Estrelle bakery, around the corner.  There is a lovely young man there who was learning to speak English and we were glad to help him out.  In Spain they had a tradition of the God Father giving a chocolate cake decorated with interesting figures and this bakery was an expert in creating these culinary delights.

Our Street in Barcelona

We set off to the Hop on Hop Off bus and 20m down the road was the Gaudi designed Palau Guell. This was the first of many commissions to Antonio Gaudi by Signor Guell. Gaudi worked with local steel workers and other artisans to create a revolutionary building. It is four or five stories high and it was ahead of time for ventilation and the use of light.  Some of the arches were the same shape that a chain has if it is hung.  This gives a completely different appearance that the traditional Gothic and Arabian influenced arches. The stone work was innovative in the use of textures and design features in the walls, floors and ceilings. Gaudi also experimented with textures created by the steel work and these early designs can be seen as the embryos of his later works.  He also created shutters to control the light and ventilation in the home. Generally, though, you can understand how Gaudi incorporated the family’s uses of the home into his design.

Great Stables

Great photography LOL

Dining Room

Shutters

Entrance Hallway

Groovy door

Holy Crap

Chimneys??

Same again

One of Gaudi’s other designs

As I am writing this we are on a high speed train between Barcelona and Madrid, speeding at 300km per hour. Shit….

Tomorrow we are going to Mont Serrat. The guide on this trip told us that Gaudi spent time at Mont Serrat and that he was influenced and wanted to reflect the landscape of Spain in his designs. After visiting Mont Serrat you can understand where his inspiration came from as it has the same rounded flowing mountains that Gaudi incorporated into his designs.

We finally got on the Hop on Hop off Bus and had a great trip around Barcelona and saw many of the major sites around Barcelona and only made us want to spend more time he exploring the city.

We went to our favourite and only restaurant and had a great meal with Sangria. Once again it was excellent; I mean the food was too.

We did try something different.  Sirloin steak Gold with truffled potatoes gratin, sautéed wild mushrooms, foie gras and Pedro Ximenez sauce and seafood paella as mains to share and apple tartin with vanilla ice cream to share.  The food at this restaurant was excellent and the service from Pablo with his waxed moustache second to none.  He was very gracious and what soft hands!!! I knew this from the way he wished us well with his two handed handshake.  This is Louise writing not Ken.  However, he shook Ken’s hand the same way but it didn’t have the same effect.

Arrive in Barcelona and as usual Dud hasn’t read the disembarkation instructions and we have to be out of the room by 8.00. We were out by 8.10 after getting up at 7.30.

Got a taxi to our apartment and like Paris it was deserted and no one would answer their phones. So we found a great bakery, with great coffee and we ate ourselves into a sugar/caffeine high until 10.00 when the reception opened.  Thank goodness someone showed up, on a bike, just like Paris.

We couldn’t check in until 2.00 so we left our bags and went for a walk, after coffee.  We ended up at the water at Port Vell where we had a great tapas, cava and beer.  On the way we spotted rides in a Ferrari or Lamborghini.  So after lunch we thought we might go for a ride in both around the city.  They offered for us to drive but we declined as we thought the power was a little too much for us to handle and they don’t drive on the right side of the road.  So we had a quick drive around being shown a few of the highlights.  Unfortunately, because the lack of English spoken by our drivers we are unable to tell you what we saw.  We got to a top speed of 140kph in a 40kmh zone and we loved the sound of the engine in the tunnels. Part of the trip was around the old Formula 1 track.  This was our third Formula 1 track but our fastest.  The Ferrari was red of course and the Lambo was white.

Back to our apartment to check in and have a little rest.

Turning left out of our apartment took us to a seedier part of our district, but we found our way back to an area that had a square with restaurants around the perimeter.

Stood in line of one restaurant and remembered using Trip Advisor in Paris.  Quickly got out of line and went to the Viana but they are booked out until Tuesday.  So opted forMy Way.  It was fabulous.  The people next to us were from Denmark and recommended the chicken.  However, one of the couples had been to Australia, in particular to visit a friend who now lives in Brisbane.  They had even been to Mt Isa as that is where their friend went to work originally as an electrician.  They love Princess Mary and said she works very hard and is doing a great job.

The meal was great.  We started with tapas of aubergine parmigina graninated with parmesan and pesto and Andalusian style fried calamari; then chicken breast stuffed with buffalo mozzarella and bacon and basil accompanied with aubergine and tomato gratin with pesto and grilled tuna loin with sautéed Mediterranean vegetables and to finish Catalan crème and black and white mouse and coffees.  Since we are in Spain it was accompanied with Sangria and not Chianti. The tuna was amazing!!!

We found our way home easier than we found our way out to the restaurant, thankfully.

Tapas

Great location

Looking good

Looking bad

Lou looks good in red

Change over

We docked in Valencia in the afternoon. We booked a tour to see the Coves of St Josep and a quick trip around the old quarter of Valencia.  On the way to the Coves we were introduced to the incredible architecture of Spain with the City of Arts and Sciences. Blown away and we will let the photos do the talking.

The Coves are part of the longest underground river in Europe. We have never been into caving and I don’t think we ever will be, however, it was interesting.

We then toured the commodity markets and food markets and we will be exploring these later on the bus trip.

Once again we found the Wake View bar and it was a stunning sunset and the place was empty as everyone else was packing.. Lou and I in true form didn’t pack, instead leaving it until the last minute in the morning.

Lou had me on the dance floor again and this time it was for the Rumba.  Sadly the hips and feet didn’t communicate and I can say more work is need before our first performance.

We had our last dinner at Alfredos’ where we had our first dinner and then off to a Whitney Houston tribute.  The singer was very talented and had a great range but her interpretation of the classic was not to my liking.

In the morning we docked at Gibraltar.  We decided against the tours as we are exploring Gibraltar on the bus tour. We, however, went for a walk through the town and window shopped.  The prices of grog in these places are amazing.  I can only think that the government in Australia is making a killing out of my bad habits.

After the success of the Cha Cha Cha, Louise took me to the Merengue.  The hips have not had a workout like that for some time.

Once again we found the Wake View bar as we sailed out of Gibraltar. Great views and great beer..

Later, after dinner, we went star gazing.  We now know how to find stars in the northern hemisphere. Very useful in the southern hemisphere and I couldn’t find the saucepan or the southern cross.  Earlier in the night we were entertained by the Princess World orchestra comprising 16 musicians and singers from around the world.

Local runway

The rock

Frotifications to keep Trump out

Bye Rock

Bye Bye Rock

Today we spent the day at sea and we crossed the Greenwich Meridian and went from west to east or something like that.

Lou took me off to a Cha Cha Cha dance class in the afternoon and after some discussion as to who was leading we were still crap but enjoyed it immensely.

In the evening after dinner we went to the Tenors of Rock which could have been better and then we went to the Marriage Match Game Show which was hilarious.

No Pictures today