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No, I haven't picked up an inflammatory skin condition on our travels (yet - touch wood...). The title "Hives" refers to the effect one experiences when you visit Barcelona for one day only, plan to visit each of the major sights during that day, and that day just so happens to fall on the first Saturday of Summer... and during a long weekend. Ant farms, bee hives, kicking the hornet's nest... call it what you will. Our day in Barcelona was a combination of walking (15km today FYI) and seeing these writhing masses of humanity congregating around the hives a.k.a. tourist hot-spots.
To be fair, these attractions were fascinating. The first three were from the warped and presumably drug-addled mind of artist and architect Antoni Gaudi.
First, picture a huge expanse of parklands overlooking the city of Barcelona. Then take some LSD, and imagine a scattering of arched columns supporting underground ampitheatres akin to something a Smurf army would rally inside. Finally, throw about a million tourists into the mix, and there you have it: Park Guell.
Next: La Sagrada Familia; the church that defies all laws of sanity! More evidence that Antoni Gaudi was not playing with a full deck of cards. It's a cathedral... sort of. By day it's a mind-bend; by night it's flat out creepy. At first glance you think you're seeing a really huge cathedral. Then the details come into focus. There are clouds carved into the Eastern facade, piles of glittering and coloured fruit stacked high atop cylindrical rooftops, and an evergreen tree covered in white doves. The columns supporting the Western facade angle in like bones on a rib cage, putting you in mind of some great hulking beast cast in stone. Most insane of all is that it is not even close to being finished. 100 years after commencement and it's still only standing at half its intended height, and is covered in cranes and work crew. And of course the thousands of tourist who flock to the sight to marvel at what Gaudi called "his divine destiny".
Gaudi's third spectacle for the day for us came in the shape of three buildings (houses, or casa in Spanish) set amidst your normal run-of-the-mill urban buildings. Cue the crowds, cameras and selfie sticks! It's understandable. It's not every day you see the equivalent of glittering Smurf houses perched alongside office buildings.
After a quick picnic lunch in the main square Placa de Catalunya (more crowds... and pigeons this time!), we proceeded down La Rambla (the main shopping mall / precinct) and found - you guessed it - another hive of activity. It wasn't like the crowds in some other major metropolises (NYC, London, Bangkok etc. just off the top of my head); people were moving but seemingly not in any rush. It made Barcelona feel like a lazy city to me, and I liked that. I think siestas must do a world of good for Spanish wellbeing. Nevertheless, we were a bit over wending our way through the masses, and headed into the old town (El Barri Gotic) in search of a glass of wine and a seat from which to do some people watching.
Now an astute reader will have realised our next problem: all the bars, cafes, restaurants, cerveserias and everything in between were packed. Eventually we stumbled upon Catedral de Barcelona (a much more traditional and much less drug-addled Cathedral than its cousin across town). Here we grabbed some drinks and nibblies from the supermarket, challenged ourselves to sketch what was in front of us. Obviously the milling masses of tourists posed a problem for novices like us, but fortunately the Cathedral didn't move too much and we were able to while away a few hours with pad and pencil.
A massive day. One which we both enjoyed, but agreed that we need to slow down a bit. The long train rides, broken sleep (Sjane has man-flu), and busy days ambolling through crowds are catching up with us. This travel business is hard work!
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