25.03 - Thursday - in Barcelona

First a bit of an introduction to the city. Barcelona is the capital of autonomous region of Catalonia, official language here is Catalan (all the signs are both in Spanish and in Catalan). Besides great architect Gaudi, this beautiful city is the birth place of Joan Miro, Salvador Dali and Antoni Tapies. Pablo Picasso spent his formative years here and Pedro Almadovar is also from here.

As mentioned - had a whole day to look around in the city and no plans :) Oleg&co took us around, we started from Eixample, walked down to old town and finished up by the sea. First stop was Sagrada Familia - greatest work of Gaudi, building of this Neo-Gothic church started year 1882 and it is not expected to finish before 2026. Passed by Arc de Triomf and walked through beautiful Parc de la Ciutadella. Arrived at Barri Gotic or the Gothic Quarter which is the oldest part of the city, Romans founded new 'colonia' or a town here during reign of Augustus (27 BC - AD 14). Enjoyed wonderful tapas in one tiny eating place with cava and wine. Next headed to El Born, walked down La Rambla - definitely the most famous street in whole Spain, it is a lively street full of newsstands, caged bird and flower stalls, musicians and mime artists. Good thing about being taken around with half locals is that they know all sorts of nice local eating places - chilled with a big bucket of sangria just a block from La Rambla. Final destination was Port Vell area, beautiful seaside complex. As you can imagine, this all meant loots of walking :)

Barcelona is wonderful - city made for people. Streets are wide, buildings are all about the same height, architecture is fabulous and everything just looks pretty. Houses at the intersections are chamfered to allow the buildings to overlook the squares or junctions. Oldest part of the city has very narrow streets, but majority of the streets are wide and city planning has quite rigid structure - streets are strictly parallel and form even squares, there are just few diagonals running through the city.

Evening was topped of with visiting absinth bar (yeah) and dinner + wine at the apartment. Yet another long day was put behind.

24.03 - Wednesday - Arrival

Flying in Europe is so quick and easy, 2+2 hours and boom you're there - very convenient. Haven't been really traveling only in Europe for many many years so makes you forget how it even works. Another major convenience is traveling with an ID-card :) I had never done that before either. I'm always going somewhere further away and passport is required. I don't think I have even gone to Finland with ID-card? Anyways, now I have - very easy and convenient.

Kaspar was already waiting for me at the airport as he arrived 2 hours before me. We quickly located bold convict looking Oleg as well :) and our journey began. Oleg lives in downtown and as we arrived just in time for the trainstation to close we ended up taking the night bus and then walking half way across Barcelona :) It was all good though, first sightseeing tour was on the way. Passed by Casa Batllo and Casa Mila - great works of Antoni Gaudi built around 1900 to 1910. He was the leader of Modernisme, a variant of Art Noveau that became means of expression for Catalan nationalism.

Once at the apartment I headed to sleep right away - it has been a long day with a whole day at the office + 2 flights and touring the city. Tomorrow we have a whole day for this wonderful place called Barcelona.

Long weekend in Spain coming up

On Wednesday I will be leaving to Spain for a long weekend, will be back late night on Monday. You ask what the plan is? The plans are grand once again. Just as a side note, there will be a time when I'm gonna go traveling and I can say "there are no plans, absolutely none" :) Someday this will be the case - promise I have made to myself :D

My route will be Barcelona-Valencia-Benidorm-Barcelona. There are 3 goals for this trip:
1) to visit my friend Oleg who moved to Barcelona about a year ago and now happily lives there
2) to celebrate Kaspar's birthday, he is living in Ireland for a year and is flying down to meet me in Spain
3) to say hi to couple of my students who are in a training camp in Benidorm
Quite grand huh :) ?

But so the plans-plans:
- leaving Tallinn on the evening of 24th and will arrive in Barcelona just before midnight, meeting Oleg and Kaspar at the airport and will camp over at Oleg's place
- spending a day in Barcelona on the 25th
- renting a car on the 26th and driving south during the day with all three of us + Oleg's flatmate, hopefully will make it to Valencia in the early evening. Celebrating Kaspar's birthday and staying in Valencia for the night.
- will head to Benidorm on Saturday, morning of 27th, and will stay there till Sunday evening
- driving back to Barcelona on the evening of 28th
- flying back to Tallinn on Monday afternoon, on the 29th and arriving a bit before midnight

Wish me/us luck :)

Ending the topic of Dubai

Got back from Dubai already two weeks ago and have forgotten to close the topic :) Getting back home was hundred times easier than getting there. Nap at the plane was much deserved, nice and peaceful. Spent the layover in Riga uploading photos and watching movies. Due to the time changes on the way there my notebook showed a bit incorrect time and I almost missed my flight to Tallinn. Oh well :)

Afterthoughts about Dubai - good place to go for a long weekend I'd say. There is not much to do besides shopping and few sights, other than that one gets bored there quickly. There is quite a bit of luxury there, but one needs to look for it, it isn't everywhere and sometimes it isn't even accessible. I've heard that there is not much local culture there - i'd have to say the opposite, but again, one must look for it. Dubai is a desert city, with few green areas and with looots of sand flying around :)

It was a great week, thank you Jaana and Dominique for showing and taking me around!

Now on to booking my accommodation and rentals during my trip to Spain in two weeks.