Monday morning we set off to visit Sagrada Familia. But, the line was extremely long, so we decided to put it off until Tuesday morning. There are a couple of photos of the exterior, but there are many, many more that will come with the Tuesday set of photos.

After our aborted attempt to visit Sagrada Familia, we decided to head off to another one of Gaudi’s projects — Parc Guell. It’s a large park filled with structures that are fanciful and playful.

Next we visited the Barcelona Pavilion (for the 1929 expo) by Mies van der Rohe. It was originally demolished after the expo, but in the 1980s there was a movement to have it restored as an excellent exemplar of Mies’ work. My architect/interior designer friends will recognize it will no problem, but for the rest of you, the structure is amazing in its precision and minimalist forms. Mies headed the Bauhaus for several years and then moved to Chicago and created several important works in the US.

Photos are here

Hello! It’s been a few days since I posted, but I’m finally getting around to sorting through my photos and getting things organized. I’m going to make a few smaller posts — one for each day — starting with Sunday July 15.

Sunday we spent a bunch of time wrestling with Air France over Jon’s bag (which, btw, is almost definitely lost at this point, but AF isn’t admitting that yet). So, we didn’t get out until fairly late in the afternoon. In many ways that was fortuitous because by that time the tourists had mostly moved on to other things and we were able to visit Casa Batllo (one of Gaudi’s most famous works) with fewer other tourists than normal.

Pictures are posted here

Casa Batllo was built for the Batllo family on the lower floor (the piano nobile) and then with apartments (2 per floor) on each of the upper 4 floors). The attic features Gaudi’s lovely caternary arches, which you also saw at La Padrera (Casa Milo).

Just a quick note before we head out for the day. Sometime later (this evening?) I’ll post photos and notes from the last couple days which included visits to Casa Batllo, Parc Guell, Camp Nou (the soccer stadium) and Mies van der Rohe’s German Pavilion from the 1929 Expo (aka “the Barcelona Pavilion). This morning though I’ve got to run so we can get in line early for Sagrada Familia. (We tried to go yesterday and the line was wrapped around three sides of the cathedral.)

Hope everyone is well, wherever you are!

It’s Sunday now and we’re getting a late start both because it was a late night yesterdday and because Jon is wrangling with the beauracracy of AirFrance to get his luggage, which never arrived here in Barcelona. So, here’s a recap of yesterday…

Casa Batllo, one of Gaudi’s famous works is about 10-15 blocks down from us, so we walked down there to check it out. The line was long, so we decided to visit another day. There are a few photos of the exterior (and the house next door Casa Amatller, which is closed until 2014).

Just around the corner from Casa Batllo is the Fundacio Antoni Tapeis. Antoni Tapeis was a famous Catalonian artist of the 20th century. The foundation is housed in a lovely building that was previously a publishing house. We took a few pictures of the exterior and then visited the museum. I can’t say that I particularly like his work, but Tapeis’ techniques are interesting and the museum was lovely.

Next we walked a bit farther to one of Gaudi’s other works — Casa Mila or La Padrera. It’s really hard to do justice to the building in pictures, but I’ve included a bunch in the gallery. The strange creatures (“buddies”) on the roof are the tops of the structural columns and chimneys. Gaudi was famous for using very organic forms and the catenary arch to form his buildings and La Padrera is an excellent example. The entire building was beautiful and it would have been an amazing place to live in the early 1900s.

After a little detour, we ended up at Parc Joan Miro just before sunset.

We ate dinner and then walked over to the nearby “arena” — a shopping mall, cinema, disco, and restaurant space with a large observation deck that looks over the Placa Espanya right at the base of Montjuic.

With some amazing luck, we happened to end up at Montjuic during a once a year nighttime festival where there were bands and food and all the museums were open until 1a. The whole area was built for the 1929 World Expo and it is really amazing to think of what it would have been like to visit then.

We walked up Av. de Reina Maria Cristina to the Magic Fountain, which was in its full lighted glory, and then on up the hill to the MNAC (Museo Nacional d’Art Catalunya) where we wandered around the top floor until about 12:30a.

A quick metro trip and we were back at the apartment ready to sleep.

I’ve posted the best photos from the day up on flickr. I had a bit of trouble getting the photos to appear properly yesterday, so from now on, I’ll give you a link to the first of the days photos up on my flickr photostream. Enjoy!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tzimmerli/7574190522/in/set-72157630568988800

So its about six hours before our plane leaves. I’m packed and pretty much ready to go. Amazingly I got everything into one bag and under 50 lbs! I also have a carry on that weighs just under 30 lbs and a tube with trace, vellum and markers, but it should all be fairly manageable.

I’ll try to take some photos in the airports and in the apartment when we get there so you have something to look at tomorrow. Enjoy your day!