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Barcelona's a big time tourist destination with its tree-lined Las Ramblas street and curvey Gaudi architecture.  (It's also famous for pickpockets - more on that later.)  Gaudi's biggest work - literally - is the Sagrada Familia which towers over the city.

Sagrada Familia.  Gaudi's biggest work, the Sagrada Familia looms over the city with its melting Gothic architecture.   When Gaudi was just 31, he took over the building of the church, saying it would take a few decades to finish it in the way he wanted.  In fact, to help finish it,  he eventually moved in to live in the church for his last 11 years, but then he died when he got hit by a tram.  The city of Barcelona is still trying to finish it, but the rule of big city projects is universal: construction stops and delays.  Think Boston's Big Dig.  Gaudi intended the complete structure to have 12 towers representing the apostles.  I figure if you count the construction cranes, it's finished!  My brother Darren hid his Wegman's supermarket card in one of the towers when we were here two years ago, so I hike up the nautilus-spiral stair to look for it.  I stick my hand in the crevice I think it's in, and instead I find someone's purse!  Those crafty pickpocketers.  I can't find Darren's card, so I hide my expired Hostel International card on one of the power boxes to find on a later visit (if you go, let me know and I can tell you where it is!)

Gaudi Year 2002
Barcelona and Gaudi.  It's not often an architect gets to be nearly synonymous with a city.  But Gaudi had a sugar daddy.  The wealthy Guell luckily saw one of Gaudi's pieces at a museum and called him up.  Guell eventually hired Gaudi to design dozens of works, including his house, Palau Guell, and a housing community, Park Guell.  Other wealthy Barceloneans got rowdy for Gaudi and hired him to design their homes as well, scatter Gaudi thruout Barcelona.  Much cooler to have your art used throughout town than sitting inside a stuffy museum.

Totally luckily, Barcelona happens to be celebrating Gaudi's 150 birthday with Gaudi Year.   Several private Gaudi-designed homes are now open to the public (thru Sept, 2002), along with new rooms of previously-open floors.  So of course, I gotta check it out while I'm here.  I'll stick the little Gaudi 2002 logo next to things open just for the celebration.

Science of Gaudi.  I first stumble into a museum exhibit to learn that Gaudi's designs weren't random wacky.  It's lucky I see this before I see the actual works so I can go "Ah-ha" in appreciation.  Calling himself a "geometrician" more than a designer, Gaudi played with math and physics principles in designing his structures.  His Sagrada Familia's columns are a double twisted cone.   His wavey house curves trace semicircles.  His elliptical arch comes from weights hanging on a chain, flipped upside down.  Like the painters Picasso and Miro, gotta break tradition to make new ground.

Palau Guell.  Guell had Gaudi design a home near the Ramblas.  Gaudi built the rooms around a 3-story high atrium that reaches the roof.  From the inside, when you look up at the roof of the atrium, you even see a moon and stars in the ceiling that let in natural light.  The tour guide raves about Gaudi's use of dark-brown wood and real cow-bone trim.  Combined with the mansion's secret passages and spyholes (so Guell can check on his guests hanky panky?), the style sounds like Haunted Mansion a la Scooby Doo to me.  Thanks to Gaudi Year 2002, they've opened up Gaudi's master bedroom on the third floor for the first time.   The bedroom is actually two bedrooms, his and hers, connected by a wall with a door.  The tour guide says that's the way they did it back then.  Hmm.... The roof features 20 chimney towers where Gaudi first decided to get funky by covering the towers with broken pieces of colored ceramic,  his trademark.  Our tour guide tells us there's a debate whether Gaudi meant the towers to look like a forest, mushrooms, or hats.  Our guide's fave explanation is that kids think they look like rockets.  Goes with Gaudi's shoot-for-the-moon design and imagination.

Park Guell Wanting to spread his name further, Guell had Gaudi design a
Park bench closeup	housing community Park Guell.   It's now a public park, and a great place to relax and check out the Gaudi Museum.   The park features the longest park bench in the world with a great view of the city.  I guess it could count as a Wonder of the World if benches were a bigger deal.

Casa Batllo Guide books say the house is closed to the public.  But it's

open this year.  The house features more curvey architecture, pastel stained glassed circles in the huge windows, and a blue-tiled four-story high atrium to let in natural light. The house is located right next to some modern architecture (a Barclays bank in this photo), and some other modernistic pieces, so they call this block the Manzana de la Discordia (Block of Discord).  Apparently the locals hated it back then.  Now the architects and tourists flock to it.

