The Sights of Barcelona

I can’t do a full travelogue of our recent trip to Barcelona, but I can do a few quick posts on the highlights of the trip. First, what stood about out seeing Barcelona.

Catalan flag

What you don’t see much of in Barcelona is the Spanish flag. Because Barcelonians seem to consider themselves Catalans first, you mostly see variants of the Catalan flag, such as: La Senyera (yellow & red stripes) which is the official flag of the region, La Estelada Blava (the same red & yellow stripes but also featuring a blue triangle containing a white star), and is the flag symbolizing the separatist movement in Catalonia, and La Estelada Vermella (the same red & yellow stripes but also featuring a yellow triangle containing a red star), and is a flag advocating for independence but also for a socialist form of government. There are still a half dozen additional Catalan flags that are much less prevalent. It’s nice how the Catalans display their politics so clearly. Makes it much easier to know who to avoid during, say, a brutally disappointing election.

Graffiti

The gothic quarter of Barcelona is basically a maze of twisty little passages, all alike (IYKYK). Store fronts and entryways to mysterious courtyards are locked up at night and often the doors are covered with graffiti and street art, making it a very interesting place to wander through even when everything is shut down.

Birds

I wanted to head out to a migratory bird sanctuary, but the extensive and horrifying flooding in Valencia probably extended to the most desirable birding areas as well so we stuck to Barcelona except for one side trip up into the mountains of Montserrat (more on this later). I did, however, do my best to spot birds in the city. Pigeons were the most populous (of course), and parakeets the most surprising. But we did spot a few other little gems.

Outside the City at Montserrat

On our only day trip out of Barcelona, our group of 6 hired a lovely driver named Jordi to take us to Montserrat and tour us around. Jordi is named after Sant Jordi (Saint George), the patron saint of Catalonia and as a result he gets special perks on the Diada de Sant Jordi (the Catalan equivalent of Valentine’s day) including free admission to some of the city’s most popular locations. He was a wonderful guide, and we learned a ton about the history of the monastery, including a charming legend about how a ray of light from heaven pointed the way to a hidden cave, within which was found the famous “Black Madonna”, a wooden sculpture of the virgin Mary that now sits above the alter of the basilica. In the early 1800s, when Napoleon arrived to ruin everything and kill everyone, the Black Madonna was hidden in one of the many caves in the surrounding mountains and was saved from his destructive campaign. She has apparently been successfully hidden from warring rampages multiple times.

After touring the basilica and completing our history lesson, we rode the funicular up to the top of the mountain and walked back down what is effectively a road to allow passage of construction and supply vehicles. Not a strenuous hike, in other words.