Long weekend in Spain & Portugal

Our friends' wedding invitation to Galicia was an excellent opportunity for us to explore western Iberia this summer: a perfect destination (Baiona, one of the best resorts at the Galician coast) and just as perfect timing (my birthday weekend)... The only challenge was getting to the right place at the right time. After extensive internet research we found the "best" flight connections: Zürich to Galicia in 3 days via Barcelona and Porto.

Never mind, at least we get the chance to add Portugal to our list of countries visited... and Barcelona, well, it's anyway a city where we wanted to return to, for two reasons: 1. our first visit was in February and the city in winter-time doesn't present its full potential, 2. to return to La Sagrada Familia, one of our favorite sites to check on the construction progress :D

From EUROPE - SPAIN - Barcelona

When we first visited it in 2007, we said we wanted to return when it was completed. We were now surprised to see how long we'd still have to wait...

From EUROPE - SPAIN - Barcelona

Since there was a very long queue and extremely hot outside, we gave up waiting for the tickets and went to the Güell park and the beach instead. Eh, well. This just gives us another reason to return to Barcelona again (perhaps with our grand-childeren :-)), waiting for the eventual completion of the La Sagrada Familia.

From EUROPE - SPAIN - Barcelona

As mentioned, we headed towards the Güell park, hoping for a bit of refreshment in the green. As always, the park was crowded by tourists, so pretty soon we ended up at the beach, enjoying a relaxing afternoon at the sea, followed by a gorgeous seafood birthday dinner at La Rambla.

From EUROPE - SPAIN - Barcelona

The next day we continued our journey to Porto, the city built along the hillsides overlooking the mouth of the Douro river, which offered a lot of pleasant moments: exhausting walks up and down the winding roads (not sure if it was the language, the hilly roads or the colourful houses, but there was something in the city that reminded us of Salvador de Bahia), followed by a relaxing 6 bridges river cruise and wine tasting of the famous Porto wine.  

From EUROPE - PORTUGAL - Porto

We spent couple of very pleasant days in Porto (see entire full album on Porto here) before heading along the coastline of North-Portugal towards the Spanish border.

From EUROPE - PORTUGAL - Porto

In the end, the purpose of our journey was to reach Baiona...

From EUROPE - SPAIN - Galicia

... and celebrate Thomas and Laura's wedding in the gorgeous Parador de Baiona castle.

From EUROPE - SPAIN - Galicia

Weekend in Barcelona

We had a beautiful, but very exhausting weekend … Saturday morning at 9 our flight landed at the airport in Barcelona and soon we started to explore the city.
Following the guidance of our travel guide, we headed down La Rambla from Placa Catalunya - one of the central squares of the city where airport busses arrive - in the direction of Barcelona Harbor. After dropping the bags at our hostel (located, by the way, in the red-light district of the city) and a quick visit at the Theatre, we turned into the Old Town and admired the beautiful Cathedral and its cloister with the 13 swans (kept in the memoir of Eulalia, the patron saint of the Cathedral who died at the age of 13)…then we had a nice walk in the Ciutadella Parc, heading towards the Arc de Triumph, built for the 1888 World's Fair.
Our next stop was at the Sagrada Familia, the worldwide famous Basilica of Barcelona, which is being built for 125 years and we are quite sure now, that it will still take a lot of time and hard work to finalize Gaudi’s masterpiece. Since there are no words to describe it, you better take a look at our photos:

EUROPE - SPAIN - Barcelona

We ended our first day’s city tour in Parc Guell, a garden complex with architectural elements, also designed by Gaudi and part of the UNESCO World Heritage (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Güell).
Our second day in Barcelona we spent by taking a trip on Montjuic, "the hill of World’s Fair and Olimpic Games”.
First we walked along the coast, all the way down from the statue of Columbus to Barceloneta, where we took a chair-lift up to the Montjuic (having a wonderful view on Barcelona Harbor) ... after a short visit at the Montjuic Castle, we headed towards the Olimpic Ring and had a great lunch inside the Olimpic Stadium ;-)
Next we visited the so called Poble Espanyol (or “Spanish Village”), which is basically a “one hour” way to get to know Spain. It’s been built for the 1929 International Exposition and consists of 116 fake buildings and artisan workshops, presenting in miniature all the different regions and typical architectural styles of the country. Our trip on the Montjuic came to an end at the main site of the 1929 World’s Fair, the main avenue leading from the grand Palau National to the Placa Espana (known for its Venetian Towers, which served as the main entrance to the Exposition).
Last but not least we visited the famous Passeig de Gracia, known for some remarkable pieces of the Catalan modernist architecture, designed by Gaudi (Casa Mila and Casa Batllo) and Montaner (Casa Lleo Morera) – all of them being World Heritage Sites.
On Monday we said good-bye to Barcelona with a final visit – at the Palau de la Musica Catalana – and flew back to Switzerland with lots of unforgettable experiences and hundreds of photos.