The Fetmans Take Barcelona Day 2: Food, Glorious Fooooood/LAST FULL DAY IN SPAIN

Yes, I know, I've been terrible about updating lately. I cannot believe that it's almost August, I'm home, and I still haven't completed my Spain blog. However, I'm in the homestretch. I'm just not motivated anymore since coming back home. Well, I'm making baby steps, and I'll finish it soon. I promise. So here's my post about my last full day in Spain...


Friday, June 23

I couldn’t believe my Spanish days were coming to a close so soon. Friday would be my last full day in Spain. I just could not believe it. We woke up, got ready, headed out for a bite to eat on another hot Barcelona morning. We walked down las Ramblas. We stopped at Starbucks for a quick pick-me-up (as much as I hate on Starbucks, I’ll miss the Spanish Starbucks…particularly for their fresh-squeezed orange juice). We got food at a tapas place where we feasted on some yummy Spanish tortilla and such. After brunch we planned on going to the Picasso museum…the main attraction for me that I’d been dying to see since my favorite UM professor told me about it. I figured it was close by according to my map, so we walked. The travel books told us that las Ramblas was worth exploring…we had no idea how worth it it actually was until that afternoon! We saw dozens and dozens of street performers (all of which were quite entertaining and very creative), kiosks of all sorts, and cafes. The best part was the abundance of pet kiosks. Yes, pet kiosks…in fact, there were at least two on every block. They held pets of all sorts: fish, birds, and rodents. The cutest pets were the miniature hamsters. The weirdest were the ducks, turkeys, pigeons, and doves. I mean, who wants a pet pigeon?? Kind of sad, nonetheless. The absolute strangest thing was the chipmunks. I’ve never seen chipmunks caged! Little do I forget that chipmunks don’t really run wild over on the Iberian Peninsula like they do back in the U.S. So strange. We looked at all of the pets, kiosks, and street performers for awhile. I mean, we spent a looooong time on las Ramblas that afternoon. Then we stumbled upon the market…the main Barcelona market. I had read about it back at the hotel and didn’t plan on checking it out, but just our luck, there it was. Again, that’s what I loved about Barcelona: there was so much to do and somehow we were able to do it all inadvertently. The market turned out to be one of the highlights from Barcelona. It’s huuuuuge! Full of so many awesome, colorful stands selling anything from food to pharmaceuticals (but mostly food). Stands of fruit, vegetables, fish, shellfish, ham, white meat, red meat, eggs, there was even an organic food stand, and a stand that just sold bananas, and one that just sold candied and dried fruit. So crazy! I saw so many gutted animals, such as turkeys, chickens, rabbits…oy. There were live shellfish crawling around, and even tripes! Ugh, tripes. This market literally had everything. We bought fruit there (it was so cheap, and good) and some dried fruit and chocolate nuts (which ended up melting in the heat right away…oh well). This market was inexplicable. It was so visually appealing, it was like a museum in and of its own. You’ll just have to check out the pictures when I post them. We spent about an hour or two in the phenomenal market and then headed the rest of the way down las Ramblas. We stopped at some artisan stands, watched some more performers, and looked at more pet kiosks.
We finally got to the main walkway along the Mediterranean which would lead us to the Picasso Museum. It was so hot and sunny it was nuts. But it was a good walk, nonetheless. We inadvertently found the famous original Warhol sculpture on the way. That was really exciting! I love Barcelona and its many surprises. Yeah, that is what I love about Barcelona: there’s so much to see and look at. It’s definitely one of the most visually appealing metropolises that I’ve ever visited. It’s like a Chicago…but a bit better because, well, it’s Spain…and instead of a lake they got the Mediterranean. So yeah, Barcelona wins. It took us an hour to finally find the Picasso Museum. I was nervous about getting lost so we kind of took a roundabout route. Oh well, we got there. The museum was in a neo-gothic building. We entered, and wandered. The museum was smaller than I had expected, and not very impressive. In fact, the Picasso Museum in Málaga was much better. This museum mostly held his earlier work (which isn’t that interesting) and a lot of his later work (even less interesting than his early stuff). All of Picasso’s really amazing pieces are in the major museums (Reina Sofía in Madrid, Art Institute, MOMA, etc.). So it was a tad disappointing, which was sad due to my immense love of Picasso and my desire to go to the museum so badly (one of my main reasons for wanting to go to Barcelona). The best part, however, was the Picasso variations of Velázquez’s Las Meninas. Cindy Sowers, my favorite UM professor, told me before going to Spain to go to Barcelona and see the variations. She’s the professor who introduced me to the true wonders of cubism and the avant-garde (she’s a Picasso scholar) and told me that those variations are her favorite Picasso works. Interesting. I really liked them and found them fascinating, but not nearly as fascinating as his other works from earlier in his life. Oh well. Picasso, I still love ya.
After about an hour or so in the museum our feet were killing us, but we kept on truckin’. On the way back we cashed some traveler’s checks and passed by the Gothic district. That was on our list of places to visit for sure but still hadn’t gotten there (due to sore feet we thought that we’d check it out the next day). But lo and behold, there it was. We didn’t necessarily go in, but we got some pictures from the outside; we were just way too tired to walk around it. Funny, we never returned to the Gothic District—very funny since it was at the top of our list to things to do, and we ended up doing things that weren’t originally on our list. I was happy with the way that our Barcelona vacation worked out, though. Nice and spontaneous.
