Welcome to Barcelona, Spain
Hello From Barcelona Spain,
I’m finally on dry land in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, Barcelona! I had 10 days to spend between cruises and decided to spend a week in Barcelona and two days in Amsterdam before I board the Holland America Zuiderdam and head back to Boston and Nova Scotia.
My nagging cough is finally receding and I’m well on the road to a full recovery.
I’m impressed with everything about Barcelona. It’s a clean ultra-modern vibrant city with lots of outdoor cafes and wide boulevards. It reminds me of a cleaned up Paris, without the ubiquitous dogs. Now it’s true my travel history dates back about 40 years so take my impressions with a grain off salt. Maybe other cities are just as nice and I haven’t travelled much lately
On my first day here, they were getting ready for a formula1 grand prix, and several race cars were exhibited and tweaked before the big event. Also my hotel was centrally located so I was within a few steps of much of the action. Many of the buildings are architecturally unique and exciting, and the streets are wide, with dedicated lanes for busses and taxis, bicycles, cars and pedestrians. And talk about cafes! I spent my days watching the world go by from one of the sidewalk cafes! Each corner has pedestrian crosswalks, with inclined ramps instead of curbs to accommodate the elderly, and the lights are long enough to allow slow walkers to cross their wide streets.
Yesterday I took a hop on hop off city tour bus to see what the rest of the city provided. I ended the day more impressed at the variety of neighborhoods but more importantly with the ratio of greenery to concrete. I was impressed with Singapore’s cleanliness and green trees and shrubs. Barcelona is just as green if not more so.
Last but not least are the people and food. As mentioned, Barcelona seemed like a young peoples city, and almost everyone I’ve met has been congenial and helpful, but generalizations about people are dubious, at best. Food on the other hand is another matter. I like to sample local food as a matter of principle, and my palate has had to adapt to many different sensations. Over the last week I have experienced the best meal I’ve had in a long time as well as the worst. The best was a simple steak at Patagonia Beef and Wine, an Argentinian steak house (take note), and the worst was at El Nacional Fish house. I ordered a simple cod fish fry and it came as a plate full of fried anchovies and tiny shrimp, with the heads , eyes, guts and fins. The fish were not tiny enough to chew the whole thing, because bones and other vicera could not be swallowed. Whew!! I generally try different Tapas, and today I tried a fried eggplant and honey….unusual but good. Yesterday’s Burger Kings whopper tasted great.
I hope this note accurately reflects my Barcelona impressions, and the pictures speak for themselves.
