43. La Pedrera. Part 2

The roof space in La Pedrera acts as both insulation and as a ventilation mechanism.  These days, the museum of the house is situated here in the roof cavity.  The ventilation windows that you can see here in the actual roof space, can also be seen in the model as having little sunshades over them.  They are on the very, very top level of the model just under the chimneys on the roof.  

This is a huge 3D model of the building.  You can see the wrought iron front door and the wrought iron on the balconies.  And all those curves.  No wonder the local authorities gave them a hard time building it.

So after our jaw-dropping sojourn on the roof terraces, and then an hour or more in the roof space museum, we were ready to tour an apartment.   Remember, this is 1912.

This is the ensuite ..........

And the master bedroom .........

And the dining room (I'm standing in the sitting room)  ....... No artificial light anywhere.  This is all natural light from windows and light wells.  And it is all open plan with large sliding doors to close off or open up areas.

The wrought iron on a window balcony, looking down on the main street.

The main bathroom, with copper water heater.

The kitchen, with all marble bench tops, wood or perhaps gas-fired stove with hot water storage above.  There was also an attached scullery and the other walls you can't see were all glass fronted, fitted cupboards.

This was the front reception hall.  All this light comes from the internal light well.  Floors here were marble tiles.  All other floors were parquetry, except the maid's room which was lino.

The sewing/ironing room.

The internal light well.

The main entrance looking out from the internal courtyard.

The fabulous internal staircase to the first floor.

Areas under the staircases were painted with gentle murals of gardens.

Looking down on that fabulous door from the first floor - possibly the first floor was the Mila apartment.

And saying goodbye.

Wow, wow, wow!  Gaudi was a genius.  And what fabulous restoration and maintenance.

42. La Pedrera. Part 1

I've had an overwhelming response to my last email.  

It seems lots of people have been to Barcelona and everyone seems to have loved La Sagrada Familia as much as we did.  Looking back over my photos it is incredibly more stunning than they depict.  

I think we will return to Barcelona.  It wasn't until we were leaving, yesterday that we realised how much of the city we had missed  There was very little paper-based information available either at the hotel or in any of the public places we went.  In addition, public signage was very poor.  We had done a bit of Internet research before we arrived, but not a huge amount.  It was as we drove "out of town" that we realised that we had been in quite a northern part of the city and that, because the city stretches north to south, we had missed a lot of things to the south, much of which were associated with the Barcelona Olympics.  Oh, well, we'll just have to visit again!

But for now ... back to the present ...

The traffic in Barcelona is brilliant.  Four lanes wide, all in one direction from north to south, with an inner circle and an outer circle.  The Metro is brilliant, too.  Much newer than Paris, and over a smaller area - a little cheaper and with trains every five minutes on every line and NEVER more than 3 or 4 SECONDS late.  We didn't try the buses.

So, after our introduction to the genius of Antoni Gaudi at La Sagrada Familia, we chose a private residence for our second visit.  This is an apartment building, on a corner, in a salubrious (as our friend Debra would say) suburb.  It was built between 1905 and 1912 for a wealthy couple by the name of Mila, hence the name La Casa Mila.  They had as much trouble with municipal planning authorities as does anyone in the world trying to build something "different".  

This building is of passive solar design and has three huge apartments on each floor.  The stair wells act as natural ventilators and the ventilation towers on the roof are unique, decorative features.  The roof area is a sun terrace which encourages tenants to "mix and talk".  Each apartment has a front door for visitors with lift access and a back door for servants and family, which is accessed via stair wells with "common meeting and talking areas".  The building is a UNESCO World Heritage site.  It was restored in the 1980's with private funds from one of the big banks which now owns the whole property.  The buildings tenants are now various art galleries, both public and private.

The official name of the building is La Casa Mila - the Mila House.  But the "nickname" has always been La Pedrera - the Quarry.  This is because the external facade has been sculpted to look like rough rock.

Of course there was a queue to get in, but it was only about 15 minutes in the sun.  We passed the front gate as we queued.  It is made up of a pedestrian gate on either side and a main car sized gate in the middle.  It is the access to the internal courtyard from the street.  Imagine the luxury in 1912 of being able to drive your "motor" through this wrought iron and glass gate to an underground garage.

And this is the internal courtyard where you would enter through the aforementioned gate .  You would drive your motor down the ramp into the underground garage (which had water-tanks collecting rainwater for the gardens), then either walk up these stairs, where the plants are, to the back door of your apartment, or you would go up in the lift to enter your front door.

