We play the state game in Spain

Our domestic road trips usually come with playing the license plate game to see how many states we can get. (FYI -- our record over seven years of playing is 48 when we went to Arizona and San Diego in 2017 and saw all but Maine and Rhode Island.)

We didn't expect to play the state game in Spain. 

Then I saw a store/restaurant called the Nevada in Madrid, followed by a store with Montana in the name. And suddenly, it was on. 

This florist shop in Madrid gave us the Sunshine State.

 

This Barcelona restaurant was the second business with Hawaii in its name that we saw (but the only one we got a picture of).

In Barcelona, we found another Montana Cans store, which is what sells spray paint that artists use for street and door art.

And one of the stores in Madrid was selling "California" shirts, so I'm totally counting that, as well.

If you're keeping score, that's five states. So the Arizona/San Diego trip record is safe ... for now.

 

 

 

Like nothing else: The Sagrada Família basilica

The Basilica de la Sagrada Familia — a still in-progress expiatory temple — ranks as the No. 1 attraction on a list of more than 1,300 in Barcelona. And when visiting, it's easy to see why.

It's the largest unfinished Roman Catholic church in the world.

Ryan and I have independently and together toured a church or two during our travels, including St. Peter’s Basilica. But in most cases, those churches were built centuries ago and share a lot of the same architectural elements. 

It's still a work in progress.

 

Whereas the Sagrada Familia began construction in 1882 and is still being built more than 140 years later, as immortalized in a 2019 Time magazine cover article. The current estimates are for the steeples and most of the church's structure to be completed by 2026, but it might take until 2032 to get all of the decorative elements in place. 

The decorative elements, like this giant fruit salad collection three-quarters of the way up, are incredibly detailed.

A few things that stuck out to us about the Sagrada Familia (many learned through the audioguide):

• The inside supportive pillars were designed by the architect Antoni Gaudi to mimic trees and branches. They are like nothing we’ve seen.

  

  They weren't just supports — they were art.
  

  
  

• The stained glass windows use color combinations to tap into the best light. The windows that get the eastern morning light feature shades of blue and cooler colors, while those that are face west feature warmer colors. The windows were designed by artist Jovian Vila-Grau. 

  

  The stained glass on every side was incredible.
  

  
  

• The ornate nature of the outside of the temple. Each of the facades tells a story about Jesus’ life: his birth, his death, and his glory or everlasting life. In all, the basilica will have 18 towers (11 are completed to date). 

  

  The ornate sculptures on either side have distinctly different styles. The Nativity side with scenes representing Jesus' birth is carved in a detailed, realistic style, while the Sagrada Familia's Passion side depicts key moments leading up to Jesus' crucifixion in a more linear, brutalist style. The sculpture to the right shows Jesus embracing St. Peter after denied him three times. Behind them is the "magic square" in which every row and column adds up to 33 — Jesus' age at the time of his crucifixion. 
  

  
  

• Every design decision has a story and a purpose. For example, the tallest tower will be 172.5 meters, which is slightly shorter than the nearby mountain of Montjuic. Gaudi was quoted as saying that he made this decision because the work of man should never surpass that of God. Another example is that 50 lamps illuminate the suspended baldachin above the altar. That number commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles 50 days after Christ’s resurrection. Gaudi took attention to detail and purpose to a whole other level. It seemed a little exhausting to think that much about every single decision.
  

  

  It is huge.
  

  
  

• The emphasis on collaboration. Gaudi knew he wouldn’t live to finish the basilica and that others would complete the construction for him. He left detailed instructions for the artists and builders who would follow him, to ensure the final product matched his unique vision. Gaudi died in 1926 (hence why they are trying to finish the project by 2026), and his successors have clearly managed to carry on his work. 

  

  Also, the Sagrada Familia offers great views of Barcelona.
  

   

  DISCLAIMER: The photos don't do justice to the basilica, its art, its structure or the views it offers. You really have to see it yourself to fully appreciate it.
  

Breaking one of our cardinal rules: The two-museum day

One of our cardinal rules in planning vacations is that we don’t plan to tour two museums/historical sites in one day. There are two reasons for the rule:

1. I insist on us pre-booking tickets for any historical site BEFORE we arrive. That means we definitely get to see a site that’s important to us, but it also means we have to be at a specific location at a specific time, which can feel like … work.
   
