Rambling in Las Rambla!

The first of many pointy cathedrals

Finally!  I’m eating some decent tapas!  Its my third evening here in Barcelona and I’ve been woefully underwhelmed so far by the dining choices I’ve made, so finally I seem to have got it right!  I’m in a little gastropub tapas place, an easy 5-10min walk from my hotel and Yelp assured me that this one would be a winner.  Well, dear blog watcher, I can assure you that the crispy crunch and then softness of the spicy potatoes with its smoky creamy aoili, plus the meaty tang of Catalan sausage on white bean puree is absolutely hitting the mark and restoring my faith in little plates of yummy goodness. 

But first, I guess, back to the beginning.  I’m in Barcelona for a week for work– I arrived on Saturday late afternoon (its now Tuesday evening) and was straight into work into my conference on Sunday.  There’s a lovely 6hr time difference between Chicago and Barcelona, which is making getting up in the morning for 7am symposia particularly special.  Now, I know, I know – I haven’t been around for a while – I can assure you I have a very good reason for my absence (and I'll look forward to introducing you to him later) but I’ve finally been instructed by the lovely Ashley to get my arse in gear, STAT, and write a new blog post because if he has to look at the picture of the polar bear swimsuit photo shoot one more bloody time…..well, you get the drift!

So, then – here I am, in Spain and I’ll share with you my trip so far.  We’ve got some catching up to do though as, since my last post, I’ve also been to London, China, New York, Nashville, Vermont, Washington DC, and Boston (no wonder I’m feeling a bit knackered!).  Now, some of those trips were less exciting as they were for work, but I should definitely give you the skinny on Nashville and Vermont as they were off-the-charts fun.  Also, most of August was taken up with another Very Special Event – the descent of the Holloway Clan who came, saw and absolutely kicked Chicago ass big-time!  So, all in all, its been an absolutely spectacular summer – probably the best one I’ve ever had!

But, for now, back to Barcelona – to be fair, I haven’t really had much chance to do much or look around as I’ve been mainly working since I got here.  But I did take the chance of a few hours downtime in my schedule this afternoon to go have a wander round Las Ramblas, the maze of shops and restaurants that threads through the center of the city and the Central Market that's considered a “must-do”.   I’m staying at a fairly nice place which seems to be a 10min cab ride from just about anywhere, so it’s been easy to get about.  The cabs are plentiful and easy to hail (think NYC rather than SF!) so no worries there.

My hotel is in the Plaza Espana part of town, directly opposite a stunning fountain, and a few steps away from the contemporary art museum (I think).   It was all lit up on Sunday night and was a spectacular sight from the hotel’s rooftop terrace.  Also next to the hotel is this enormous shopping complex called Las Arenas which used to be an old bull-fighting stadium.  After bull-fighting was banned in Catalonia in September 2011, it's been converted into a huge mall, IMAX theater, restaurants and the like, so that was fun to have a quick troll round and get my first fix of Iberico ham! (and yes, I've heard the recent press that's its now been confirmed that processed meats give you cancer - but, hey! we've all got to go from something, right?).  I popped in first at Sunday lunchtime, looking to get some food before heading off to my congress and I was amazed to see the vast majority of the shops were actually closed.  I guess that as most of the Catalan population are Catholic, I probably shouldn’t have been surprised!

Anyway, the hotel is fine – with the exception of one minor grumble.  I had to finally give in and wash my hair today (this is quite some undertaking and one I usually pay a well-armed, highly skilled professional to do on my behalf) as it was ridiculously out-of-control, even when fully Bunned-Up.  I was starting to look like Doc from Back to The Future.  

There were two slight problems with this. 

