Barcelona!

I miss the sunshine. It's been really dreary since we got back and it seems funny already to think that only last Saturday we were lying on the beach sunbathing.

It was a really good holiday. I'm not sure that either of us really knew what to expect from it really, and certainly it was different from the last time we went away, but in a good way. This holiday was a much more doing things holiday. We went out on the train for a few days, exploring Barcelona and further afield out to Montserrat (in the rain and thunder and low lying cloud!) and there wasn't as much of the sitting around we managed in Moraira. This could have ben because it wasn't nearly as hot as when we went out there and also that this time I wasn't pick pocketed!

Anyway, the highlight for me I think was exploring Barcelona. What a superb city it is! There was so much to see from the old Cathedral, the Gaudi work, the art museums (The Picasso Museum was great- I'm never sure that I'm going to like looking at art, but I did appreciate this one), the aquarium, where Sharks swam above us as we went round on a conveyor belt... the tranquil parks... but best of all was The Segrada Familia, the unfinished Gaudi temple. Just such an outstanding building, with so much going on. In a moment of madness I went in the lift to the top, and while the view was quite astonishing, it was far too high for me and I felt giddy and unsafe being up there. I should have known better, but it's good to challenge your fears sometimes. Still Steve got some great pictures from the top for me to see, which you can see on his blog here. The modern carvings into the stone at the front of the crucifixion of Christ where just superb.
I'd go back again in a few years time just to see how much they managed to get built. I'm not hopeful that I'll be alive when it's finished!
So highly recommended city- well worth a visit!

I like the way their trains run on time, (except when they don't run at all when we need to the back to the airport for our flight, of course!), that the streets of Sitges are all cleaned every day- why can't we manage these things over here?