Barcelona: avoiding theft, soaking up sun, and an ambitious two day coastal hiking trip.
This will be a more lengthy post than usual (saying a lot) since Barcelona was a very full and fun time on our trip. First, coming from Granada we had trouble finding full accommodation for the entire length of our stay. We ended up at two different couch surfing spots, plus a day or two at a hostel, and then having one day not covered at all, we decided to take a weekend trip to the coast for some ambitious hiking.
Barcelona felt like it had some of the qualities of every city we had seen thus far. Wide boulevards, historical neighbourhoods … but into the mix Barcelona brings the relaxed, coastal feeling as you approach the ocean pier. There is sun, and sand. I enjoyed all of the public sculpture and creatively designed buildings. And of course, the brilliant and fascinating architecture of Gaudi. We visited Casa Mila, Casa Batlo, the Sagrada Familia, and his home in the Parc Gaudi he designed. I will spare you too many pictures, the rest are available in my Flickr archive, but will select some of my favourites from the building that affected me the most, Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia cathedral. He died before its completion, but using his designs Barcelona is attempting to complete its construction.
Exterior sculptures:
Inside:
Ceiling:
Barcelona is rumoured to be the city of theft; pickpocketers are said to abound and I have heard of several people having valuables stolen. Katie and I managed to have no incidents, watching our bags very carefully in the crowded areas such as the boulevard Las Ramblas.
We made a quick stop at Els Quatre Gats, the infamous coffee shop where the late greats such as Picasso interacted with fellow artists and thinkers:
Scattered across the city we explored, the health food store chain Veritas was a godsend. It is here that after days of searching in Spain, we finally found peanut butter! (the Spanish love their nutella and other chocolate spreads on toast)
Barcelona also happens to have a 100% vegan restaurant, called Juicy Jones, which was also very delicious. We ate there a few times, I think:
the colourful interior:
roasted vegetable sandwich with pesto and olive tapenade:
soba noodle salad with olives and tofu slices:
At Amaltea, with our amazing CS hosts, I had batter fried artichoke hearts with guacamole, hummus and pita:
At one point it was a twist of fate where Katie and I happened to be ravenous, hadn’t planned a restaurant but were searching around the local neighbourhood in vain. Finally Katie spotted some chairs outside a restaurant, where we discovered the best vegan foccaccia pizza slice known to man. We dreamed about it afterwards, it was so delicious:
and hanging from their windows they had lavender, rather than the ham shanks in typical Spanish restaurants:
Inspired by a recommendation from our CS hosts, we decided to embark on a hike on the East coast of Spain, a train distance away from Barcelona. Day one consisted of a hike along the coast from Llanca to Port de la Selva. Day two consisted of a hike in the mountains to the Saint Pere de Rhodes monastery, then a hike back to Llanca following a mountain trail.
A view of the coastal trail of day one:
In Llanca, starting out:
I have so many beautiful pictures (hard to go wrong with a coast like that):
Day one went well without a hitch. We settled in for the night in gorgeous Port de la Selva, then headed out bright and early the next morning into the mountains on a fairly steep hiking trail. The trail was marked with red and white stripes that became very comforting as we followed them towards the monastery.
Here is Katie, looking down at Port de la Selva:
When we reached the monastery, we stopped before entering to have our lunch - with the best view I have ever eaten in front of:
The monastery:
After the monastery I have less and less photos as we continued to hike towards Llanca, somewhat exhausted. We ended up getting lost, losing the trail that we were following without initially realizing it. Then, suddenly we had to hike down a very steep hill that caused me to stumble several times (very dangerous since we had no idea where we were and it would have been difficult to get help if I was seriously injured). Then we had no path to follow and knew we were very far from our initial easy path into the city of Llanca. But luckily with mountains, you usually know which direction you need to go in - up, or down. So we headed down, finally finding a passable trail to follow. We ended up in the countryside near a vineyard, about 3 or 4 km outside the town. So we walked alongside the highway until we reached the train station. What a crazy long journey.
All in all, Barcelona was a lot of fun. Good food, amazing architecture, great people encountered via couch surfing, and an exciting coastal trip to complete the journey.
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