Jul 11, 2018
Continued from yesterday’s post
After our tour of Casa Batllo and a very light snack we were ready for our tour of Casa Mila. During our free Gaudi walking tour the day prior Colin decided that he definitely wanted to see this second home. I went online and was able to secure two tickets at the senior rate of 16.50euros each so about $52.00CAD for both of us. I wrote the first part of this post about June 7th yesterday and you can find that here.
Casa Mila is best described as a huge wave set in motion.
Casa Mila is widely known as la Pedrera because of its rough outer appearance that resembles a stone quarry. The building is made up of two blocks of apartments interconnected by interior courtyards and a shared facade. Gaudi designed the building when he was 54 and at the height of his powers. The building was declared a Cultural World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1984.
Once inside, the tour starts on the roof. Included in the price of our ticket was a regular headset with explanations of what we were looking at.
They are huge.
Are you thinking Star Wars?
We actually thought that the roof was the best part of the tour.
The dark and stormy clouds were approaching. Shortly after this photo we went inside and the skies opened. Sadly when it rains the roof is closed so all those who came behind us missed seeing this amazing roof.
This is Barcelona from the rooftop. I love all the greenery in this city. The blue on the horizon is the ocean.
The rest of the tour had us descending the levels. Amazing architecture.
There were many displays of nature that had inspired Gaudi’s work. There were examples of how he created the impossible in structure simply by inverting things he saw in nature such as a tree with many branches. We also saw many samples of the furniture he had built, most ergonomically constructed to the degree of how your wrist rested on the arm of a chair. I am a detailed person but this boggled my mind. The man was a genius. There are still actual rented apartments in the building so there were areas in which we had to be quiet so as to not disturb the tenants. A full set of apartments was on display along with actual furniture of the time, toys that children played with, musical instruments of the time, mementos and photos as well as a very well done video of life in Barcelona in that era. I have no photos to show you. We enjoyed the tour and the presentation but neither of us were inspired to take photos. We really did enjoy the tour and it was worth the price of admission to see the roof. Neither of us agreed with the free walking tour guide that this was the best of the two Gaudi homes we saw on this day. They each had very different visions for us to enjoy and we were glad that we saw both, however, Casa Batllo was our favorite. It was mid afternoon and we had been walking since 8AM and had only stopped for a croissant and a coffee, we were hungry. We stepped outside into heavy rain.
It took a few blocks to find a place that we could relax and enjoy a menu of the day. We were rather late in the afternoon ( 4 PM ) and our choice of tuna was sold out so we settled for a fish dish ( ? cod ) with roasted veggies and potatoes and more veggies on the side. I only recall that the wine was very good.
The day was far from over. Back home to put our feet up and relax. The pink thongs on the right have great arch support and feel like you are walking on air. The other four pair are my walking shoes that I switched out day after day. Some days I wore two pair. Of those four pair I had to have the heels redone on three of them! That is how much I walked over the last four weeks.
I don’t know how many steps/miles I walked on this day but the day was far from over. We were not too far from our next stop but I just could not walk that far as had been our original plan so instead we walked three blocks to the metro and just went the one stop. Barcelona has the best deal on metro tickets. You can get ten tickets for a mere 10.2 euros, so 1 euro per use. Best of all both of could use the same card. One of the best transportation deals on our entire trip.
Nest stop of this very long day was to see the Magic Fountains located at the Museu Nacional D’art de Cataluny. We would have loved to check this place out but we only had three full days and four nights in Barcelona. I really hope that there will be a next time. The entire area you see in this photo was shoulder to shoulder people. There were dozens of tour buses dropping people off. We were happy to have come early enough that we got a spot mid overpass along the edge. However it was still unusually cool for that time of year. I was tired of being cold not to mention tired of walking so much each day considering I was healing from my head wound and still was coughing non stop.
Wow, okay it was worth the effort to get here.
We took so very many photos.
But these few photos give you the idea of what we saw. We did stay until the end. I think I kept hoping for just a bit more. We enjoyed the fountains but would not go back. A great end to the day.
Once we got off the metro we realized that we were hungry so stopped at a local place for some delicious tomato mixture spread on toast and an order of tempura to share. So ended another long day. Despite the next day being our last full day in Barcelona we manage to fit in a lot more. Stay tuned 😆
But first a few more Gaudi links.
This link gives a very concise and short biography of the great man and how he died, almost an unknown on the street after a freak accident. https://www.casabatllo.es/en/antoni-gaudi/?utm_campaign=CJ18&utm_medium=email&utm_source=thankyounew&utm_content=link_gaudi&utm_term=en
This link shows you when he created his outstanding works in a chronological order.
I hope that you have enjoyed Barcelona with us. Only one more day to go.
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What an amazing building … and beautiful fountains!
Yes an amazing and unusual building. I forgot to mention the metal parts of the balconies, made from scrap metal and all unique designs.
Another awesome day with so many wonderful sights to see, thanks for all the great photos.
It was an awesome day BUT it was the same day as yesterday’s post. We toured both the homes and saw the fountains all in the same day! Glad you enjoyed seeing Gaudi’s work and Barcelona.
We too spent four nights and three full days in Barcelona, an amazing city. Funny thing is, a lot of your photos shared here are in my files too. Taken from pretty much the same spot! We were blown away in Parc Güell, it’s serpentine bench and pillars… The two “hop on and off” bus routes were our way of getting around, I figured it would be nicer than the metro because it’s not under ground. Mind you, we did not have nasty weather. Your narration is awesome…
We loved Barcelona as well. Parc Güell was our favorite, spents hours there wandering about. A truly amazing city.
Sadly Parc Guell was more than 50% under renovation construction so we did not get there as there were so many other choices available.
Boy, you really did some walking in those shoes. 🙂
I’m so appreciative of the time you are putting in to post all these wonderful pictures of your trip.
(My daughter lived in Valencia then moved to Andora where she met and married a fella.)