On to Barcelona

After spending a few days in Madrid, Anne, Mark and Bren took an overnight train to Barcelona.  On paper, this looked like a great idea.  Spring for the first class tickets, get a little sleep on the train, wake up in Barcelona ready to see the sights.  Unfortunately, real life is not on paper.  In Madrid, "First Class" tickets mean that the seats will recline nearly 2 degrees and the florescent cabin lights will remain on for the duration of the trip.  Despite their rather extraordinary efforts to find sleep (efforts which may have included one member of the group reclining on or near the floor of the train car), the trio arrived in Barcelona more than a bit fatigued.  Luckily, Barcelona is in Spain (duh!), so a siesta is a perfectly acceptable cure for this problem.

Asleep at 12:30.  You got to love Europe.

After a brief siesta, Anne, Mark and Bren headed out to see what was going on in Barcelona.  One day that they were there a huge parade was taking place to honor the Barcelona football club, who had just clinched the La Liga Championship (at least that is what it said on the caption on the newspaper the next day - Anne, Mark and Bren do not really follow La Liga).  However, the parade was over by the time the siesta ended, so the trio attempted to find other cultural experiences in Barcelona, and they were not disappointed.

Anne is either looking up the address of an exciting place to visit or looking inside the briefcase from Pulp Fiction.

One thing that Spain is famous for is tapas.  "Tapas" is basically a way to serve a variety of cheeses, meats and breads in snack-size portions.  The customer generally gets an opportunity to try several different types of foods, rather than filling up on one entree.  Anne, Mark and Bren made it their mission to find a tapas restaurant.  Unfortunately, the trio was looking for one on Sunday, and did so as Americans (actually they do everything as Americans - by this comment I mean that they went looking for a lunch place at around noon).  Not so fast, my friends.  Not only are they not serving lunch at noon, most of the places are not even open.  Eventually, however, the three found a nice place to try this new style of dining.  They ordered what the waiter recommended and then waited for the delicious to begin.  The food served included a variety of cheeses (the stinky kind) and hams.

Mark inspects the cheese.

The big hit however, was the chorizo diablo.

 The waiter brought the chorizo diablo to the table and did most of the cooking right there.  Anne, Mark and Bren washed the meal down with some vino manzana and sangria.

In addition to sampling the tapas, the trio wandered around Barcelona and did a few other things that the locals do.  For example, they went down to the waterfront boardwalk and watched the ships.

Mysteriously, the boardwalk has no actual boards.

They also had the opportunity to watch the locals do what only the locals do.  For example, dancing in front of a church.

Barcelona is located in a region called Catalonia.  Catalonia is contained within the nation of Spain, but many of the people who live there consider themselves to be Catalonians first, Spaniards second (or not at all).  It is not its own nation, but sometimes acts like it wants to be (like Quebec or Texas).  As such, many of the signs in Barcelona are written in Spanish and Catalan.  The people pictured above are Catalonians who gather in front of their church each Sunday at noon to do some traditional Catalonian dancing and other Catalonian-only activities (secret handshakes, etc.).  You can see their belongings placed in the center of their dancing circle, which is either a way to symbolize that they are all part of a collective group and would provide for one another materially or a way to prevent their stuff from getting stolen while they danced (Barcelona is crawling with pickpockets - bring a money belt).