We climbed the internal stairs to the roof.  There were eight flights like this.  Oh, my poor knee.

But I made it to the roof ...  and what a sight.  These "sculptures"  on the roof are chimneys and ventilation vents.  Each has a significance, but because I'm not much into iconology or religious motif, I didn't take all that much notice of the audioguide.

I just thought they "looked" incredible - whatever they symbolised.  The dark "stuff" is dark glass mosaic.

This mosaic is ceramic tile.

A view over the edge towards the street below.  It's obvious there is some other notable architecture in this street.

What curves!

Can you see the multi-levels of the roof terraces?  And look - that's La Sagrada Familia in the background!

There it is again.

And there is Paul with his headphones/audioguide on.

The last photo of the roof.

Then we went inside to the museum and to see one of the apartments.

41. La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

After our explosive introduction to Barcelona on fireworks night, we got ourselves a tourist map and a metro ticket, and found our way to one of the most beautiful modern buildings in the world - Antoni Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia (The Sacred Family) a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  

The basilica was begun in 1883 and is expected to be completed in 2026, the centenary of Gaudi's death.  It reached the mid-way point in its construction in 2010.  Progress was extremely slow because it was disrupted by the Spanish civil war and relied on private donations. There are still three cranes permanently on the site.  The church has three facades.  The first was overseen by Gaudi himself and tells the story of the conception and birth of Christ.  It is a rather heavy style - very, very detailed, with four bell towers. 

Here is Gaudi's original facade.  The photo doesn't do it justice - the building is big and you cant get back far enough to fit it all in.  We had to queue for ages in the hot sun in a queue circling the cathedral, and it cost 18 euros (about $26.00 AUD) entry, including an excellent audio-guide, per person.  They say there are 4,000 visitors per day, and Paul worked out that, given seasonal attendances, the entry charge would raise about 18 million euros per year.  Not much for such a huge project.  Perhaps that is still why progress is slow.

The wooden framing you can see is part of the final stage of construction making up the highest central tower and  the third facade (which will eventually become the main entry).

This is the second facade, the passion and crucifixion of Christ.  Much more modern than the first facade.  And much lighter stone.  It is absolutely breathtaking.

Each smaller section tells a different story.

You hardly notice the mechanics of construction - scaffolding, cranes, lifts, platforms, workers ….  there is so much detail to look at.   And we are still in the queue, albeit, now in the shade.

And because it is so difficult to get a photo of the whole building, here is a snap of a model that was in a shop, showing the second facade and the towers on that side.  Looking at this model, the tallest central tower as well as the facade and towers to the right, are still to be built (but have begun).  

And then we went inside.  Talk about the master of light and space.  This is all natural light!

 The west wall of the apse.

The east wall of the apse.

The dome over the alter with northern light.

The dome over the alter from further back.

Standing at what will finally be the front entrance, looking towards the alter.

The only artificial light is the parachute affair, suspended above the alter.  There will eventually be five organs - currently there are only the two you can see here.  The parachute is actually a beautiful sculpture of Jesus ascending into heaven, surrounded by representations of the eucharist.  

As you can imagine, I took dozens and dozens of photos.  But I can't include them all.  After three hours of the church and the museum (which is in the crypt), we needed a break.

So it was outside for a coffee and a sandwich and a good sit down, watching the bedlam of those 4,000 tourists per day and contemplating the third facade, which will be about the role of the church in the modern world; humanity's responsibility to God to care for his kingdom on Earth.  I can't wait for that one!   But very seriously, I think it will be sensational.  And given the commitment of this project to Gaudi's original vision of an organic structure, reflecting nature itself, it could turn out to be a work of art with a very strong message.

40. A Fiery Introduction to Barcelona

After an uneventful trip down the north eastern coast of Spain, which began on the French autoroute and then became the autopista (literal translation: racetrack), and the timely purchase of a map of Espana & Portugal, we cruised into Barcelona with reasonable ease.  

I just can't trust the lady on the SatNav!  I like to have a real map in front of me and I still haven't got over being put out of a job!  One of the problems with the SatNav in a non-English speaking country is that hotels and businesses often give you their location address in either "local lingo" or as a translation into English, which doesn't necessarily match up with the Spanish data base of the SatNav.  But, once you figure out the key differences between the roads on your map and the address you've been given, you can give the SatNav lady the local name and she can then "do her thing" and take you to the door.

