Brandan's parents are serving a 23 month mission in Barcelona, Spain. They are photographing government records for family history research and Martha also serves as the mission nurse. Our family visited them for a few days after Christmas and they showed us a bit of Barcelona and a few nearby sites.
During the week, Dan and Martha travel to surrounding towns to photograph archives. Family Search arranges their schedule of places to go. They keep an apartment in Mataro, a small town about 45 minutes from Barcelona and are usually there on the weekends. The archives were closed for the holidays which meant we could spend our whole visit together. Their apartment is located a 10 minute walk from the Mediterranean Sea.
The water was a bit chilly, but not as cold as the Pacific Ocean off the Oregon coast.
We found lots and lots of sea glass, more than we've ever seen on a beach before.
We love the different shades of glass.
Mataro is home to the first building Gaudi built: a warehouse for a textile factory. There's a lot more Gaudi ahead in this post.
Helen turned 15 on Sunday! Martha helped us make a red velvet cake to celebrate. Abe is napping behind her in this photo. Jet lag was a constant struggle.
We started sightseeing early Monday morning.
We didn't have time to see everything so we prioritized a few sites. Before we came, we read about the architect, Antoni Gaudi. His projects, constructed in a highly original style, have become the most recognizable landmarks in Barcelona. We started at Park Guell, built up above the city. This lizard sculpture is the informal mascot of Barcelona.
The ramps and stairways in the park were irregularly shaped.
Park Guell was named for Gaudi's wealthy patron, Eusebi Guell. Guell and Gaudi had a vision of building an exclusive neighborhood above the city of Barcelona with the houses, walkways and shared spaces designed by Gaudi. In the end, they only sold 2 of the 60 lots, one for Guell and one for Gaudi. This charming pink creation is Gaudi's house. The two men were neighbors until Guell's death in 1918. His heirs offered the land to the city of Barcelona who turned the site into a public park.
This is one of the gatehouses for the development. It looks like a gingerbread house.
There was a wish tree in the plaza next to the gatehouse. Visitors from around the world wrote wishes for 2020 and added them to the tree.
We made wishes of our own.
Next we went to La Boqueria, a famous market in the old part of Barcelona, for lunch. A market has existed on this location since 1217.
The market had many stalls selling fresh produce, meat. . .
. . .and sweets!
We tried jambon Iberica, Spain's famous cured ham. At $80 a pound, it's the most expensive ham in the world. However, a paper cone full only costs a couple of dollars.
We had to hurry at the market in order to make it to our next stop, La Sagrada Familia. This cathedral, Gaudi's masterpiece, is dedicated to the Holy Family. It is still under construction and will eventually have a giant spire in the center. In the meantime, the twelve spires representing the twelve apostles are Barcelona's most famous landmark.
From a distance, the stonework looks blobby. Up close, you can see the cathedral is actually covered in intricate sculptures. Gaudi was inspired by nature and tried to make his buildings seem organic like plants. He was also deeply religious and the cathedral is filled with Christian symbolism. We entered the cathedral through the nativity facade, dedicated to Jesus' birth. You can see Jesus, Mary and Joseph (the Holy Family) directly over the doors. Angels surround them and the star of Bethlehem is overhead.
The pillars at the front door are supported by carvings of turtles. Gaudi placed a sea turtle on the side of the door closest to the sea. . .
. . .and a tortoise on the side closest to the mountains.
After the exuberance (gaudiness?) of the exterior, the interior of the cathedral took our breath away. Gaudi wanted the cathedral to feel like a forest, with pillars shaped like trees and light filtering through stained glass windows.
We planned our visit for late afternoon and the setting sun poured through the windows on the west.
The interior looked like a kaleidoscope.
We lingered in the beautiful light.
We exited through the passion facade which commemorates the death of Christ. A third side, currently under construction, is called the glory facade and represents the resurrected, eternal Christ.
