We headed over to the tourist info office at Placa De Catalunya to meet up with our walking tour, only to discover that the internet outfit that sold us the tickets messed up-- they had scheduled us for a day when the markets would be closed. Very annoying; we put our names on the list for the next day (Sat) and headed our for greener pastures.
We decided to head to the Picasso Museum, which was about a 10 minute walk or so. Very crowded-- huge line coming out the door. We decided almost reflexively to get in the queue (how British!) while deciding what to do next. While looking at the maps and the guide book, we discovered that the line was actually moving at a decent pace, so we decided to stick with it.
It's a very odd museum in terms of the collection, since it has pieces primarily from the beginning of Picasso's career around the turn of the century (when his works were very traditional in style) and then from the very end, in the late 50's and 60's (very avante garde), but virtually nothing in between. At one point during the walk through the museum I was convinced that we must have missed an entire building or wing, but in fact this is how they have it set up. It was an interesting visit; I'm glad we went. It was especially astonishing to see the sort of works that Picasso was turning out when only 14 or 15 years of age.
Here is a shot that gives you a sense for what the back alleys are like in Barcelona-- tiny passageway with buildings on either side that are 3, 4, 5 stories tall:
Lunch at a local noodle restaurant, then a walk back home. At the apartment we were greeted by a note saying that they would have to move us (they had shut off the water to the place completely at this point). Grumbling, we got everything packed up to relocate.
Before doing the move we walked over to the Palau De Musica to take a tour. Quite an extraordinary place, inside and out. No picture-taking allowed, so I don't have any photos, but it was very interesting to tour it and learn a little bit about the history. The most amazing thing for me was the fact that architect did all of the designs for the decorating, as well, including very elaborate indoor sculpture, paintings, mosaics, and a fabulous stained-glass "dome" creation that hangs from the center of the roof. Astonishing.
After that, off by cab to the new place, located off Placa Merce just up from the main drag that goes along the water, the Paseo de Colom. Here is a shot from the doorway of the building looking into the Placa:
After getting settled in we almost immediately discovered that the stove in the kitchen was almost non-functional-- oven busted, three of the burner control knobs gone. How annoying! Anyhow, we were able to cook a small pot of pasta and a few other things for dinner.
After dinner we headed over for an excursion to "Poble Espanyol" for a flamenco dancing performance that Amy arranged. Poble Espanyol is a rather odd place-- it's a sort of artificial "tourist village" that was built over on Montjuic for an international exposition of some sort. After the expo they decided not to tear it down after all; it has various shops, restaurants, etc, all with a sort of weird "Disneyworld" quality to them.
The flamenco dance performance was fun, though; enjoyed by both kids and adults. The dancers (at least for this performance) had a very severe look to them-- hair tightly pulled back, very serious expressions, complemented by similarly serious singers and a guitar player (I think he did actually crack a smile at one point).
Cabbed it back afterwards, had a quick dessert, and headed for bed-- everyone was tired.
Spanish has been a bit of a struggle so far. To my chagrin, I keep on breaking into French ("oui" instead of "si", for example); this mortifies Ethan no end. Luckily I haven't had to make any serious attempts at Catalan, which I think is totally beyond my abilities.
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