We walked back to the hotel for a quick rest, then headed back out (despite our aching feet…the whole trip was starting to catch up with us) to go to the Gaudí apartment building, La Pedrera, before it closed. We walked the 15 minutes to get there and headed up. We started on one floor which was very similar to the skydeck of the John Hancock Building (you know, modern, museum-ish, history, etc.). So that was nothing worth mentioning. Then we took an elevator up to the famous roof. It was so cool! Rolling meadow-like walkways dipping and curving around every Gaudí-esque corner. Lots of sculptures and moldings that are extremely difficult to describe without having an image. Don’t worry, I’ll post pictures soon enough. But yeah, so unique. I freaking love Gaudí. He’s definitely my favorite architect. Hands down. From the top we got a fantastic aerial view of the city. It was perfect. And a gorgeous evening. After spending a good amount of time on the roof we went down to see an interior of an apartment. The apartment was more like a penthouse. It was set-up in a museum sort of way to look like how it would have appeared back during the turn of the 20th century. Really neat. The apartment was effing huge, I couldn’t believe it. It would have been amazing to live there. Despite the modernist quality of the building itself, the interior of the apartment was very normal. Ya know, some of the furniture was Gaudí modernist-inspired, but besides that, it was just normal. Nevertheless, fascinating. At around 8:15 we headed down and left to go out to dinner.
For dinner I wanted to take the family out for tapas typical of the northernmost provinces of Spain. I had read all about these kinds of tapas: they’re served at the bar on toothpicks, you pick out what you want, save the toothpicks, and pay by how many toothpicks you have accumulated. I really wanted to give this a try. I read about a northern tapas restaurant in the book in the hotel, and we headed over. It wasn’t too far of a walk. We got there at around 8:45 and the place was pretty much empty. But on the bar sat an enormously long line of platters with breads and meats and fish all on toothpicks. They looked like hors d’oeveurs one would eat at a fancy cocktail party. I was a bit baffled by the system, so I talked to the really nice, attentive waiter and he explained it. He offered to give us a sample platter, but we decided that it’d be easier to just serve ourselves and eat at a table. He looked pretty baffled. Later a group of people came in and drank at the bar and munched on some of the tapas. I later learned that this must have been a local place, and that the whole concept is you sit, have a drink, and munch on the tapas as you are mingling and drinking. I see. So our eating just tapas at a table must have come off as pretty strange. I mean, as we were eating he kept offering to give us a menu to order entrees. We just thought that it was like a buffet, I mean, all we wanted were the tapas! Yeah, it was pretty confusing. But anyways, the tapas were AMAZING. I kid you not, THIS was the best tapas…the best Spanish food that I had eaten. Hands down. Northern Spanish cuisine is fresher (not all of it is fried like down south) and they use more veggies and fresh ingredients. We all ate so much. All different toasted breads with hams, fish spreads, cheeses, croquetas of all sorts, fried vegetables, etc. It was kind of like going to sushi buffet…but better. Oh man, I still crave it. Best Spanish food EVER. Barcelona, you win. Our waiter was so attentive that we all felt a bit guilty that we were only eating tapas. He kept insisting that we order something off the menu. He suggested their homemade leche frita (fried milk) off of the menu—that it’s one of their few homemade desserts. A few weeks earlier I was discussing Spanish cuisine with María del Mar and Maruja and they suggested that before I leave Spain I try leche frita. That it’s delicious. So we figured why not. Even though we weren’t really wanting dessert from their, we felt guilty. And I wanted to try leche frita. So we only ordered one for all of us to split (which also baffled him…we were being such Americans, hehe). The leche frita was good, like a thick custard or flan. Not bad, but nothing too special. Creamy, thick, cinnamony, but not too sweet. A good little treat. We then paid (we had sooooo many toothpicks, yet it wasn’t too expensive thankfully), and headed out. Shana had been wanting to try this chocolate porcupine thing that we had seen in many bakery windows (it’s a chocolate cake shaped like a porcupine). We couldn’t find one on the way home, but stumbled upon this awesome dessert café. It was decorated really nicely, very modern. We had a waiter that spoke really good English, which gave me a break from speaking constantly for the family (it’s exhausting!). We sat at a nice little table under nice lighting with nice décor (they had a chandelier made of wire whisks!). Shana got a chocolate raspberry cake and milk, I got a chocolate mango cake, and Daddy got some cheesecake-ish pudding cup thing with strawberries. Shana’s and my cakes were alright, but Daddy’s pudding thing was AWESOME. Yeah, his dessert won. He even said that it was one of the best desserts that he had ever had…and Daddy’s a tough food critic! Barcelona, you were definitely winning.
After those amazing culinary experiences we walked back to the hotel which wasn’t too far away. We were all in very good spirits. It was a great day. A great last full day in Spain. The next day would be it…I would be leaving Spain for good the next evening and couldn’t believe it. Nevertheless, I had an amazing last full day and couldn’t have asked for better…and we still had much to do the next day. Once back at the hotel I blogged a bit, watched some more music video countdowns, then passed out. My body was exhausted. All of these months of constant walking were finally beginning to catch up with me. Last night sleeping in Spain. There is one coincidence about my last night in Spain: I watched "South Park" on the German channel. I watched "South Park" in German at a four-star hotel. I also did that my very first night in Spain, back in the Becquer. Yup, if you recall, I watched "South Park" in German at the Becquer, a four-star hotel, my very first night in Spain. Did the same my last night. How funny. Not intentional at all. Anyways, very strange that this would be my final night in Spain...my third home. Sigh.