Other than Gaudi...

Fundacio Miro.  If you aren't a fan of Miro, you probably will be by the time you finish touring his museum.  Or at least you'll understand why a squiggly line and a red, blue, and black dot on a white canvas is considered great art.   Miro uses paints and sculptures featuring woman, the stars and the moon (our aspirations and dreams).

Picasso Museum.   When Picasso started painting as a teen, he did gentle traditional oil paintings of the countryside - not the wacked out Picasso we know at all.  His early landscapes are in the Picasso Museum.  But when his friend committed suicide, he flipped and started drawing blue-tinted depressed people (his Blue Period).  And later he branched into the cubic style he's now famous for.  Like Gaudi, gotta break the mold again.  The museum features two rooms to his versions (uh, obsessions) of the famous Las Meninas up in the Prado in Madrid.

Pablo Espanyol.  This shopping complex built for Barcelona's 1992 Olympics is the biggest tourist trap ever.  Avoid at all costs.  They say it combines architecture from around Spain, but it really serves as a tourist trap for artisans to hawk their overpriced goods.  They even charge a few bucks to enter. Rip off.  

First Pickpocketing Attempt!
Friends had warned me about pickpocketers in Barcelona.  And after seeing how easily George Clooney and Matt Damon pickpocketed each other in Ocean's 11, I was nervous when I started the trip.  But after a month of walking New York style (fast, determined), and no pickpoceters, I get lazy.  Here's what happens.  I leave the Picasso museum in that dreamy post-museum daze (bad, didn't switch to street mode), and wander down a side side street (not unusual, most of Barcelona is side streets).  I find myself a little lost, so I get out my map (BAD, EXTREMELY BAD.  Tourist flag!), just as I see this group of three guys hanging out in the street.  One of them waves at me to come over.  I immediately turn around (good), but he follows me smiling, "Football, football (soccer)."  He sticks out his foot like he wants to practice soccer footwork, and I defensively stick out my foot.  He then hooks my ankle with his ankle, playfully doing footwork.  But then I feel his hand go for my wallet in my front-pocket.  I immediately grab my pocket to keep my wallet in it and at the same time kick him in the ass, shoving him away.  Good thing I had that practice krav maga lesson.  Once the punk realizes I know his scam, he shrugs and wanders away.  Once I realize what happened, I want to chase him down, but his 3 friends are around the corner, so I walk off the other direction.  Incidentally, I see a policeman two minutes later and think about reporting the dude, but he could just claim innocence.  And besides, I don't know how to say "pickpocket" in Spanish.  But word to other travelers: watch out, they'll even go for your front-pocket wallet, and NEVER get your map out walking down the street.  I shoulda ducked down a side street.

After all that, I go from celebrating Gaudi's 150 birthday, to celebrate Rome's 2755th birthday.

Breakdancer on Las Ramblas.   Most people take photos of the many human statues on Las Ramblas.  But it's pretty easy to get the statues to move.  Just try taking their photo without dropping money in the hat, and they will spring to life.  I know from experience.  I try to photo this John Wayne statue guy without knowing about giving money, and he suddenly jumps after me.  Oops.  So instead, I move on to photo the breakdancers.  They're way more fun and talented than people who just stand there.  Better tunes too.  And yeah, I did give them money.  THEY totally deserve it. 

After 2 hours of looking for a hostel near the tourist-packed Las Ramblas, I finally score a room in the alley between Las Ramblas and the bar-and-restaurant packed Palais Real.  Seemed good during the day, but at night I hear noisy bar hoppers.  Well, my bad for snoozing early on the weekend.  You can even see the towers of the Palau Guell museum in the upper left.

OK, in case you had trouble, here's a closer view of a tower from the tour of the Palau Guell.

Gidyup Dragon!  Kev rides Gaudi's famous dragon in Park Guell.  If Gaudi only knew...

Inside Casa Batllo.  Also called the Bones House - check out the column near the window.

Miro artwork

This is the way gelato should be served.  I find a great gelato shop and stop by for a cone twice a day.  I also stop by for breakfast for their geofles, crispy sweet waffles with chocolate, dulce de leche, almond, or sweetened condensed milk drizzled on top.

Another breakdancer photo, cause they were that good, and the photos actually came out OK.