I know this will shock you but it turns out that our teen children no longer want to have all of us in one "cozy" room when we travel. This is understandable because among us, we have a combination of people who do the following during the night: snore, thwack others in the head, refuse to wear pajamas, knee others in the kidneys, hog the middle of the bed, steal the covers, yell loudly while dreaming, rattle Tums bottles, and one who wakes up immediately at the slightest snore, thwack, territory encroachment, knee, rattle or yell.
To foster a harmonious vacation, I therefore booked us a small apartment in Barcelona so we could have a little breathing (and sleeping) space. We stayed at the delightful Casa de Las Lettres and couldn't have been happier. It's a boutique apartment hotel with a literary theme -- all the apartments are unique and are named after writers with a connection to Barcelona. We stayed in the Josep Pla, a two story apartment named after a Catalonian writer who I am embarrassed to admit I had never heard of before. If you are similarly uninformed, you might enjoy this article about him that contains some great excerpts of his writing. http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2014/03/24/a-vitreous-vault/. He has a knack for description that any blogger would envy.
The apartment was a chic oasis of calm after our long flight and forced morning tour of the Ramblas. Note the girl who has already collapsed onto the couch.
Also a boy who does not like to have his photo taken.
Here is the view from the window. Can you believe that spectacular building is the telephone company?
To adjust to Barcelona time, we tried to stay awake as much as we could during the day. You may recall our questionable success with this strategy when we went to London. This time, after some naps, most of us got up to grab dinner and a quick walk around the neighborhood. Conveniently, our hotel had a small cafe on the ground level with a lovely outdoor section on the plaza outside. The tapas were excellent.
See that glass of Sangria? While I don't necessarily recommend a giant glass of wine when jet lagged and trying to pretend that you are not tired (per Gary's Theory of Fatigue Denial), it certainly worked wonders for me.
After dinner, a little stroll around the neighborhood. We were quite near the barceloneta -- the waterfront/beach area.
This Roy Lichtenstein statute is one of the many pieces of evidence in the case that Barcelona is one of the hippest cities on earth.
Finally ready to pack it in for our first day in Barcelona, we returned to our apartment to find that one of our party had already beaten us to it . . .
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