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“Looking upon Sagrada Familia one can definatly understand why it has been under construction since 1882.” |
Today we woke up early to a sunny day and hit the streets for some sightseeing. We planned to have an all-out Gaudi day, but after scanning over the admission prices, we thought we'd just hit the big one: la Sagrada Familia. Admission was €8, or €9 to get a combined admission to both the temple and the Gaudi Museum. Paying the extra euro is deffinatly worth it, as admission into the Museum later turned out to be €4.
Looking upon Sagrada Familia one can definatly understand why it has been under construction since 1882; and they say that it won't even be finished for at least another eighty years. Each inch of the place is carefully planned out and considered with meticulous detail. Even something as simple as a doorway was so intricate, truely a feast for the eyes. It's a shame that neither of us are likely to see it completed in our lifetime. To get to the top of the temple, you had to pay €2. We saw many people turn it down, either because of the price or the 45 minute wait, but they severly missed out. The view from the top will literally make you gasp.
We headed back down a 275 step spiral staircase, and understood why the elevator operator told the elderly woman infront of us she wasn't allowed up. There are no handrails, it's very steep, and too narrow for you to take a break as it would block the people behind you from decending. The stairway was so narrow infact that someone on the heavier side would probably not fit.
From the temple we then took the metro to the Gaudi Museum and Park. We have to admit, paying the extra one euro to go into the Gaudi Museum was almost not worth it, let alone paying the four euros without a combined ticket. It's two floors small, crowded, and contains little of interest other then a few doodles that Gaudi drew.
The free park outside was much more interesting. At the front there is an absolutley beautiful plant fountain, and the classic Gaudi benches were a treat. An interesting thing we noticed were the street vendors on the path. Some of them had their goods on a blanket with rope on each of the corners, and the ones who were selling jewlery had necklaces and earings clipped to umbrellas. This was confusing untill we realized their reasoning: selling things on the path is illegal. When the police patroling the area start heading their way, the vendors either grab all four corners of their blanket to lift up all their goods, tie it together and sling it over their shoulders. Then they run about 100 meters down the path and set up again untill the police come in sight again. In the case of the umbrella, they can just neatly fold it up and put it in a bag and then do the same. Very funny to watch, at any rate.
After the museum we headed over to Las Rambas, the main pedestrian shopping street, to go to the market. This market deffinatly put ours at home to shame. There are beautiful, colourful displays of fruit and vegtables at the front. As you wander into the back the air turns foul in the meat section, were we saw everything from gutted rabbits to sheep's heads. At the fruit stands they also had a large variety of fresh juices; Karin got a coconut one, and Christy selected kiwi. Originally, we were going to buy some food and prepare dinner back at the hostel. The process turned out to be too overwhealming, so instead we bought some fruit salad and some frozen chicken paella.
It started to get late so we headed back to the hostel and chatted with some of our fellow backpackers. That's what makes hosteling so unique and interesting. We were sad to hear that peoples reviews of Madrid are mostly thumbs down, because tomorrow we've booked a night train over there. We hope that it will be okay.
Christy has solved the problem about what to do when Karin goes to Poland, which is going back to the Netherlands for a week. The flights from Milan to Amsterdam, and then Amsterdam to Prague where we will meet back up again, turned out to be under 100 dollars total. This being the cheapest option thusfar, and wanting to see more of Holland, she took it eagerly. And so our whole trip has pretty much all been booked from here to Australia, which is good because hostels have been filling up fast.
Our next update will be from Madrid, so talk to you all then!
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