Barcelona - Day 2

Today we embarked on another walking tour of Barcelona, but this time we headed to the old town area, or Barri Gotic.

Again we took the Avenguda Diagonal, but this time we turned into Passeig de Gracia, which runs parallel to Rambla de Catalunya and ends at Placa de Catalunya.

Along Passeig de Garcia we passed two buildings designed and built by the famous Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi (1852-1926), La Pedrera and Casa Batllo.

La Pedrera, built between 1905 and 1910 as a combined apartment and office block, is one of Gaudi’s undisputed masterpieces. It has an uneven grey-stone façade which ripples around the corner, and a roof with giant chimney pots looking like sci-fi versions of medieval knights.

Casa Batllo, is a whimsical building which like many of his creations has an almost organic style with its façade of wave shaped window frames and balconies, such that it almost seems like a living being. We didn’t visit inside but there were many queued up to do so.

We headed into the old town and visited the Catedral de Barcelona, one of the city’s most magnificent Gothic structures. We took a lift to the roof for access to excellent views of the city.

Afterwards we strolled through the historic streets and headed back to our hotel.

At night we joined our tour guide and tour group for a welcome dinner of tapas. The group was a mix of mostly Australians and Americans, and about 39 in total. The tour guide Enzo Bonnano was a lot of fun.Read more