   
2. We both acknowledge that learning takes significant bandwidth. To avoid overtaxing our brains, we try to prevent having to “input” too much new information in a short time. Otherwise, making sense of it starts to feel like … work.

And when we’re traveling, we’re on vacation! Our brains want a break!

But we decided to ignore our rule on Tuesday in Barcelona. We had pre-booked tickets to the Picasso museum at 10:30 in the morning, but we were really interested in touring a second museum, too, the Museu d’Historia de Barcelona (MUHBA). So we got tickets to tour it at 4:15 in the afternoon. 

Fortunately, the museums were small enough and their focuses unique enough that it didn’t feel like too much for one day. 

The Picasso museum features mostly work that the artist did in this city, where he lived at various periods. Highlights included a few painting from his blue period in 1901-04 and his intense 58-painting study of Velazquez’s Las Meninas in 1957 (we had seen the original painting in the Prado Museum in Madrid earlier on our trip). 

Picasso donated many of his works to this museum, including most of a series in which he re-envisioned various Velazquez masterpieces.

Here's a wall-sized version of one of Picasso's interpretation of Velazquez’s Las Meninas: 

 And then, of course, there's Picasso's take on portraits, including this one of his friend.

The second museum, the MUHBA, focuses on the historical development of Barcelona from its time as a colony of the Roman Empire in the 1st century through its transition to Christianity in 3rd and 4th centuries, and then as a medieval city in the 15th and 16th centuries. You can see parts of the original city walls that they have unearthed, and a fish salting and fish sauce factory. Later, the walls of the church and altar have been unearthed. This museum was very similar to the Settlement Exhibition we had toured in Iceland in 2018.

The remains of building walls and the original city walls took visitors back to the age of the Roman Empire. 

Some of the tiling from the original Roman buildings still exists.

This was the floor from an ancient Roman fabric dying and laundry business.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the other major museum we visited on our trip was the Prado Museum in Madrid, frequently ranked as one of the top art museums in the world. (The only drawback of the Prado was that it strictly prohibited photos inside the museum.)

We couldn't take pictures inside, so we selfied it up outside the Prado.

We both really enjoyed touring this museum and discussing it afterward. Key highlights:

• The scope of Francisco Goya’s career and particularly seeing the difference in his earlier portraits and his late-career series of Black Paintings.
• Hieronymus Bosch’s captivating, yet disturbing, The Garden of Earthly Delights triptych and Ryan’s late night rabbit hole research about its “butt music” and the artist tripping on bread mold.
• We were surprised to learn that we shared a “favorite” painting, Queen Joanna the Mad by Francisco Padilla y Ortiz. This is HUGE, it measures 3 meters by 5 meters, and is a compelling oil on canvas depicting the queen watching over the casket of her husband, Phillip the Handsome. I thought it really captured the torment of her grief and how public it had to be, and I appreciated that the Prado also had one of the early "concept" sketches that the artist created. Ryan appreciated its nuanced storytelling and the composition that harnessed the golden spiral.

Shut the front door: Where art and advertising mix

One cool feature that Madrid and Barcelona had in common was that when shops and restaurants were closed, many still showed off their personalities — on their doors. 

Three doors in Madrid.

And that included many of the the storefront rolling doors.

This place leaves no questions about what its purpose is. 

Ooh, I have an idea ... what this shop deals with.

Guess what kind of dishes this restaurant in Madrid specializes in?

If you're into reading and writing, this pen and stationary store is on the same corner as this bookstore in Barcelona.

Popcorn with butter?

Heaven holds a place for those who eat here (in Barcelona).

Other times, the art is a little more abstract ... or at least less on-the-nose. 

In Barcelona.

In Madrid.

In Madrid.

Love those Bibliotecas.

And coffee shops, naturally, showed a lot of energy even after hours. 

In Barcelona.

Where Jordi isn’t the worst. He's a saint.

Shifting to Barcelona meant we changed languages, since this area speaks Catalan. I assumed incorrectly that Catalan was simply a dialect of Spanish, but it is a separate language.

Besides Catalonia (where Barcelona is located), Catalan is spoken in the Aragon, Balearic Islands, the autonomous communities of Murcia and Valencia in Spain, the country of Andorra, the Roussillon region of France, and the city of Alghero in Sardinia, Italy.

