Disembarked on the morning of May 8. Windstar was a wonderful cruise line – service, excursions and food all great. We’ll sail with them again.
We’d been to Barcelona a couple of times after other cruises in the past but only for a couple of days and I’m pretty sure we just did the cruise ship add-on hotel. This time we were in a different neighborhood – quite central and met our criteria of having many, many vegan friendly restaurants nearby.
This is a screen print from our favorite app, happycow that we use to find plant-healthy meals. The red leaves are vegan options, the green are 100% vegan, the purple are vegetarian.
The only tricky bit was making sure that we checked the hours. I’m not sure how long it would take me to live by Spanish hours. Late breakfast, late lunch, siesta, and dinner at 10 pm. Turns out that we liked a restaurant, called Bubita (a vegan sangria bar), so much we went back for a couple more meals.
Note – we don’t eat much fake meat anymore but, when in Rome (or Barcelona)… that salmon looking dish is fake meat – BUT was startlingly like the real thing. The cheeses reminded us of Sonoma Dry Jack. Also on the platter were eggplant with pink peppercorns, tempeh with mushrooms, baby artichokes, whole grain breadsticks and a variety of dips.
All the sangria versions were named – this one was the Inquisition.
And, we came across another Honest Greens restaurant, which we’d enjoyed in Lisbon:
Our best meal was at Rasoterra – a vegan restaurant with natural wines (i.e. no additives). As soon as I let the waiter know that that’s how we’d had our wines made, there were smiles all around.
A plant eater friend of mine made the comment once that omnivores think we suffer – it’s a secret: we don’t! Here’s the Rasoterra menu the night we had dinner there:
When we got to Barcelona, it dawned on us that we’d not taken the hop-on, hop-off bus in Barcelona so we did that. Ron has an above average spatial ability, which is good because no one in my family can find their way out of a paper bag. The bus tour immediately cemented his knowledge of what was where – that, combined with his getting more comfortable with his phone’s GPS meant that there was very little backtracking. Helpful in a country where you don’t speak the language!
Various city views:
The name of this building is Torre Glories.
The louvers can be adjusted and as you can see, the building is painted in a variety of colors.
Needless to say, this building stands out day or night. Although we didn’t see it at night, I did read that there are lights which can be illuminated in an infinite number of patterns. I found this picture on a tour company’s website.
A shop very much like a little Harrod’s:
When you’re bored, just dance.
No, I didn’t price them.
Coffee pods!
Note the size of the asparagus and the price (exchange rate is about 1:1):
I loved the family in the closest boat – I’m assuming it was a 3 generation group – the boy definitely wanted to try to participate – the grandad said sure. It was a good thing the oars were attached.
This was far more somber – a gazebo in a nearby park was renamed in honor of a transgender woman who was murdered there in 1991 by a group of neo-nazis. This was the first identified hate crime in Spain.
View inside our hotel lobby:
We had toured the ever popular Sagrada Familia the last time we were here. Because we landed in Barcelona at the beginning of the high season, we were unable to get tickets to tour the inside. It’s still not finished – so we’ll come back in a few years for the grand opening. Thus, the pictures below were taken from a bus:
Another Gaudi building:
After a pretty full schedule of ship excursions, we were happy to just explore this new (to us) neighborhood of Barcelona and find new restaurants. But, on a whim, I checked what events were taking place. An unexpected discovery was the Palau de la Musica, a concert venue, which was only a 3 minute walk from our hotel. Not only did they offer tours of the 100+ year old building, which looked like a cross between art nouveau and Disneyland, but while we were there they were offering what I initially thought was just a performance of opera music from Turandot (the program called it a concert). It was actually the entire opera – Puccini’s last and one for which the music was finished by someone else. I was thrilled!
There were a few of these horses – the biggest group was a rendition of the Ride of the Valkyries, by Wagner. I had to zoom in on the brown stripes – as best as we could determine, they were leather reins.
Also, note the two rows for more singers next to the organ – the children’s choir stood there for their role in the opera.
During our tour, there was a sample (listen to videos below) of a performance by an organist, who was going to play in a few days (there are over 300 performances of some kind in this hall, and the add on smaller venue, a year.
One of the most notable features of this concert hall is that it’s mostly illuminated by daylight. Those are stained glass panels above and on the sides.
Ron and I did a self guided tour and then, the following night, I attended the opera. I lucked out on an excellent seat and the place was completely packed. It holds about 1000 fewer seats than the San Francisco Opera House but was never really intended for stage type performances. If your seat is on the side, you can’t see the stage. I was almost in the center and about 13 rows from the stage. This was a first experience for me to see an opera with the entire orchestra on stage, somewhere between 40-50 costumed adult performers on a small stage that’s been built out from the main stage, and NO scenery. There were a couple of small step platforms that had a couple of props but that was it.
And, I’d forgotten that the very, very classic Nessun Dorme was in this one. The tenor nailed it. 2500 people didn’t make a sound while he, the singers and the orchestra filled the every corner of the building with wave upon wave of aching beauty – then the place exploded with applause. The Spaniards love their opera – it was overwhelming and I get weepy just remembering the moment.
For opera fans, here’s a rendition by Andrea Bocelli (turn it up!!!):
The light at 9 pm. At the end of the opera, there was at least a 10 minute standing ovation (and I didn’t get lost getting back to the hotel!). A stellar end to a great vacation.
And, our last evening – view from our rooftop terrace – the Barcelona cathedral in the distance. We’re glad to be home but we’re also happy to be planning the details on the next one: A National Geographic/Lindblad cruise to Patagonia in October. Stay tuned!
