How Gaudí

Posted by Emily

Hello from Budapest! But more on that later. I'm behind on my posting because everytime we go to a cyber café it seems that I always have many emails to right and Nicki just sails on ahead of me with her posts.

Going back to Barcelona....

It's a very beautiful city and we spent most of our time walking around and looking at the various architecture of the famous Spanish architect Gaudí. The first structre we visted was the cathedral Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family I believe). It's HUGE and is not completed. If the website I just consulted is correct, construction began in 1882. It's not scheduled to be finished until 2050. If that gives you any idea of the scale and detail of the place. I wish I had my photos with me to post because it's very hard to describe! One side is very surreal (if I can even use that word to describe stone carvings...) with lots of curvy shapes. Alex aptly described it as looking like it was melting. The other side, which is a bit disputed because, if I remember correctly, Gaudí did not design himself, is cubist and depicts different religion scenes such as Christ on the cross and a nativity scene. The inside of the church is very unfinished, with lots of scafolding everywhere. There are many beautiful stained glass windows, mosaic tiles and columns that look kind of like trees in the way that they branch out near the ceiling. It's all very stunning.

Later that day we ventured to an apartment building built by him but I can't remember the name at the moment. Again, I wish I had pictures because I don't really know how to decribe what we saw!! There are many curved balconies, iron work and irridescent color washes on the outside of the building. I'll try to post pictures later because I'm not really doing it justice....

We also spent an afternoon exploring Park Guell, a large park designed by Gaudí. if any of you have ever been to Solera in Minneapolis, many of the mosaica mimic his style. There is a large mosaic tiled lizard fountain, a hall of columns with many circular mosaics on the ceiling (looking through this area was made even better by the fact that there was a violinist playing in the enclosure and the acoustics are surprisingly good). Another highlight is the long curving mosaic bench that we had lunch on. Finally, we walked to the top of one of the hills in the park and got an amazing panaramic view of Barcelona.

Another thing that made Barcelona a great time was the fact that we got (free!!) lodgin with a Spanish friend of Alex. He has a large apartment near downtown and we were very lucky to have such a great location, a hospitable host, a washing machine and a nice break from staying in hostels. Sometimes it's just nice to be in a home. Not to mention, it really helped the budget!!