28 Feb 2015. <ES> El Masnou (Costa del Maresme), & Barcelona, Catalunya —

Today is a relaxation and recovery day! Warren catching up on blog, Suzie writing up her journal. We spent much of the day in the van, doing just this! Then we went into Barcelona, just to go to the shops in Las Ramblas.

On the way in we noticed a plaque on the station — some bright spark has removed the Os at the end of words, and changed the Y ('and') into an I, effectively converting the plaque from Spanish to Catalan! Love these Catalan activists!

Also on the way in, we shared the train carriage with a group of four cyclists — you get bikes, and dogs, and beggars, on the train — always entertaining!

Then back to the van for a quiet night. Sometimes you just have to have a day off!!!

Distance driven — today, nil; to date, 14,402 miles ( 23,178 km )

27 Feb 2015. <ES> Barcelona, Catalunya —

Barcelona, Day 3. Today's agenda — La Sagrada Família and Park Güell, both of which we have visited before.

Bearing in mind that the entry queues to La Sagrada Familia can be quite long, we made an early start. Again we took the train in to Plaça Catalunya, then the Metro changing at Diagonal for Sagrada Familia station. Very quick, and we were there by about 10am. The queue wasn't too bad, but we took it in turns while the other ducked across the road to McDonald's — a takeaway coffee makes the queue much more bearable. But it was only about 15 minutes before we had our tickets and could walk around the building to the entrance at the Nativity Facade (Ticketing is outside the Passion Facade, on the other side).

We took our time outside — the Nativity Facade itself is a World Heritage listed site, and well worth savouring in full. It is the only part of the exterior which Gaudí himself supervised the construction — the other parts follow his drawings and instructions, but have been worked on after his death. Gaudí was very much influenced by natural forms — there are over 30 species of plant represented on the Nativity facade itself. The entry doors, for example, are covered with green and red leaves, with lizards, frogs and insects scurrying or sitting amidst them. The whole nativity and childhood of Jesus is described in very naturalistic statuary which entirely covers the facade. It is capped by four bell towers, typically Gaudí. We have discovered that Gaudí designed a huge set of tubular bells for these towers. There are actually eight bell towers, four over the Nativity facade, four over the Passion facade. The openings in the towers are functional in two ways — each opening has a protruding hood to direct the sound downwards and to deflect from the bells any rain that dares to fall on the building!

When we finally went inside, we were amazed. The last time we were here, the nave was in the throes of construction, and basically closed to the public. Today, it is all but finished, and is open to the public. They were even setting out seating for a service. The nave was covered and the first organ installed (of what will ultimately be four, playable separately, or as one huge whole from a single console). The church held its first services in mid-2010, and.was consecrated by Pope Benedict XVI on 7 November of that year. The skeletal and organic tree-like shapes Gaudí achieves in the arches up to the gorgeous ceiling have to be seen to be believed. As we keep saying, nothing Gaudí does is without function — the shape of the ceiling is designed to focus the sound of the potential 1,000-voice choir (accommodated in the choir balcony around the three sides if the nave) and the organ(s) with perfect acoustic fidelity down to the congregation.

But it is the stained glass that really took our breath away. Everywhere around the cathedral are gorgeous, brilliantly-coloured abstract stained glass windows, designed by the Catalan glass designer Joan Vila-Grau since 1999, and brought to fruition by Josep Maria Bonet's artistic stained glass company, which contribute much to the space. The windows themselves are beautiful, with each one having a theme or meaning, but the way light comes through these windows — reds, yellows, blues and greens — and plays upon Gaudí's interior, is absolutely awe-inspiring. You could simply stand in the cathedral all day, watching the changes as the light plays differently on the columns and the choir balcony from minute to minute!

Every detail in La Sagrada Familia is exquisite, and it is surely Gaudí's crowning achievement. Gaudí himself is buried in a crypt beneath the apse, and there is even a committee in place seeking to have him beatified, the first step towards sainthood!

But we promised you a link between La Sagrada Familia and La Pedrera. If you go outside to look at the Passion Facade (much of which today was covered for construction work), you see the work of the sculptor Josep Maria Subirachs. When we first saw this facade, we thought that it was so different from the Nativity facade that it must have been the new sculptor going his own way, but no, Gaudí.s instructions were that this facade was to be simple, stark, angular, and this is what Subirachs has done. It traces the passion story in a sinuous path up the face, with the crucifixion at the top of the lower part of the facade, but with a huge gilded statue between the bell towers of this face representing the ascension.

But, now to Subirach's homage to Gaudí — just below and to the left of the crucifixion is a grouping of a man and two centurions — the man bears the face of Antoni Gaudí, and the helmets of the centurions are copies of the helmeted chimney-tops of La Pedrera!

Another interesting part of the Passion facade is the magic square just left of the Judas kiss statue. This square sums in various ways to 33, the age of Jesus at his death. The two repeated numbers (10 and 14), which breach the usual rules for magic squares, sum to 48, which is the numerological sum of 'INRI' ('Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum' — Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews). Fascinating!

And we can't fail to mention the entry door in this facade, which bears the full biblical text (in Catalan) of the Passion.

Work is currently under way on the Gloria facade, the largest of them all, and destined to be the main entrance to the cathedral. La Sagrada Familia has been under construction since 1882 (Gaudí took it over when the first architect resigned in 1883), and it is anticipated that the work will be complete in another two decades! We will have to come back then to see the completed building!

But enough of La Sagrada Familia — we'll let the pictures speak for themselves!

We then took the metro across to a station near Park Güell. Suzie was delighted to find that they have installed escalators to take you the last part of the way up the hill! Park Güell, Gaudí's playground for Barcelona, started off as a failed residential project, but Gaudí, with the full cooperation of his friend and patron Eusebio Güell created this fantastic (in the truest sense of the word), fabulous park for the city. Entry to the park has changed since last time we were here — because it is being loved to death, they have instituted timed entry into the 'Monumental' section of the park. Every 30 minutes there is a surge of 400 newcomers into the area! Last time we were able to take photos of the monuments themselves — this time it was more crowd scenes! There was even a bridal couple getting their photos taken! And a lutanist playing, amongst other more usual lute solos, "Michelle" and some other Beatles tunes — you can't deny it, Lennon and McCartney are responsible for some beautiful music! Busy it might have been, but it was great fun.

View over Barcelona from Park Güell

After a couple of hours in Park Güell, our feet were beginning to protest, so we made our way (via Metro and Renfe line) back to El Masnou to recover in the van!

Distance driven — today, nil; to date, 14,402 miles ( 23,178 km )