Spain

Hola! Welcome to Barcelona!

Actually, before we get to the city we can give a quick update on the voyage. The end of Croatia officially marked the spot where we would have disembarked for the last time on our last voyage. So we are into unmarked territory for the JL's. Not only have we gone to all the ports, it certainly looks like we are going to make it all the way to the end of this thing. Weird. 

Between Croatia and Spain we had a few days of sailing and Sea Olympics. Certainly fatigue was starting to set in. Semester at Sea is a blast, but you get really tired in the second half. Almost every day at sea is a school day and when you're in port, you are there for such a short amount of time, it's hard to take it easy. But we had made it to the second half of the voyage and we had lots to look forward to in this port. Wally's birthday, visiting friends from Fort Collins, a beautiful city, and great food!

We had so much fun on the food tour in Greece that we looked for another Day 1 tour that would get us oriented to the city. This time we picked a bike tour. Barcelona is know as very biker friendly and there are bike lanes in almost every part of the city.

 

Of course we picked a bike company that reminded us of home!

Guthrie got his own bike this time. Let's hope it goes better than the bike tour we took on our last voyage.

Barcelona is a beautiful city. I would say the architecture looked very colonial which would make sense because the Spanish tried to colonize most of the western world. 

 

The Spanish love beautiful art and buildings. 

In the middle of a park was a guy blowing tons of bubbles. Chasing and popping bubbles is ALMOST as fun as chasing pigeons. 

This place might have been Chris' dream come true. They made cookies, pizza, and cinnamon roles. That's it. Those three things. And they did it well. We enjoyed a raspberry cinnamon role for afternoon snack. 

Another bubble guy and more bubbles to pop.

The most known landmark in Barcelona is the Sagrada Familia, the unfinished masterpiece of architect

and designer, Gaudi. Gaudi is a famous modernist artist; his work contains elements from the natural

world. Even for the nonreligious the Sagrada Familia is unbelievably impressive. Everything about it

contains symbolism and meaning. 

On the outside, the church has two main faces. One features stories and people from the “Christmas story” (birth of Christ). The other side (which was designed after Gaudi’s death by a different artist) is the “passion” side featuring scenes from the crucifixion.

You can see the church from pretty much anywhere in Barcelona, and they haven’t even finished the tallest tower yet! The Sagrada Familia is actively under construction while thousands of tourists visit every day. The inside of the church was the real surprise – it is absolutely breathtaking. Enormous pillars fashioned like trees hold the whole thing up. Beautiful stained glass shines a rainbow of light

Every detail of this building is a work of art. We were all very impressed. It's the kind of place that brings tears to your eyes because it's just that beautiful. Construction is supposed to be done in the next 10 years or so and anyone in Spain should come take a look. 

In the evening we went to a Flamenco show. We have done so much walking in our ports that it was

refreshing and novel to sit down and take in a great performance. The Flamenco dancing was really

entertaining – it’s dramatic, and LOUD –it sounds like super complex tap dancing. What was most

surprising (at least to me as somebody that has no background in Flamenco) was the guitar and the

singing. Whew! The guitarists were amazing – with complex finger picking and the singing was almost

guttural.

Wally’s birthday was on March 24, our third day in port. We started celebrating with some presents and a decorated door on the ship. Then we headed to Park Guell, another famous landmark in Barcelona. Park Guell, like the Sagrada Familia, was designed by Gaudi, originally intended as the infrastructure for an “intact” community but is now a major tourist attraction in Barcelona. The park contains a lot of

interesting meandering paths, aqueducts, a big plaza with mosaic adorned benches, and some really

cool houses.

We invited several of the other ship families to join us for a scavenger hunt / escape room of the city. The puzzles were fun (which involved several interesting landmarks of the city). Most of all it was just fun to wander around outside in the sunshine with our friends. It also happened to be the exact same day as another ship kid's birthday. She was turning 9.

To Guthrie’s delight, the scavenger hunt ended in a plaza filled with thousands of pigeons. The kids chased, and chased, and chased. A few pigeons “fought back” including one that landed on Guthrie’s head. That night we hopped on a train.

Well, maybe one more Gaudi house before we get on the train...

The last two days of port in Spain we headed to Girona to visit our friends Dan, Kristen, Linnea, and

Freya. Rigley and Linnea have been classmates at Polaris since Kindergarten, so we have known them for a long time. For several years, they have shared with us their dream to move to Spain. It was very cool to get to visit them as they are actualizing their dream.

Girona is a sweet little town of about 100K people. Similar to some of the places we visited in Croatia, it’s a walled city (Like Dubrovnik, it is also a filming site for Game of Thrones). We met Dan, Kristen, and the kids in “la rambla” (the shopping area of Girona) and “walked the walls” of the city while we caught up.

They told us all about the kids’ school (they are learning in two languages—Spanish and Catalan), work, their travels, the history of their town, and so much more. Having worked up an appetite, we went to a great tapas lunch restaurant where everything was served buffet style and you took what you wanted from the buffet (they charge by toothpick – so cool!). We were treated to some amazing flavors – savory, sweet, and in ABUNDANCE 😊. 

One of the things Dan and Kristen love the most about living in Spain is permission (and even the expectation) for leisurely lunches to enjoy great food, great drink, and great company. After lunch we walked around through a nearby park before separating for a proper siesta (and the teenage girls could wander around together sans adult meddling). 

At night we opted to leave all five of the kids at our Airbnb in front of screens so we could go out as adults sans distraction. The restaurant OPENED at 9pm so both Chris and I had to pound caffeine in the afternoon to ensure that we’d be awake😊. 

Once again we hit an amazing restaurant and spent 4.5 hours together talking about everything under the sun. Such an amazing reunion! 

Hanging with Kristen and Dan is always pure joy. And we really admire how they have made a bold choice on how and where to live.

Meanwhile, back on the ship it was time for one last bday celebration for Wally and his birthday buddy. Their personalities are captured below.

Spain was amazing and like everywhere else, we just scratched the surface. What we saw was a dedication to art and a slower paced life full of good food and spending time with people. Two big things we are already pretty aligned with. 

Our next port is Morocco. All of us have been looking forward to this one as we’ll be meeting Chris’s

bestie, “funny Mark” for some traveling together. We also can’t wait to revisit some of our favorite places from 20+ years ago when Chris and I traveled there from The Gambia. Onward!