'Colour in certain places...'

'...has the great value of making the outlines and structural planes seem more energetic.' ~Antoni Gaudí

23-24 mayo: Barcelona, Catalonia (Spain)

Sunday morning I hopped on the metro and went out into a farther section of the city. All I had to do, supposedly, was follow the signs and walk a few blocks to get to Parc Güell. Cross street after cross street, the signs pointed straight onward. And apparently I stopped looking as closely because I missed the one that said to turn. I just kept going, oblivious until at last I came upon a Parc Güell road sign very different from the previous ones. But I followed it and found myself in a hilly residential neighborhood. I kept going, despite the lack of signs until I decided it couldn't be hidden behind the local gym or the motorcycle bar. I turned around and returned to the main street, sat down with my map and decided I really could get to the park via the neighborhood and at this point it was closer to go that way again than back to the missed sign. A few more twists in the street and a parking lot later, there it was.

The park was designed by Antoni Gaudí, a famous Catalan architect, and built between 1900 and 1914. It was meant to be a park with sites for houses – so basically a gated community for the aristocracy who wanted to get away from the city's pollution and poor people. Only two houses were ever built, one of which Gaudí and his family ended up living in for a while and which is now a pequeño (little) museum dedicated to him and the previous occupants and their furniture. In 1923, the area was converted to a public municipal park so that all the poor people, too, could escape the pollution as the park is on a very steep hill that puts it above the smog hanging around in the valley of the main city, though you will be glad to know that the pollution has most definitely decreased since the early 1900s.

The map at the side entrance I had come to showed the park to be quite large, so I picked a path that looked nice and started exploring, keeping in mind a few of the sites the map had marked as places to try to find in my explorations. The paths were dusty, as were the plants, some of a desert-y persuasion, some seeming more used to a temperate climate. Both palm trees and pine trees were present as well as a few deciduous ones. Pathways went up and down, twisted back on themselves and turned into bridges and tunnels of rough, pale stone of the same desert-dust colour as the paths. I started going up, found a man playing old country music, and later a man on drums, but then I turned down and came to a main path where I came across a woman plucking something that looked like a harp turned on its side. She along with dozens of people selling fans, sunglasses, little watercolours, and other trinkets lined one of the main paths which led to the park's plaza. I stood still, staring. There in front of me was a sight I remembered from long ago.

In middle school when I started taking Spanish, the textbook we used had a close-up mosaic design on the front cover and a smaller picture of people sitting on a mosaic bench on the back. The photo credits on the inside page must have told me that these mosaic benches were in Barcelona, but that didn't stick. All I remembered was that one day I hoped to go to the place with those cool benches. And here I was, not even knowing until it was in front of me that I had at last come to the right city. I overheard a tour guide say that the structure is designed to collect rainwater in the gutter around the outside edge of the benches and it gets channeled down through the columns to a system of pipes to be used (I assume) in the fountains. I also learned from the tour guide that the outer columns supporting the plaza are deliberately slanted inward for better support. Underneath, the columns fill the whole space so it is like an open cave full of connected stalactites and stalagmites. And the ceiling is filled with more mosaics. From the top of the plaza, where all the crowds are gathered in the picture, you can see the main entrance which is flanked by two Gaudí guardhouses – one a gift shop, one the office of security. They are sort of like gingerbread cottages in their colourful mosaic exteriors and lumpy shapes. From the gates to the area under the plaza is a set of white marble stairs with two fountains in the center; one small bubbling moss-covered one and one that is a beautiful mosaic dragon-lizard crawling down the stairs with water spouting from his mouth. You think Gaudí liked mosaics? Just maybe. There were other houses and apartments of his around the city that I didn't make it to, but pictures reveal a similar penchant for wavy shapes and colourful mosaics.

I climbed up to the highest point in the park where a mound of stone with steps built into the sides was erected to mimic Golgotha (the hill where Jesus and the two criminals were crucified) with three rough stone crosses on top. Most people crowding the monument were more interested in the view of the city (which was excellent) than in the crosses or the monument itself. This made it difficult to get a decent picture of the crosses. I wandered the paths and took pictures of plants and of more musicians. It would have been impossible to explore everything in the time I had, but I certainly tried.

Finally I couldn't put off leaving any longer and so made my way back to the metro station (this time via the shorter route from the main entrance) and from there to La Rambla. At Plaça Sant Michel, I settled on a bench to wait for the long-anticipated arrival of amigas. I figured they would have to come through the plaça eventually, but after 45 minutes of waiting, I thought perhaps I should check at the hostel. I asked the man in the office, but he said they hadn't arrived. He offered to see if their flight had been delayed, but I didn't know which flight was theirs, so I returned to the plaça and found a spot in the shade this time to continue my wait and make notes on my adventures (so I could write this blog post 3 months later...). It was nearly two hours before Val finally called me to say they were in the hostel. Melina, Allison's friend, had met them at the airport and tried to help them get to the hostel, but I guess they got even more lost than I as they came to the hostel from the other end of the street, apparently. They were exhausted and not ready to do anything just yet, so I made myself the last of my pasta for lunch and chatted with Melina while they napped.

