Europe 2006 - Florence to Barcelona

First stop was the Picasso museum; we were there at 10 when they opened. We started at the 'end' of the tour route and worked back which worked well as we had a decent chunk of the museum to ourselves for a bit. As opposed to the Modern Art Museum, this one had lots of very attentive guards, no pictures were allowed (the ones below were taken of postcards we purchased).

Then we walked east a few blocks to the Parc del la Ciutadella where was walked up a huge fountain with water spouting dragons. We sat and had some water and then headed back to the hotel to drop off the cameras. Next stop: shopping!

We wandered around the streets around the hotel. The streets were packed with people and there were hundreds of shops selling all kinds of crazy trendy clothing. We covered quite a bit of ground and walked into a number of stores, but didn't actually buy anything. At 2pm everything started to close for siesta, it was a sudden change, and seemed very strange.

We decided to use the downtime to hop on the Bus Turistica, an open top double decker bus that drives around the city. It was a nice vantage point for looking at the arhitecture of the buildings. We hopped off at the base of Tibidabo, a mountain at the north end of the city. We took a tram and then a funicular up to the top and were surprised to see a small amusement park there! It was a great view. On the way back we opted to take the metro most of the way back since it was faster.

We wandered around the gay part of the Eixample looking for some shopping. After getting lost for a bit (oops!) we found a quick bite to eat and then went into a number of stores. Rick even bought some pants and a shirt. Shopping in Barcelona is interesting; much of what we saw was really flashy and trendy. Seems to be the style.

We went back to the hotel for a quick nap, then had a great tapas dinner near the hotel around 11pm. It was really busy. Then we took a cab to the bar/club area of town and had a few drinks. We had intended to go to a club, but at 1:30am it was still empty (things apparently don't get going until 3 or 4), so we called it a night.