Gaudi died in 1926 and only saw the completion of the nativity facade. He knew other artists would alter his designs and felt that would make his cathedral richer and more inclusive. The passion facade is simpler than the nativity facade. This is a carving of Judas betraying Jesus with a kiss. The magic square in the photo represents Jesus's death. The cathedral is on schedule to be completed in 2026, 100 years after Gaudi's death. Visiting the cathedral was a highlight of our visit.
We returned to the old part of Barcelona for some shopping and gelato. The gelato display was impressive!
We tried chocolate orange, mango, vanilla, cookie dough and raspberry and all were delicious.
We loved the Christmas lights we saw everywhere we went.
Spain loves nativity displays. Becky's favorite was in a pharmacy window. The designer used a variety of dried flowers to create a realistic scene. We saw nativities in shops, cafeterias, city squares, churches and apartment buildings.
On Tuesday morning, Brandan, Becky and Sofi slipped out to the sister missionaries favorite bakery in Mataro to try their favorite pastry: dark and white chocolate Napolitanos. Delicious!
Our first tourist stop of the day was Gaudi's crypt in a small town called Colonia Guell. As you might guess from the name, the town was owned by Gaudi's patron. Guell asked Gaudi to build a church for the town. Only the crypt, or basement, was ever built.
Inside the crypt, it's hard to find a straight line or a regular curve. When work stopped on the church, the crypt was dedicated and it is used as a church. No one knows why work stopped. It could be because Sagrada Familia took all of Gaudi's time or because Guell died and no one else was interested in paying for Gaudi's unusual work.
The top of this photo shows how the church would have looked. The bottom of the photo shows the model Gaudi used to build the church. We saw photos of this model before our trip and the model did not seem like it would be helpful at all.
A museum near the crypt recreated Gaudi's model with chains and now it makes sense. Gaudi would use strings and sandbags to create the arches he wanted for his design. He could alter the weight in the sandbag to change the curve in the arch and visualize how the final building would look. In this model, the chains representing the crypt are black and the chains for the unbuilt portion are silver. Gaudi would then take a photo of the model and turn the photo upside down to visualize the building.
The museum recreated the effect by putting large mirror underneath the model so we could see the shape of the church. Ingenious and a little crazy at the same time! One of Gaudi's professors said that Gaudi was either a genius or a madman. After experiencing his creations, we're inclined to say genius. His spaces are vibrant, inspiring and magical.
Next we stopped at the stadium of FC Barcelona, home to the most famous sports team in the world. Founded in 1899, they have consistently been one of the best soccer teams, winning scores of tournaments and trophies.
The stadium seats 99,354 people. It's the largest stadium in Europe, with plans to increase to 105,000 seats.
Barcelona wasn't playing a game while we were in town, but we got to try out VR glasses to imagine what a game would be like.
The team gets to sit on these comfortable seats during games.
The carefully manicured field is a mixture of grass and artificial turf.
These are the press seats with a great view of the field. The white contraption on the field is full of lights to help the grass grow.
The area around the stadium is a little like a theme park, with lots of attractions. Abe tried to score on an robotic goalie, but the goalie was very quick and blocked his shot.
This fence is decorated with FC Barcelona's crest.
And we love this bus painted with Barca's colors.
Between jet lag, poor sleep and long days sightseeing, half of our family fell asleep long before midnight on New Year's Eve. By 11 pm, only Gibson, Sofi, Abe and Becky were awake. Abe suddenly said he wanted to jump into the Mediterranean Sea at midnight. Gibson didn't want to go, but the rest of us walked to the beach. Abe jumped in and Sofi walked in to ring in the new year.
Abe and Sofi walked back to the apartment barefoot. We didn't see many people, but we could hear fireworks and people banging on pots. Sofi played Ed Sheeran's song, "Barcelona" on her phone as we walked home.
Martha bought cans of grapes to share a Spanish tradition with us. Spaniards try to eat one grape with each stroke of midnight, twelve in all.
