The heat and our exhaustion from the previous spent night under canvas in the landing path of Boeing 747s meant we slept late.
We emerged from our pensíon with its dark inlaid wooden decor into the clean-feeling cobbled streets of old Barcelona which had that coolness you get in the morning shade of things when the day is going to be hot.
We grabbed a bread and cheese breakfast and caught the metro to La Sagrada Familia. It is Barcelona's most distinctive landmark, the one which adorns postcards and paintings of the city - Gaudi's cathedral - designed to have 18 spires... It was enormous. It was expensive to go up the spires or go into the cathedral, so we decided that we would gawp from outside for a while and enjoy the outside views of the place, from the front which was built in Gaudi's timeand looks a little like it was made by dribbling wet sand into pointy piles, and the back - the more recent facade which is made of a brighter...more concrete-looking stone, where the sculptures are more angular.
We descended into the metro system again to head towards another Gaudi landmark - Parc Guell. Less well known than the cathedral, Parc Guell was another area where the people of Barcelona appear to have allowed their resident architectural enfant terrible run riot. And it was marvellous.
Everywhere was tiled - sculpture, buildings...with glazed coloured tiles and rough clay or earthy colours, but everything looked crazed and fractured. The landscaping was brilliant, hiding the works of art and of environment away behind lines of trees or the lie of the land so that you happened upon them all at once. The park was on a number of different levels and one curling overhang of land rose back away from the path that ran underneath it and broke overhead like a wave, supported by pillars in the forms of female figures, horses, spirals and strange shapes...all in tiny brown earthy tiles and stones.
Another wide flat open space near the top of the park was lined with seats in white glazed tile and the undulating rim of the seating area was decorated in thousands of colours. Underneath it, giant pillars continued the theme and the arched ceiling enclaves of the tiles met in between them in round bosses, set with broken bottle glass and more colour. I laid down on the floor underneath it all and exhausted my film.
We ate a lunch of baguette and small sausages called Snackis on a bench underneath the shade of trees on a dusty path near Gaudi's house, attracting a huge number of feral cats.
We walked back into the old town from the park, enjoying the atmosphere of a city that was preparing for a Saturday night party. We were feeling good, and the evening was looking even better than we felt.
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