Barcelona - Cathedral, MACBA, Gaudi - Casas Batllo y Mila

So full-day-one of Kungfuerists and luver do Barca so its off on the best walking tour I've ever had of Barcelona...must have been something to do with the skill and unwaning enthusiasm of the guide! Well he was imported from Gloucester specially for the job.

So after crossing over Carrer de Ferran from our hostel and winding through the Medieval back alleys of Barri Gòtic we did chance upon one resplendant 19th Century Barcelona Cathedral. Turns out they were even slower building this one than the Sagrada Familia - this was started in 1408 but not finished until 1913! It is suspected they may have been leeching the siestas.

It was a pretty church though just like Mexico it was very Catholic with its lavish gold-clad, well, everything! The cloisters were pretty complete with dinner in the form of tame goose and goldfish and fresh water from a fountain to boil them in. You don't go hungry here. This was also postcard stop 1 for Katie - how happy she looked!

We burst from the cloisters into the square, in some fashion, to find the main facade lavishly dorbed in scaffholding. A slight letdown but you could almost hide it and make it look artistic with a photo from the other side of the Roman city walls. I say almost.

Off wee tootled in the direction of Mercado *** and low and behold - what did we find? A walkers van which some yobbo had overwritten with his own design, perhaps in the hope of a lucky night out. We took a wee look around the slightly overpriced market whilst feeling a little hungry and slightly dehydrated from the previous night. A few more pretty backstreets on though and I did aspy a man with many bananas. Muchos plátanos, or whatever the Catalan is for them! Either way he understood what I wanted making Katie and me most happy with something slightly less greasy than last night's sausagemeat on break in our stomachs!

On to the Palau de la Música Catalana and what did we see - two superchilled pigs. And the woman wonders why we are taking photos eh?! Torrents of school children prevented us from getting in the palace, which is a shame now I've seen the photos in the guidebook - but here's a photo to show our intensions were true!

So on to the big square (Placa Catalunya) and its large buildings which would have looked a whole lot nicer without the neon signs! Tasteless Europeans again! Being as we are now mature we clearly didn't find any amusement in chasing the pleathora of pigeons about the square.

On to Barcelona's modern art museum (MACBA) by way of a shop for Sam-sized people. There were toe hairs on the threshold and a wizards hat on the wall. What could this mean?

More backalleys and we arrived at the huge modern building of MACBA. There were some clear flaws in the design of their floors...in fact some probably weren't designed. Well after an stack of 28-year old chocolate and the big chair-gong we thought we might be just about getting our money's worth. One of the most interesting exhibits had to be a piece about birth through life through death, and the power of the multicoloured neon schlongs. Truly imaginative or something. Without getting technical though, a green man seems a bit far fetched but a green man with a blue willy is makes me really begin to doubt the sanity of the creator.

In a true sign of the times and one which I have yet to show the boys back at Brand 57 I came across a sign which signs our song of suvival. "I Learned Helplessness From Rats"! Rats behold, we shall outstay you, outwit you and out-spark-you-out!

Dinner din dins - we were off to the eat-all-you-like buffet central! Oh yes - time to make up for last night's lightweight meal! So in we walked, taking two plates like everyone else and filling them from the salad bar. As we neared the cash desk though we realised we were rapidly running out of self-service items. Well if it was to be only salad then we better have a lot of it to fill ourselves up - so on it went salad after salad until we were each a proud 2-plates full! Then grab a drink, pay our €7 and sit down to a whole lot of food. And that's when it dawned on us - we simply had to wait until after the cashpoint to get at the meat...and soup...and pizza. Arse. Feeling guilty we ate as much salad as a man can hold and then some! Katie was a bigger man than any of us. The food wasn't brilliant but it was still worth tucking into the soup and pizzas and then the ice-cream and créme bruille type thing which was also included! And then we sat and watched Rob eat sweets - lots of them. I was just jealous my stomach was so full.

Enter Señor Gaudi and friends and the walking tour of architecture! First to Casa ***, then on to la Illa de la Discórdia and its group of four of Barcelona's most famous Modernista houses. Casa Lleó Morera on the corner with its ornate tower is the work of Lluís Domènech i Montaner. I vaguely remember the guidebook saying something about the insides having unforunately been "renovated" by the shop owners...oops. Then next came Casa Ramon Mulleras, which none of us took a photo of so I guess it wasn't so very eyecatching! And then finally next to each other Casa Amatller by Puig i Cadafalch (1898) on the left and Casa Batlló by Antoni Gaudi (1904-1906) on the right. And that wasn't read straight out of the guidebook. hmmm...

Casa Battló looked like a huge array of bones stuck together to build some window arches and then a giant lizzard skin for a roof! Genius. Mum tells me its great inside as well but we were off to see other things.

Enter Casa Milà or La Pedrera (the Stone Quarry) as it is more commonly known! An awesome building with a rippled facade which bares its weight entirely on columns so as to allow the crazy external windows that have no regular shape. Much like the inside to be honest! Everything in here wobbles! When we walked into the central atrium we didn't even realise we were back outside again. It was all painted crazy colours too. The whole building was fascinating and completely unique!

The most amazing part was definitely the roof - inside and out! The inside had immense amounts of whalebone-like arches creating a labarynth which we completely lost each other in! And then the outside was adorned with loads of chimneys dressed up as stormtroopers! So ahead of his time our Gaudi.

Bit of a random and slightly long walk back after this in the general direction of our hostel. Rob was getting hungry again and after our trek through the town a some were beginning to feel the achiness in their legs! Ah well I'd only get away with making people walk this much one day - might as well make the most of it!

On the way back we still managed to catch another couple of architectural gems! One of which called ***** seemed like a slightly less-enthusiastic effort by Gaudi to built Casa Battló.

Our second wee gem was Casa Terrades - a six-sided appartment block also by Puig i Cadafalch and looking rather like a castle! A quick snap from across the street and then back into the depths of Barcelona's Eixample and Barrio Gòtic, making a beeline for the hostel.

After dropping the younguns back at the hostel Katie and I went for a wander down Las Ramblas to the waterfront - to see the sea as we still hadn't managed it! Had a bit of a wander round, managing to constantly refer to Columbus' Column as Nelson's Column...well if they hadn't copied us in the first place!

We aspied a nightclub which was actually onboard a ship and noted it as a potential for later in the wee break and then headed to a strange wooden submarine! One replica of an actual wooden one which was navigated around Barcelona harbour back in the late 1800s! Crazy crazy people!

But not as crazy as the Post Office. It turns out that the quickest way to buy stamps at the post office is not simply to purchase them over the counter from the person at the information desk, or even to stand in a queue and wait for a person behind the windows. It is actually to ask the person at the desk how exactly you are supposed to buy stamps, then go to the machine on the right, hit C, wait about 5 minutes for your number to show up on the electric board on the far wall and then walk to a window from where you can be served with stamps destined for England! They must be very proud of their acheivements. I was glad of the sit down though and it was another pretty building.

On our return home Katies disbelief in my sense of direction was proved unfounded. I was happy.

That night we ended up at some greasy spoon...rather greasy spoon down in the depths of Barrio Gòtic. Well then it probably wasn't as bad as the one we were about to eat at by the Chocolate Museum, but in comparison it would have been only €7 for a three-course. We ended up with tapas. I personally had two tiny sausages on a tiny plate and I can only think that in the photo they had of them they'd used especially small knives and forks to make them look a whole lot bigger! Ach you live and learn. Katie and I returned knackered afterwards and left the Rob and Sam to go find a late night bar.