The Book of Ashes

The rain in Spain... 9:45AM

And so we arrived in Barecelona, Spain. A thriving, bustling, happening city with character. Coming from the Greek Islands it was all a little much at first. So many cool buildings. So many people, and they were all just walking around with little purpose (many of them tourists I presume).

So we found our accomodation in the heart of the city, just off La Ramblas, the busy street. Where we were staying was once an amazing apartment building but now a little aged. There were worn marble steps up the stair case and huge doors. Very cool. So we ventured out for our first walk down La Ramblas and were met by so many people it was a bit over welming. However we soon got used to it.

The markets on La Ramblas. Lots of fresh fruit and veges for very cheap. We got a huge punet of strawberries for $2 Euros. Lasted us a few days.

The House of Bones, the appartment block that Gaudi designed. Appart from the bizzareness of it all its actually quite incredibly thought out. Every room has interesting stuff in it and its all functional, not just looks. It cost heaps to go in here $16 Euro each, but was well worth it. You won't see anything else like this around.

Inside the Gaudi apparments. Each room was designed differently. This one had a whirlpool room with a cool light in the middle. The doors were curved wood and looked quite natural (rather than squares).

The Catedral, not far off La Ramblas. Huge old church, would be quite impressive if you hadn't seen the Sagrada Familia.

In general the architecture in Barecelona is amazing. The city is divided up into square blocks, all with appartments (about 3 or 4 stories high) around the outside and an area in the center of each block. The buildings were built in a time of money and they are all different and interesting. Its cool to walk around and see them. However the most amazing and bizzare building of all was the Sagrada Familia. From a distance this is a fairy tale castle. The spires are huge and it looms over everything and its not even finished yet! They plan to put another bigger tower in the center thats a third as tall again!

Up close it looks like its grown up out of the ground. Its huge and organic and enough to convert you to religion (how could man have created this? Its too bizare! Must be God!).

Inside its fantastic. Huge big stained glass windows. Lots of arches and so much space. Its also filled with scaffolding and resembles a construction yard. They're still working on it.

Still, the designs are unlike anything you've ever seen before...

We took the lift up one of the towers. It was pretty high up and I experienced my first bout of vertigo (coming out of the enclosed lift to a windy bridge so high up, got a little dizzy). Then you spiral down the staircase with no inside rail (you can see all the way down) till you're back at the bottom. Not for the light hearted.

Our next stop was off to the Gaudi park which has a gingerbread house, bridges that look like they're survived from the dinosaur age and heaps of other interesting and cool stuff.

Like this underneath of a walkway that is designed like a wave.

So that was Barecelona. There are tonnes of shops there, food is good if you can find a non tourist place. We had an excellent Paella and Sangria deal at one place but not so successful with another. The hot chocolates there are very good and you get little things to dip into them.

So we hopped on the plane and flew to Grenada. This was my first experience of flying through some thunder clouds. The plane dropped quite suddenly a few times (like when you're in a car going fast over a bridge and your stomach drops on the other side). A little freaky but we landed safely.

Grenada was cool. A little quieter and laid back than Barecelona but still lots of interesting things to see and do.

The one cool thing in Grenada was its free Tapas. Grenada has a large student base and many places give away a free snack with a drink.

The thing to see in Grenada is the Alhambra. This is a huge fortress with gardens, a palace and walls and towers. The gardens were amazing, fountains, hedges, flowers and walls. They had aqueducts and streams going every where to provide water to all areas of the gardens.

A square building with a round inside. Quite impressive.

The palace was home to Muslim kings and shows off some amazing Islamic architecture. The entire walls, pillars, roofs are carved with intricate details.

This is looking straight up at a large intricate roof. Quite an amazing pattern.

The fortress part of it. High walls and towers and a great view.

The Alhambra was quite amazing. You need to book in advance as so many people go through it each day. It started raining as we were lining up but then went away for a while. It started again once we were home in the hotel then it bucketted down then turned to large hail. Awesome!

That night we discovered a cool place that gave us free tapas with each drink. I was trying everything on tap and we got a medium plate of Tuna (very good), 6 large meat balls, meatballs and chips and some soup. All for buying 3 drinks each. It was great.

Later that night we visited a place that has flamenco dancing. This was amazing. We went into a small hall and sat in the near darkness while a guy sang solo, then sang with guitar. He was just like a guy off Desperado (long hair in pony tail, older guy, etc) and his guitar playing was amazing. Then out came a flutest and another female singer then later the flamenco dancer. The dancer was great, all stern faced and dramatic movements. Altogether an amazing performance. I've put some movies up on YouTube (see link on a previous entry) but they don't do the real thing justice.

From Spain we caught the bus to Malaga then flew to Dublin, Ireland.