And one of the first things we learned about Catalan is that they spell and pronounce their patron Saint George as Sant Jordi. 

We found out about Sant Jordi because he looks down over the nave of the Sagrada Familia, an enormous and still-in-progress basilica that towers over Barcelona. 

Sant Jordi watches over the    
inside of the basilica. 

That’s right, the exact name we gave our lovable but not-very-bright-dog. The one who wakes us up for breakfast by standing on our chests. The who hops over the back fence to scavenge for compost in the neighborhood. The one who Ryan has affectionately nicknamed “The Worst.”

Armed with this knowledge, we began seeing references to Jordi in other places. 

This Jordi bodega (above) near the Sagrada Familia sells souvenirs. 

This is the Galerias de Sant Jordi in the oldest part of the city. 

Catalan recognizes Sant Jordi's feast day on April 23. Couples celebrate by giving each other roses or books(!) on this holiday similar to Valentine's Day. 

And to top it off, we found this t-shirt in an art shop that more accurately reflects the less saintly aspects of Jordi’s personality. It had to come home with us, obviously. 

Music sounds better in nature (and in Spanish)

Are we too old for selfies? (We are not.)

No football matches at the moment. None of our favorite bands were in town. And taking in a play wasn’t an option, considering we have managed just enough Spanish to order food and drinks.

 

So operating under the assumption that music is a universal language, we got tickets to walk through Madrid’s Botanical Gardens while listening to different ensembles play classical music. 

 

My favorite was the performance of Joseph Haydn's "Cuarteto de cuerda op. 33, No. 3 en Do Major" — as in major deer, a female deer.

 

 

Elizabeth was most captivated by the duo of the flutist and viola's rendition of Franz Anton Hoffmeister's Duo-Concertante No. 3 en Fa Major" (a long, long way to run). I haven't picked up much Spanish but in the flutist's introductory remarks, I understood "viola," "violin," "flauta," and "transformar" enough to understand that the music was initially written for a violin and viola and had been adapted so the flute took the violin's part.

While I got to focus on the music, Elizabeth shot the video (which is why it's vertical — "I'm embracing the TikTok generation," she claimed). 

Elizabeth also noticed how the teenage audience members seemed less than enthralled, while the older ones spent the whole time recording video. 

 

We also enjoyed a trio of a violin, viola and cello, and the musicians performed three songs (pieces from Schubert, Antonín Dvorák and Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf).

 

 We hope to post links to the songs once we get back. 

Madrid's artistic signs o' the times

It's sort of easy to get lost in Madrid — not Venice-level lost, but regular old-European-city lost. Still, the street signs here make it a pleasant experience. Most corners have nine- or 16-tile square artwork that not only tells wanders where they are but shows them.

Isabel II is the only queen regnant (female king) in Spain's history, although the eldest daughter of the current king is in line to be the next.

Some feature little scenes, like this one from Calle del Salitre (the saltpeter area, which apparently is where slat was processed).

 

We saw the sign, and it opened up our eyes. (You're welcome for that.)

Many of the streets are named after saints and feature religious iconography. Others depict what the area looks -- or looked like.

It's no coincidence that the medium is ceramic tile. That's a big deal in Madrid and in Spain, generally, where Arabic ceramic artists came starting in the 8th century. It gave rise to a big industry, and many of the country's treasures include ceramic artwork. 

At the Palacio Real (the Royal Palace), for instance, we saw an intricate ceramic-top desk that leaders use for signing the most important documents. (Sorry, we couldn't take photos in that part of the Palacio.)

Classic double signage.

Not so classic double signage.

Streets used to only have nicknames from people who lived in those neighborhoods and were officially listed as Manzana (block) and the number. That must have sucked to navigate.

For much of it's history, Madrid was a place that Bono might have sung about: where the streets had no names. (Hat tip to the Making of Madrid site for that one — and the history lesson.) Finally, in the 18th century, the government began assigning blocks and numbers — for ease of taxing residents, of course. In the next century, one of Madrid's mayor named plazas and streets after events, key people and some of the unions or guilds that had influence, like the salt refiners. 

And apparently the naming process has continued to be an ongoing discussion in city politics. For reasons not entirely clear, one plaza had been named after former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, which became a political issue in 2015. 

Even if we didn't know where we were, we knew where we were.