Kirstin was still to tired to get up, but Allison, Val and Melina were all ready for a stroll down La Rambla al mar (to the sea). We took our time going down the artisans section of La Rambla. The street ends at el Mirador de Colom (the view of Columbus), a tall pillar monument with Christopher Columbus on top, pointing to the harbor. Around the base are some lovely angel statues (DON'T BLINK) and other figures in niches below that. It is quite impressive and mildly terrifying if you get the Dr. Who reference there. The only catch was that we couldn't figure out why he was there. Columbus was, indeed funded by the Spanish crown, but he did not set sail from Barcelona, nor was the seat of the government there at the time (we think). Even Melina couldn't give us a reason (she's from Valencia, a nearby region, but has been going to school in Barcelona for a while now).

We crossed the busy sea-side road and crossed a modern-looking bridge, la Rambla de Mar, onto a pier that was home to the aquarium, an IMAX theater, regular movie theaters, restaurants, and some shopping. Lady GaGa's 'Bad Romance' was playing as we walked past one restaurant, taking in the fresh salt air. We had wanted to make it to the beach, but by the time we had circled around via a land-bridge back to the mainland, Allison and Val were starting to get tired again. And hungry. So we picked a place on the corner and sat at a table outside for dinner. I wasn't hungry, due to my adopted Spanish-style eating times, but had a bite of their paellas when the arrived, shrimp still with their little eyes staring blankly at us.

We walked back along the pedestrian/bike pathway by the sea. On our right was a 4-lane road, on our left and below were another three lanes of traffic with lots of palm trees all over the place in between the lanes and covering the cobblestone area between the traffic and the actual shoreline. We saw some modern art things, some old governmental-looking buildings, and a group of people on Segways. We started back up La Rambla and began the quest for a grocery store. In the end this proved unsuccessful as the grocery store Melina remembered was closed Sundays and Monday (this seems to be the Spanish weekend), the market was closed the same days, and the only other place was a small convenience shop without too much selection. At last we made it back to the hostel, Allison and Val returned to napping, Melina went home, and I finished up the France postcards and wrote some that I bought in Parc Güell.

Around 9:30pm, I went to see who was up again. Allison was the only one awake, so we headed out together for the metro and went to Plaça Espanya, where we met Melina again. The Magic Fountain shows had begun at 9:30, but ran until 11:30 or so, a new set of music starting every half and hour. The walk was totally different with the fountains instead of sunlight lighting the way up the road. We took the escalators up and paused on the bridge over the road to admire the little cascading fountains below and behind us and to get our first real look at the Magic Fountain itself. Its first performance was 19 may 1929 for the Barcelona International Exhibition. It was designed by Carles Buigas for whom the plaza is named and it was he who supervised repairs in the 1950's because it was badly damaged in the Spanish Civil War. In the 1980's the music was added; film soundtracks, classical and modern music are all part of its repertoire. From its premier right through today the fountain has well-deserved the epithet 'magic'.

We pushed through the throngs of people to get closer so that dark silhouettes were not covering the bottom half of our pictures. A fine mist made it impossible to take a good picture with the flash, but gave us our official baptism into its enchanted waters. One moment the fountain appeared to be made of molten lava and the mist could have been fine ash falling on us, and a moment later it was the fountain of youth, the arches of watery gold tame and tempting. It could do a rainbow, it could do traditional cool blues, it could become a purple-blue misty cloud brewing a magical storm. It could do enthusiastic spouts of water like elephants gathered for their baths and it could do traditional bubbling fonts of water. It looked like a jell-o mould, it looked like a huge circular fence, it looked like a rising spaceship.

We climbed up to the next level and marveled at the Cascades, now lit up so that it seemed like an artists' interpretation of how those ancient Aztec pyramids looked in their hey-day, plated in gold and shining staircases rising up to the baroque temple on top. Behind the art museum, spotlights were arranged so that it appeared to be crowned with rays.