I tell you this because we had some difficulty with the address of the hotel we had booked the night before on the Internet.   The address on the website was Aragon, 569 Bis, Eixample, Barcelona. (Street, Number, Suburb, City).  The SatNav would not recognise the street name.  But once Paul worked out that the street name of Aragon had probably been translated into English and that the Spanish name was probably Arago, the SatNav recognised Arago and the lady brought us directly to the door.

We arrived at about 3.00 pm and got right down to business.  The first priority was, of course, to chill a bottle of white wine (for me) by tying it to the air conditioner outlet ...

... with lots of pillows underneath - JUST IN CASE .

Please note that all of the pillows were from Paul's side of the bed.  Most appropriate!

While Paul's bottle of red went into the hand basin.

There are always boring necessities to take care of and in this case it was quite a bit of washing.  I did the first load by hand, in the bath, and filled my makeshift clothes line.  The rest would have to wait until the morrow.  

In the hour it took me to do this, Paul tried to solve the problem of car parking.  Hotel reception had said "Oh dear, our car park is full and the roller door on our spare car park is broken!  But tomorrow (Friday) is a public holiday and you don't have to pay for parking on the weekend, so if you can find a street car park now, and pay until 7pm tonight - you'll be OK for the rest of your four night stay."   So Paul spent an hour walking and driving around the streets looking for a (legal) car park.  No success!  

Finally, he spat the dummy with reception telling them the situation was not to his liking and miraculously they said they had solved the problem of parking and had gained access to another private car park just down the road and "Of course, you can use that, sir.  Just pay the man at the gate."  So for 90 euros ($128.00 AUD) we had four days parking!  

With the essentials taken care of .... and fortified by a reasonably cool glass of vino, we hit the street.   We left the hotel about 6.00 pm and failed to find a suitable restaurant until 9.00pm.  It seemed as though the hatches were well and truly battened down.  And no wonder - it was the eve of the Festival of St John and it was all fires and fireworks.  

The fireworks were on sale to anyone, of any age, on every street corner and the fires were - quite literally - in the intersections of the main roads.  It was as though the locals had decided to build a bonfire in the middle of Moorabool and McKillop Streets and sell fireworks willy-nilly.  It all started about 7.00 pm and finished about 4.00 am.  The photos below were taken about 10.30 pm in the main street of our suburb.

Yes, a public urinal.  But better than using the street.

There were toddlers nonchalantly playing in this playground while chaos reigned around them.

This fire had been quite large. 

I heard the Council trucks out cleaning up the streets at about 4.00 or 5.00 am; they did a pretty good job, but what a mess.  There are still fireworks going off tonight (Sunday) in odd little neighbourhood pockets.

So … this was our introduction to Barcelona.  And I had read that this was supposed to be a sophisticated city.  Hmmmm!

39. The Costa Brava, Espana

Well, it's me again, still feeling miserable with my shocking hair cut, saying goodbye to Collioure and wondering how I will face up to Barcelona.  You are probably thinking a hair cut can't be that bad …. what is she on about?   Well, think again - and just believe me - it is awful.

So goodbye lovely Collioure.  This is the church ....

... and this is the fort ....

…  and the church again.

And then 70 km later it is the Costa Brava in Spain, where the Pyrenees roll down into the Mediterranean Sea.  This is really rugged terrain - windy and bleak and hot and dry.

This is the town of Cadaques (pronounced Ca-dark-ez) supposedly one of the most beautiful villages in Spain.  Well, if that's the case we are going to be very, very disappointed with whatever comes next.  Our hotel was on top of the hill, and the town centre (and the beach and the food) was at the bottom.  No car access to the town centre so we had to walk.  We went to the beach in the afternoon and then down again for dinner at night.  That is four times up and down the hill in one day. Not good!   I now have serious issues with my knee and back.

The Cadarques beach.    And below is Salvadore Dali's summer house and museum.

Very difficult access.  I was really struggling with my dickie knee and aching back from the previous day.  Very poor management of the property, so we didn't hand over our money to go in.  This house is the reason tourists come to town and yet you can only get to it if you are very good on your feet and can walk quite a long way.  There is absolutely no access for the elderly or for families with strollers or with toddlers. 

We were pretty disappointed, so we hobbled back to our car and took a bit of a drive around the point before heading for Barcelona.

I'm sure many people would find this environment beautiful, but it was far too brutal for us.

And this was our first taste of Spain.  

Unlike the French, the Spanish seem to have little regard for the beautification or maintenance of public areas.  What a contrast between Collioure and Cadarques - only about 70km between them on the same coastline - but a world apart.