¡Bar-thay-lo-nah!

For the second part of our spring break we headed to bright and sunny Spain and spent four days in Barcelona. It was incredible, definitely one of my favorite places in Europe thus far. As is apparent from my inability to reduce the amount of pictures in this entry below ten, the weather was amazing and the city itself was beautiful. This here is Plaça Reial (said "pla-tha" with the Spanish lisp...i actually couldn't stop saying it after we heard it a few times), which is where our hostel was located, right off Las Ramblas.

The long and busy strip called Las Ramblas is divided in the center by a large sidewalk that hosts a variety of street performers (like Edward Scissorhands shown here, who I thought looked uncannily like Mr. Depp) as well as flower shops and stands selling an odd assortment of birds not usually seen in your average pet store (i.e. pigeons, chickens, doves, etc.). Very strange.

The facade of the famous La Sagrada Família designed by Antoni Gaudí. Looking exactly like a drip castle made of sand and yes, still under construction. But even with the cranes in the background the church was fantastically bizarre and definitely lived up to its reputation-unlike anything I've ever seen!

Although the church was beautiful, I think my favorite of Gaudí's creations (at least of the few I was able to see during our short visit) is Parc Güell. There were beautiful views of the city, and the design of the park seemed like a strange combination of elements from Jurassic Park and a Dr. Seuss book, all mixed together with colorful broken pottery pieces. Again, the whole place was surreal in the best way possible.

After visiting Parc Güell, I wanted to see more of Gaudí's buildings and so I took a walk toward one of Barcelona's main streets called Passeig de Gràcia to see the Casa Milà apartments. Not a particularly great photograph, but just wanted to show the serpentine balconies and the interesting avoidance of corners. Since Gaudí's buildings are scattered throughout the city, they seem to stand out all the more alongside their comparatively conservative neighbors.

We took a free walking tour of the city on one of our first days and our tour guide told us that this rather ugly looking building is ironically an architecture school. And this drawing here-which in my opinion saves the structure from being a complete sore thumb in this main center-was apparently copied from a sketch done by Picasso on a restaurant napkin. I love that guy.

On our tour we visited a small plaza and came across this group of adorable preschoolers wearing pastel-colored smocks. I couldn't tell if it was a uniform or if it was for some sort of arts and crafts project, but they looked so cute and they were really excited about wherever they were going. And I was able to practice my creeping-on-people picture-taking skills, hence the odd angle of the photo (but I'm just going to call that an artistic choice).

On one of our last nights we finally made it to Barceloneta, a small part of the city that borders the beach. Of course the only time it drizzled while we were there happened to coincide with our beach time, but as we got closer the skies cleared and we were able to witness quite a beautiful sunset.

This was the marina we walked alongside in order to get to the beach, packed to the max with sailboats whose masts reached like a wall up to the sky.

By the time we made it onto the sand the sun had almost completely set, but to see the water and the city behind it was still incredible. I really hope to go back to Barcelona when it's warmer, but the peaceful emptiness of the city beach in off-season was greatly appreciated.

Amsterdam

So the last few weeks have been pretty hectic and I've fallen a bit behind on updating this blog...I currently have around four entries worth of pictures, so here I am starting back a few weeks ago with spring break. One step at a time, and starting with Amsterdam!

Here is one of the many canals we walked over while traversing the city, close to the red light district (and for some reason this canal in particular was always filled with large groups of swans). I never realized quite how many waterways there were in the city until I got there; there are four main canals that circle the center of the city, and therefore any sort of walk through Amsterdam involves multiple canal crossings (each bordered by unique buildings).

This is Amsterdam Central Station, the main train station designed by the same man who created the winning design for the Rijksmuseum (the national museum which we also visited) in the late 19th century. I think it's one of the most beautiful stations I've ever seen, and the color of the brick looked incredible in the light of the setting sun.

The table in the room of our hostel. A random picture but for some reason I liked how it looked like graffiti and seemed to act in lieu of a formal guest-book. It was covered with names and all sorts of quotes and words of advice--i.e. one of our French roommates who left the day we arrived contributed "Free your mind from mental prostitution." Deep, man.

Amsterdam is really a city of bikers. My roommates and I rented bikes for three days, and while some were happier with the experience than others, I absolutely loved being back on two wheels. I had forgotten how much I missed riding around the city and how much more efficient it is than walking. We got caught in one of many rainstorms when we were on our bikes and I actually found it thrilling to ride back to our hostel with the rain in our faces and rushing over various bridges.

On our walk back from breakfast one morning we spotted a group of people staring toward the canal, and upon closer inspection realized that there was a heron on the roof of a parked car (or maybe it's a crane? not sure). I was surprised how calm it was, and I was able to get up fairly close to take its photo, almost as if it was enjoying all the attention.

On the weekend Maddie, David, and I went to one of the main markets near the canal named Prisengracht (which also happens to have an amazing vintage market on Monday mornings...could have spent all day there on my own!). They sold specialty foods, plants, and all sorts of random objects to a lively crowd of both locals and tourists alike.

I've noticed that whenever I go to Europe for some reason I see marzipan everywhere, and the Netherlands were no different. There were lots of nut stands, and Maddie and I splurged on this amazing creation of sliced walnuts filled with rounds of marzipan and rolled in sugar. And yes, it was as good as it looks and sounds.

On the way back from the market we came upon a group of street performers, playing what sounded like a kind of folk music (maybe even a bit like klezmer music?). Whatever the genre, it was nice hearing live music that seemed in some way connected to the surrounding city that we had been exploring.