Thursday, June 11, 2009

Barcelona


We said goodbye to Paul´s parents after having a wonderful visit with them and took a train from Alicante to Barcelona. Barcelona - what can I say to do it justice. It is a city that blends the old with the new perfectly. It is magical. We took a bus tour around the city and saw many of the Gaudi buildings, amazing! We stopped at the Sagrada Familia Temple, a cathedral started by Gaudi in 1885 and is still far from being completed. It is breathtaking with a completely different view from every angle. I took over 70 photographs of all the amazing sites and buildings we saw along the route.

That evening we walked the Les Rambles and took in the many sites and booths selling everything from postcards to live chickens and turtles. We ended at the port with the column of Columbus pointing out to sea (but not in the direction of America?). We stopped for a cold drink in a mall and when a young man asked for directions another took my bag. We spent the next 2 hours at the police station where we were treated with the utmost care and kindness. There was no money in my bag but there was my camera, our passports, a credit card and a bank card. When we returned to our room a note was on our door saying that a lady had found my bag and a phone number to contact her. The next morning we retrieved my bag (she lived in an apartment 2 blocks from our hotel) with everything in it except the camera, a change purse with about 3 euros and my favorite red lipstick.

The lesson learned - for every bad person, there are many kind and wonderful people in this world.

I was upset about loosing all my pictures though but Paul kindly suggested we take the tour again and he brought his camera this time and took another 100 pictures so all is well. (I had another red lipstick with me in the room as well!) I had also downloaded the pictures from the first week at my in laws so no pictures were lost. Whew!

In spite of the mishap we still love Barcelona and will do more exploring today.

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