From the very top, we looked back down on the Cascades, the Magic Fountain, and out over the city of Barcelona, glittering in the night. From there we watched the Fountain wind down its last display. While it rested in a steady traditional fountain pattern, we headed back down and watched a few final mutations while munching on croissants from a nearby stand (not as good as France, but who's keeping score?). At last, it was time to go home and get some real rest for a full Monday.

~~~

On Monday, I finished my French cereal before we set out for the day. It was good to be setting out with friends again. We took the metro out to the site of another Gaudí creation: Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family), a huge, strange, and beautiful church still under construction. The brief synopsis of its life goes something like this: People got together with money and wanted to build a church (or 'temple' as it is often referred to in the signage there - I suspect poor translation). They started with one architect, but soon switched to Gaudí (1883). The crypt and Parish school went up first, then the Nativity façade in the picture above, then a bell tower. In 1926 Gaudí died, but all his models and plans were still there, so work continued and the four bell towers of the Nativity façade were completed in 1930. Spanish Civil War 1936-9: destruction abounds, most of the plans and models are burned/destroyed, as is the crypt (now a museum-type place), school, and Rosary chapel. But they carry on! Fragments were recovered and the re-construction of models continues in workshops by the crypt. The Passion façade (on the opposite side from the Nativity one) was begun in 1954 based on another architect's design and its four bell towers are completed in 1977. The foundations of the naves were begun during the Civil War and were complete in 1990. Since then some stained glass has gone up and interior decorating (stairs, floors, decorative columns, etc.) has been worked on.

As we waited in line to get in, we peered up at the side of the church and played a sort of I Spy game. Instead of gargoyles there were a variety of animals and some plants, my favourite being a snail. I like to think that my friend Louis XIX is famous (and long-lived) enough to have been the model for Gaudí's snail. We spotted some berry-like clumps of mosaics on different points in the architecture and marveled at the decision to cover just the tops of the bell towers in bright mosaics (see the quote that starts this post for Gaudí's reasoning). We also wondered why Gaudí decided to repeat the word 'sanctus' in orange and yellow mosaics on one of the bell towers. It just looked too much like the neon signs used for advertising (though I suppose he didn't know about that).

At last we bought our tickets and went in with the crowds and were promptly blown away by the beauty. Even incomplete, the church is amazing. The columns throughout the building at first seem like your regular column, but as you follow it all the way up, you realize that soaring high above the columns start to branch off and form a ceiling of palm leaves. In the central parts, there are circular windows amongst the leaves. Bright sunlight was pouring through them and reflecting off of the gold paint (or mosaic, it's hard to tell from so far away on the ground) that has been started to fill in the points between the leaves. I don't know if these windows will be filled with stained glass, but many of the other windows on the sides were still clearly awaiting their colour. But the part of the nave where we first walked in already had stained glass. In true Gaudí tradition the glass was done like a random mosaic. Even in the standard rosette window, the colour (mostly blues and greens) was not arranged in any sort of pattern. The sun shone through strongly, casting haphazard rainbows across the organic stone of the church walls. Both the sections with stained glass and without felt equally sacred to me.

We came back out and darted right next door to the gift shop where we ended up waiting in line to make our purchases for much longer than I would have liked, but not longer than the original ticket line. From there we lazily made our way through the museum crypt and peered a the scale models in the workshops, some still in progress for upcoming additions to the building and interior. We came back out on the side with the Nativity façade and after stepping back as far as possible to try to take it all in, we gave up and got up close to inspect the details. Along with the three kings was a turkey, there was an angel playing a clarinet, and there were turtles supporting the columns between the huge, arching doorways. The doors were set back into the wall and there were some empty niches under the archway, just waiting for their saints, I suppose. So Allison, Val, and I climbed in while Kirstin took pictures as evidence that we might have been saints.

From Sagrada Familia we got back on the metro and went to Parc Güell. The tickets that got us into the church also got us into the little museum at the park. This time I did not miss the turn and we went up a San Francisco-like street that turned into stairs for the last two blocks (we opted for the escalators) and arrived at the wall surrounding the park that proclaimed 'Parc Güell' over and over in circles of mosaics. Just before the last block, we turned onto the cross street and picked up personal-sized flatbread pizzas from a bakery and sandwich shop and Allison got a nectarine from the shop next door where you could browse the fruit, then tell the man what you wanted and he picked it out for you. In the park, we wound our way through one side and stopped to eat in a shady spot just off the path and within earshot of a guitarist. We came to the plaza where Kirstin and Val bought sunglasses for 5 euro from a vendor with a sheet on the ground and a feather duster to keep his merchandise clean. I should have as well, it being so sunny and my sunglasses being lost in Versailles, but I was feeling particularly reluctant to part with money, so I just squinted and carried on. We rested on the benches and people-watched for a while before finally making our way to the museum.

The house was a lovely little place and I quite liked most of the art nouveau furniture, especially the smooth, curving cabinetry made of some dark wood I couldn't identify. Outside, we explored the little garden for the house. It was greener than the rest of the park because every inch of space was planted with lush vegetation (or palm trees). From there we made our way back out via the underside of the plaza. On Carrer Ferran, we stopped for gelato. A perfect Spanish afternoon treat.

Back at the hostel, I packed up my things and checked the metro maps and timetables one last time. I said my goodbyes, laughing to push away the sadness at too short a time spent with good friends once again, and made my way back to the airport alone.