Wednesday was New Year's Day. We took a short drive into the mountains, first stopping in Cardona. This is the town where Dan and Martha are currently photographing records. It's a medieval town, although the salt mountain near the town has been used for salt since 10,000 BC.
Built on top of a mountain, the streets are narrow and steep.
Gibson could almost touch both sides of the street in this alleyway.
This Christmas tree stood outside the town church, originally built in the 1000s and then rebuilt in the 1300s.
The yellow ribbons tied to the trees in this photo are a sign of Catalonian independence. The northern region of Spain is called Catalonia and Barcelona is the capital. It has its own language and history and was largely independent until the Spanish Civil War and General Franco. Catalonia voted for independence in 2017, but Spain's constitutional court declared the referendum illegal. We saw support for independence everywhere we went through ribbons, flags, posters and spray painted slogans.
The tip top of the mountain is dominated by the Castle of Cardona. It was originally built in 886 to defend the salt mines. The dukes of Cardona became as wealthy and powerful as kings by controlling salt, a very valuable commodity in a time before refrigeration. The castle has a long and distinguished history. It was undefeated when Muslims invaded Catalonia in the 800s. It was the last castle to fall when the French Bourbons invaded Spain in the 18th century and was last used as a fortress and garrison during the Spanish Civil War which ended in 1939.
Today it is open to the public and fun to explore.
These tiny guard towers are called bastions.
Seven bastions are built on the outer castle wall and they perch precariously over the valley. The oldest bastion was built in the 1600s.
This is the view of the town of Cardona from the top of the castle tower which is about 30 feet taller than the surrounding castle. It used to be twice as tall, but the height was reduced to make a less visible target for artillery. The salt mine is the flat terracing on the far left of the photo.
We left Cardona and drove to Montserrat, which means serrated mountain.
The peaks of Montserrat are made of limestone and are softer than the surrounding rocks. Wind and water has carved the peaks into interesting shapes. Besides having an interesting geological history, Montserrat is known for being the home of the Black Madonna. A statue depicting Mary was found in a cave by shepherds in 880. The wooden statue was already black from age when the shepherds found it. They assumed someone hid the statue to protect it when the Muslims invaded. Legend says she was carved in Jerusalem in the earliest days of Christianity (some people say the current statue only dates to the 1200s and replaced the older statue.) Instead of moving the statue, Benedictine monks built a monastery around it and it has been a site for pilgrims ever since. Besides the Black Madonna, the church at the monastery contains many other works of art.
Making a pilgrimage to the Shrine of the Black Madonna would have been an undertaking in medieval times, but it was just a short drive for us. You can even take a train, called a funicular, to the top of the mountain if you don't want to walk.
We saw an olive tree in the courtyard outside the monastery. This felt appropriate since Spain is the largest producer of olive oil in the world.
Back at the apartment, we ate dinner and packed for our trip home. We had a few postcards to mail so Brandan, Becky, Sofi and Abe took one last walk in Mataro to find a postal drop box. The plaza was well lit with Christmas lights and a small cafe was open, even though it was 9:30 pm on New Year's Day. We stopped and ordered hot chocolate, which was really warm chocolate pudding. It was a delightful way to say goodbye to Barcelona. Three cheers to Dan and Martha for taking good care of us and sharing some of the beautiful area where they are serving!
We arrived home late Thursday night and now are battling jet lag. It's pretty funny to come downstairs at 5 in the morning and find out the kids have already been awake for hours. We celebrated Brandan's birthday on Saturday. Between jet lag and catching up on work and church responsibilities, it was a long day for him, but we still squeezed in a birthday dinner and birthday cake.
Here is Brandan's birthday problem for 2020:
How old is Brandan? Grandpa Dan is 3 times as old as Brandan was when Grandpa Dan was as old as Brandan is now. In 24 years, Brandan will be twice as old as Grandpa Dan was when Brandan was half as old as Grandpa Dan is now.
(This math problem is only true for the next two weeks until Grandpa Dan has his birthday.)
