Sabbatical 8/30 - Scouting Mission
When I had dinner with mishamish and babymonkey, they pointed out that Barcelona covers an enormous amount of territory, with tourist attractions at all points. They suggested that I get oriented by taking one of the tourist "hop on hop off" buses around the city on a scouting tour. This seemed like excellent advice, so when I work on Sunday, August 30, I headed to Plaça de Catalunya to catch the bus.
My only prior experience with a tourist tour like this was Dublin in 2006, and I found this to be quite similar. A double decker bus outfitted with an audio tour in multiple translations (sixteen in this case) drove a large regular route. If you liked what you saw at a stop you could hop off and catch another bus later once you were done exploring the area.
Barcelona is famous for its architecture, particularly the works of Gaudi. The tour highlighted that extensively. I caught the bus right by La Pedrera. From there it went by Sagrada Familia and on to Guell Pavilions, where I hopped off and paid the nominal entry fee for a look around. Gaudi isn't the only attraction though; the works of many other architects as well as many pieces of monumental art dot the city. I'm not sure I've ever been to a city that highlighted architecture so much, or that had so much unique architecture to highlight.
Anyway, Guell Pavilion had a marvelous wrought iron dragon gate which was worth seeing all by itself. From there bus headed down to the mountainous area where the main portions of the 1992 Olympics were held. Then it hit the waterfront, where I fell in love with the monumental statue David and Goliath by Atoni Llena. Eventually I ended up back at Plaça de Catalunya many, many hours later, having completed the entire bus loop on not one but two different lines. Somewhere in the middle of all this touring I snagged some lunch (this was the only hotel I went to that didn't have breakfast so it screwed up my food patterns) and took a nap before returning to the bus.
On a side note, all of the tour books for Barcelona warned that pickpockets were rampant. I didn't have any problems, but apparently the books were right because even the canned audio tour on the bus warned of pickpockets multiple times.
It was a hot day, and even with my ridiculous hiking hat to shade me I was hot and tired. I took a bunch of notes on what looked interesting and planned out a rough itinerary for the next few days. After a quick dinner I went to bed early, because I wanted to arrive at Sagrada Familia before it opened.
Photos one through sixteen in this set are from August 30.
This article was pre-recorded; I am away from the internet.
My only prior experience with a tourist tour like this was Dublin in 2006, and I found this to be quite similar. A double decker bus outfitted with an audio tour in multiple translations (sixteen in this case) drove a large regular route. If you liked what you saw at a stop you could hop off and catch another bus later once you were done exploring the area.
Barcelona is famous for its architecture, particularly the works of Gaudi. The tour highlighted that extensively. I caught the bus right by La Pedrera. From there it went by Sagrada Familia and on to Guell Pavilions, where I hopped off and paid the nominal entry fee for a look around. Gaudi isn't the only attraction though; the works of many other architects as well as many pieces of monumental art dot the city. I'm not sure I've ever been to a city that highlighted architecture so much, or that had so much unique architecture to highlight.
Anyway, Guell Pavilion had a marvelous wrought iron dragon gate which was worth seeing all by itself. From there bus headed down to the mountainous area where the main portions of the 1992 Olympics were held. Then it hit the waterfront, where I fell in love with the monumental statue David and Goliath by Atoni Llena. Eventually I ended up back at Plaça de Catalunya many, many hours later, having completed the entire bus loop on not one but two different lines. Somewhere in the middle of all this touring I snagged some lunch (this was the only hotel I went to that didn't have breakfast so it screwed up my food patterns) and took a nap before returning to the bus.
On a side note, all of the tour books for Barcelona warned that pickpockets were rampant. I didn't have any problems, but apparently the books were right because even the canned audio tour on the bus warned of pickpockets multiple times.
It was a hot day, and even with my ridiculous hiking hat to shade me I was hot and tired. I took a bunch of notes on what looked interesting and planned out a rough itinerary for the next few days. After a quick dinner I went to bed early, because I wanted to arrive at Sagrada Familia before it opened.
Photos one through sixteen in this set are from August 30.
This article was pre-recorded; I am away from the internet.