The first being that - yet again- I’d forgotten to pack a hairbrush into my meticulously-packed I’m An Awesome World Traveler Because I’m Away For A Whole Week but Still Only Have Hand Luggage hand luggage.   When I’ve just had a blow-dry and its all sleek and bouncy (steady), its not a problem.  A simple pat down and smoothing with serum, and Bob's Your Uncle.  However, this was not one of those times.  It is probably telling that I only discovered lack of said accessory, 3 days into my trip, standing in the shower with dripping wet hair, but what can I say?  I’m not perfect. 

The second problem I only discovered after I had already committed to washing my hair, using the really terrible hotel shampoo whose sole purpose seemed to be to try and suck the life and soul (and any residual moisture) out of your hair, rather than to clean it.  Why do they give you shampoo that’s patently the same stuff as the bath gel?  I know I’m supremely jet-lagged, but come on – you think we Seasoned World Travelers don’t notice these things?  Ah well, I thought, as I reached for the conditioner after my bargain basement shampoo – I’ll slather this on and this will transform my hair from a head of straw back to beautiful silken tresses.

Umm.  Well, no.  Not quite.

It was at that point that I actually read the description of what was in the little clear rectangular bottle that had been nestled up against the shampoo in its fancy-pants presentation basket in the bathroom. And why would anyone expend precious energy doing a detailed inventory of all the hotel-supplied bathroom products?  Of course its the creamy, life-giving hair conditioner that any sane individual would assume it to be, right?  Riiiiight?

Nope. 

It was body lotion. 

Oh great.  So I’ve already got a head full of hair to rival Medusa that either is going to be combed out with my inept fingers into only slightly smaller chunks of tangle or tackled with the saddest plastic comb from the bathroom amenities kit you’ve ever seen.  Neither particularly thrilling choices.  And now – instead of combing out cooperatively silky soft waves, I will be dragging either my fingers or tragic plastic through hair that seemed to have doubled in both volume and thickness and was as coarse as a badger's arse.

Sod it.

It went on anyway.

So one of the unexpected things I’ve now learned during my trip to Barcelona is that body lotion is a surprisingly poor substitute for hair conditioner.  It does absolutely feck-all good.  Felt like straw when it went on.  Still felt like straw when it came off.  Ah well.  At least I’ve spent the day smelling lovely from top to toe while looking like a complete dog’s breakfast.

That was a lot of excitement to be had before midday, so I decided I’d earned my afternoon off and that’s when I headed out to Las Ramblas and downtown, for lunch and some souvenir shopping. 

Top of the list? 

Conditioner and a hair brush.

The banjo is alive and well in Barcelona!

Getting happily lost in Las Ramblas 

Umm...weird.

I love me a shop that loves a good pun.  No
prizes for guess what type of restaurant this was!

I can see Paradise by the overhead light.

Feeeesch peeeneeeeeeccccc! (Mumsie)

Evil bastard sea urchins.  Disgusting to eat, even
more evil fuckers to tread on.

Why, are they for me?  Gosh... you shouldn't
have...really.

Jammin' jamon!  Cancer be damned.

That's quite a claim.
I decided not to test it out.

Waiter in my lunchtime restaurant trying to find
the fish that he just knows is there somewhere....

The Spanish don't eff about with their coffee.  This
one was so strong the spoon was quite literally
standing up.  My jetlag deeply appreciated it.

Unfortunately the coffee was the best thing about my poorly
chosen lunch place.

Deeply unsatisfying tapas.  Included the Jenny special.

Random beautiful old building.  

And everywhere you turned there were little side
streets that led to...

....beautiful courtyards and plazas

Alas, though, there were no d.mags in sight....

Wow.  Galileo really WAS ahead of his time.
I wonder if his phone is a Galaxy?

Port of Barcelona

Rozzers in the front; street sellers of dodgy goods
in the back.  

I looked everywhere for one of these lucky
fortune cats in China - and could i find one?  No!

Finally!  Decent tapas!  Yummy patatas.

Catalan sausage tapas.  Equally as delicious.

The former bull-ring turned shopping center just across from
the hotel

My hotel.
Swanky rooftop bar.  Terrible bathroom products.