Barcelona, in Stunning Colour

Regular readers will have already digested Barcelona in Black and White and that gives most of the story. I’ve been so lazy with this that Barcelona in Black and White, Again, is already out. I did take colour photos, with my phone, and I present them here for your education and amusement.

Yep, we must be in Barcelona as there’s cured pig’s-legs everywhere. Our Spanish friend calls this Catalan comfort-food.

Dig in, I say. Local beer, three types of cheese, fresh bread and charcuterie up the wazoo. But there’s more to Spain’s second city than food and booze. No, really.

That’s the view from the hotel room window and that’s the Sagrada Familiar. The foundations were laid in 1882 and the final stone is yet to be placed. There are a ton of jokes to be made about the lazy Spaniards taking a 100 year siesta and such but that’s just how long it takes to make a cathedral. It’s the big tourist draw in this town and we were lucky enough to watch it taking shape from our bedroom window.

On our stroll to the pig-leg café, above, we happened to pass by this world’s most famous building-site and it really is impressive. Especially if you like cranes, which I do.

Here’s another look on our first evening in town, from battery hill. It’s a nice day and the view is good at sunset.

It’s the early the next day and we found this around the corner from our hotel. It’s a Gaudi-designed place and a pretty famous one.

We are off to the park. This involves navigating the unfamiliar public transport network. Nice marble on the walls.

Mrs Sachie calculates our route.

The train system is pretty easy. Before you could say “knife” we were waiting for our local friends at the park gate.

If you’ve read Barcelona in Black and White you’ll know all about this park. If you haven’t, get cracking.

Enough park, it’s a nice day so let’s go for lunch.

Zip, zip, zip.

We’ll take a spin through town first.

Even the light poles are fancy.

This place could really grow on one.

There’s that place again.

Tapas

The big omelet is called a tortia.

This sign says don’t feed the wild pigs. But we’re in the city, right? What pigs? Oh no! Here they come!

After lunch, Ruben said he had something special planned. One can book a place at a hotel’s rooftop bar with a special view.

Yep, even better than the view from our room. They’ll let you stay up there for an hour or two, it’s not free, but if you keep ordering drinks then you’re welcome to stay.

The view really is a million bucks. Pity I can’t get the lighting right. Need a fill-flash.

It was a beautiful day and after about thirty minutes of going “Wow. That’s amazing!” one starts to notice some of the finer detail.

The cathedral is an expression of weightless mass, soaring towers and hyper-decoration, but if one gets a an idea of the scale…

These decorations a truly massive. Still hyper-detailed, almost fractal, but the delicate peak of this tower is the size of a lorry and much heavier.

The day remained sunny so it only made sense to sit back and soak it all up.

And by soak it all up, I mean soaking up a good weight of Estrella.

That’s the local Barcelona-beer and it does well in its natural habitat.

That truck in the background contains the bar. How they drive it up here each day is a mystery to me.

By now sun was getting low in the sky and the cathedral was changing colours.

It’s a spectacular sight, I wanted to stay up there until sundown to see the whole show.

Bloody hell Dan, haven’t you seen enough?
He’s right. Go home, you have a big day tomorrow.

So retire we did and glad we were too. Sachie had earlier laid hints that platinum-people receive gifts on checking into a room and we hadn’t. Hats off to the Renaissance Hotel team though.

Apparently I’m Mr Oguni now.

And now it’s time for bed. It’s taken me, oh, a year and a half to get this post written so I’m going to cut it here and pick up the next day in a new one.

To be continued…

Australia 2023: Last Days

Here is the final entry to the Australia 2023 trilogy, in which shopping is performed, signs are seen and oysters are eaten.

It’s December 31, 2023. Goodbye 2023, you bastard! Hopefully your brethren will be better. Sachie flies out tomorrow and I go on the second.

That’s Victoria Market. It’s a big tourist draw for its excellent produce but we came to buy tourist tat for the folks back in Siam The Kingdom Thailand. Sachie came along because she heard you can buy a dozen oysters cheap and eat them right in front of the stall-keeper all the while maintaining eye-contact with him. Likes her oysters, she does.

Continue reading “Australia 2023: Last Days”

Dan went down to Georgia: Part III

About two years late but better than never, here is the final chapter of our Georgia triptych. You’ll have to go back a few posts to find parts one and two but I’ll add a callout or something later.

After a big yesterday of driving all over Georgia it was time to head back to Tbilisi and that means another Bolt! trip. We wanted to get a little before leaving so Sachie wanted to go back to the market where there were some exchange booths. But first, breakfast.

That’s at the fancy café around the corner, the serve beer at 10am, if you ask them to. Miss Sachie did so.

Continue reading “Dan went down to Georgia: Part III”

Australia 2024: Zoo & Art

The penultimate bulletin on our 2023/2024 trip to Australia. In this episode we venture to Melbourne Zoo and Point Leo.

Yes, the mighty giraffe. There’s a bunch of them in Melbourne Zoo and they appeared to be in really excellent condition. Very attractive mammals. This post follows a series, being, Australia 2024: Melbs, Australia 2024: Point Lonsdale and Points Beyond and Australia in B&W. All part of the Australia 2023 suite, because I went home for Christmas.

Continue reading “Australia 2024: Zoo & Art”

Barcelona in Black and White, Again

So I finally got around to processing the last roll of film from the Barcelona trip and I must say I was pleased. This is a roll of Kentmere 100 PAN and I like the grainy, dreamy effect it gives.

Barcelona Gothic Quarter

So here we are in Barcelona’s Gothic district. It’s a region of ancient buildings, narrow lanes, heavy tourism and cheap smack.

Continue reading “Barcelona in Black and White, Again”