Barcelona, Spain – Day 20
July 14, 2015
Today I had class and had to give an oral presentation in Spanish on our menu. Our menu was Menu de Queso Extremo (Extreme Cheese Menu) because it was a cheese plate, mac and cheese and cheesecake. (Kara and I thought it would be funny haha) The presentation went pretty well!
After classes for the day I headed home and did some homework and showered, then we headed to Gaudi’s Park Guell! We took the metro to Christina’s apartment in Gracia and then walked from there. Unfortunately that ended up being way out of the way and we had to walk pretty far to get to the park. Finally after some close calls at getting lost we made it! Only to find out that we would have to wait 45 minutes to go into the park because it was currently full…
Luckily you can walk around the forrest/garden area for free and it is quite expansive. The views are so remarkable from this point in the city, you have a pretty clear shot over the city to the water and it’s beautiful. So many of the structures in this area mimic the Earth and are so natural looking, but totally intricate. Gaudi really looked to nature for inspiration (remember Casa Batllo and his ocean inspiration?).
It was time to enter the park at 8:30, yippee! We went straight for the long, serpentine, tile-mosaic bench that spans the top of the park to take some classic photos. I’m sure that you’ve seen some somewhere because this spot is so popular, between the mosaics and the vistas it doesn’t get much more beautiful!!
Then we headed down below to explore some more. There are only two houses on the property, one that Gaudi lived in and one that Guell lived in. These were the only houses build as models for prospective buyers, but instead of attracting buyers, they scared them off and the rest of the park remained undeveloped and was instead filled with garden. Gaudi did not use to have the same reputation as he does today and people did not respond as well to his art.
Down below you can also see the famous lizard fountain, pretty sweet.
After spending some time taking pictures and exploring the park we headed to find the metro to go back home because it was late and we were hungry.
We got home and cooked some dinner and then we changed and went to Dow Jones to meet up with everyone else. Sarah and I love the bartenders there and they love us too I think because they took free shots with us haha. We spent some time there hanging out and playing the drink stock market before heading home for the night.
xoxo J