We met our tour guide, Luka, who is actually Italian. It is interesting that, except for Cologne, our tour guides have all been transplants. He was a little hard to understand, but he provided a lot of good information. The first thing we learned is that if you don't speak Catalan, you should just use English. Natives of Barcelona, don't think highly of Castilian (the Spanish language) as it was forced upon them by King Philip in the 15th century. Barcelona was part of Aragon when the Iberian peninsula was made up of separate kingdoms. The kingdoms of Castile and Aragon were united by the marriage of Queen Isabella (Castile) and King Ferdinand (Aragon) which eventually lead to the founding of Spain. Notice in the picture below Aragon included part of Italy.
Barcelona (having been a part of Catalonia) commemorates their loss to Spain on September 11, 1714 by having a National Day of Catalonia. Aragon was closer to France so the Catalan has more French influence. Castile had a Moorish history and the language has an Arabic influence. While there are many words that are the same, it is definitely a different language.
Our tour group was small and started
in the square that houses the city hall in Placa Sant Jaume in the Gothic
Quarter. It was opposite Palau de la
Generalitat de Catalunya which houses the regional government. The buildings
were built in the neoclassical style in the 14 century and renovated in 1847. Our tour guide showed the flag of Catalonia
and Barcelona, which flies alongside the Spanish flag. From what he told us, Catalonians would like
to be their own country. The flag of Barcelona
is a combines the cross of Saint George (Sant Jordi) who is the patron saint of
Catalan with the red and yellow striped flag of the crown of Aragon.
Barcelona commemorates their loss of independence to Spain
on September 11, 1714 (911) by having a National Day of Catalonia. Because
Aragon (later known as Catalonia) was closer to France and Catalan language has
more French influence. The Castile language, on the other hand, was more
influence by the Moors who came to Spain and the language has an Arabic
influence. While there are many words that are the same, they are both
their own language.
As our tour moves, once again we see Roman ruins down alley
way. The ruins are in between buildings and
there are signs about the ruins and when they were found. Just like in other cities we have seen,
construction was halted or change to accommodate the ruins.
Next we see the palace and Barcelona Cathedral. The cathedral was built in the gothic style
in the 15th century. Luka
tells us that the construction was plain and all the stone for the construction
of the historic buildings was quarried from the same place at a nearby mountain.
Barcelona
wanted to attract tourist to its city and felt the cathedral was too plain compared to other cathedrals. They decided to put a new façade on the front
of the cathedral and a steeple tower in the late 19th century. They also built a bridge between to buildings
called the bishop’s bridge (Pont del Bisbe) in 1929 for the International Expo. This was also designed to attract visitors to
the city. Luka then pointed out the
Picasso museum and told us that the first Sunday of the month, the museums in
Barcelona are free. Too bad we can’t
take advantage as we will tomorrow.
After viewing the cathedral from all sides, we went into
the palace courtyard, where we learned a little more about King Ferdinand and
Queen Isabella. They were the rulers
during the time of Columbus and financed his trips to the new world. Luka showed us a display that also shows what
Aragon had control of before they lost their power.
Our final destination on the tour was the people’s church
as opposed to the king’s (or royal) church we saw earlier. It is called the Basillica de Santo Maria del
Mar. Along with the town hall, these are
the two location that people get married in Barcelona (at least that is what Luka
said). This also was also built in
Gothic style in 1300’s with the laborers carrying blocks with a human chain
from the quarry to the church. The church
construction was paid for by the local middle class, as the bishop would not
fund a second church.
Our tour ends in El Born which was the worker’s district. Now it host the artisans that make local artwork and crafts. There are also restaurants which cater to the locals, although tourists are welcome as well. In El Born has narrow streets and quaint squares with many little cafes.
When our tour ends, we headed to see the famed Sagrada Familia basilica which I had heard of before, but have no idea what to expect. On our way, we walked through a different part of town and saw what looks like a city gate. It is called the Arco de Triunfo de Barcelona and was designed by architect Joseph Vilaseca. It was built in 1888. There is a park area around the gate and a street performer was using a string bubble maker to entertain the children. It created hundreds of bubbles with the slightest of movements.
As we got closer to the Sagrada, the
crowds were getting bigger. When we
finally saw it, it was hard to believe. This was when I thought, if a fairy tale
castle and a church had a child, this would be it. The first stone was laid 140 years ago. Believe it or not, the Sagrada is still under
construction. The side we saw first
looked to be mostly done. Some of the
features were built in the typical neo-Gothic of that period of time; pointed
windows, external buttresses, and a tapered bell tower. What makes the Sagrada
so different is the was the more fanciful direction that began under the
direction of Antoni Gaudi; whose ambitious proposal transformed the look of the
basilica. Gaudi’s idea was that it would
be a church from the future. The
completion date for the Sagrada was to be 2026, however; Covid slowed the
progress and the new date is set for 2032.
The stone of the church is very light with colorful painted sculptures
and other painted designs. It is really
large and there are openings within the walls and towers with sculpted
scenes. We walked around and found a
park on the backside. There is work being
done on the backside and the last side we get to is just an unfinished
wall. My thought is that the photos that I post will not do it justice.
Our last plan for today, is to go back to the Arena de Barcelona to walk the at the top and see the sights. We took a subway fairly close by and found a nice little restaurant with outdoor seating for lunch. The found was good and the servers were great.
At the arena, we took the elevator to the top. It was not extremely high, but you still got some good views of the city. We were better able to see the site of the 1929 Expo and some of the location of the 1992 Olympics. There are restaurants in the center of the upper floor. On our way done, we went inside and walked through the mall and to the escalators down. There was a display on one of the floors that showed the construction of the mall. They basically gutted the arena, leaving the beautiful brickwork of the original walls and built the mall inside. It was completed in 2010, however; the restaurants on the top floor were added later. This was a really great way in which to reuse the space.
We were a 10 minute walk from the hostel and so we head back. We took a break and then headed to 8:00 pm dinner with Roz (Aussy friend from Angloville). Roz flew into Barcelona the Monday after Angloville. Her friend, Nat, joined us for dinner. Their daughters were childhood friends and were also in Barcelona with another friend. The daughters did not join us. We had a great meal and sangria in the Old Town in a plaza even though the waitstaff was kind of bad. It was fun catching up on the week we had after Angloville. Roz’s big adventure was a salsa night with Nat and their daughters that went 1 or 2 am. After a long dinner, we headed by subway to our hostel. Tomorrow, we head to Porto.
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