I had hoped to be able to start this post with the good news that Patricia is fully recovered, but that isn’t the case. She is improving, but still can’t be up and about for very long.
Yesterday, Friday, I took a walk to the Barcelona Harbor. I suspect there is more than one actual harbor but this is the place where the cruise boats arrive. It was also the focus for some of the events in the 1992 Olympics. Our first visit to Barcelona was a few years after the Olympics, 1996 I think, It still looks much the same as I recall it from our visit in 2024. What doesn’t look the same is the street I walked down to get the sea: La Rambla (or Las Ramblas, depending on how pedantic you want to be) has deteriorated just since 2024 and it seems completely different from what I remember for 1996.
Part of that, I am sure, is due to the massive construction running up the street from Plaza Catalunya all the way down to the water. The middle part of the street is completely torn up and is impossible to “ramble” along. There is construction equipment, holes in the street, construction fences and is generally a big mess. Because some of the cross street are blocked traffic seems backed up from one end to another.
But more than that, over time many of the nice local stores have been displaced by what I can only call tourist souvenir shops and brand-name stores you can see in any city in Europe. The famous Boqueria market is now so crowded by tourists that it has lost its local flavor. It was a disappointing walk.
But the harbor and marina were still nice. There were several very large yachts (unless they were small cruise ships, which I doubt) and the Aquarium looked to be doing good business. The tram from Montjüic terminates at the harbor so I could see trams going back and forth.
I brought some ice cream back to the room for Patricia. We spent a good part of the eveng on the rooftop terrace at the Kimpton hotel where I took pictures that I could not compose from ground level and we watched to moonrise.
We were both disappointed that we could not take the tours of Casa Batlló (a house, now major tourist attraction by Gaudi) and Sagrada Familia. We had been looking forward to them.
Today, Sunday, Patricia is feeling a little better. We were able to revisit a store she had spotted a few days ago. [There is no point in me trying to say “I can’t remember”, because I can always find my way back.] Then we got some ice cream and sat on the steps of the Cathedral and listened to a folk-music band play for a while.
Tomorrow we head for Seville. We will get there by train after a 6.5 hour trip.
I have added a few more pictures to the pictures page.
