Barcelona is a living museum for historic buildings, great architecture and art

by Lucy Komisar

Barcelona is an amazing city of great art and architecture created by world-class artists who lived there. From the historic Gothic Quarter to the fabulous Sagrada Familia church by Antoni Gaudí, we were overwhelmed by its beauty, intelligence and charm.

The best way to begin to see Barcelona is with the 2-hour Gothic Quarter tour run by the tourist office every morning at 10am. English commentary is provided by the guide via headsets. We started at the Plaça St. Jaume, site of the Palace of the Generalitat, the 14th-century building that is the seat of the Catalonia government. The façade was changed in 1600 to Renaissance style. The palace is a place of great pride, as the Catalonians struggled a long time for self-rule.

We walked down the narrow Bishop's Street (Carrer del Bisbe) with a neo-Gothic archway and covered gallery that leads off that square in the direction of the Cathedral. Then our guide took a sudden detour on a street named Paradis. He said we'd be surprised. Indeed we were!  We were overwhelmed by the 30-foot tall Corinthian columns that are ruins of a temple built in honor of Emperor Augustus. Barcelona was founded by the Romans in about 15 to 10 BC, the time of Augustus. The city walls also date to that era.

Most of the landmarks in European cities is about who the rulers were – temporal or ecclesiastic. From the Temple of Augustus we walked to the Plaça del Rey, a medieval square that is the site of the 14th-century King's Palace, now a museum. I loved the stunning throne room. These rulers exhibited great art along with terrible authoritarian politics! The Museum of the History of Barcelona is in the square, and there you can get a map and guide of the city's Roman ruins.

The ecclesiastical rulers of course generally had just as much power and money as the monarchs and they built equally massive and impressive edifices. Across the way from the King's Palace looms the Gothic Cathedral (started in the 13th century and finished in the 19th!  We stopped there to explore on our own.

I found the most charming aspect to be the ducks that wandered about the courtyard in the center of which was a spectacular statue of Saint George and the Dragon. Saint George is a popular Barcelona saint. He is supposed to have helped the Christians fighting the Moors in the Middle Ages. The ducks? Who can say?

Then we went inside and saw the gorgeous apse and some chapels of which the most stunning to me was the Black Madonna of Montserrat.

Sometimes ancient history connects suddenly with modern times. A block west of the Cathedral, we stopped at the nearly hidden Plaça de Sant Felip Neri where the Baroque church of Sant Felip Neri, built in 1752, was bombed and pockmarked by bullets during the Civil War. After the fall of Barcelona to the Franco fascists, people were lined up in front of the church and executed. Later, 42 civilians, mostly children, were killed by Franco air raids which bombed the church where they had taken shelter. Now a plaque commemorates the deaths.

Barcelona continues to be a city of major contemporary art and artists. After looking at the great historical and religious works, we headed to some amazing examples of current artistic creation. Continuing the tradition of religious inspiration, is masterpiece of the city's premier architect, Antoni Gaudí, the neoGothic/art nouveau Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family) church. It is the most prominent example of a Barcelona structure by who was born in Barcelona in 1852. His work, from 1883 till his death in 1926, became an obsession. It is still being completed according to his designs. This is Barcelona's prime tourist attraction, with people lining up to visit it. The inside is stunning white and gold; the outside looks like gingerbread.

As kitchy in its own way is the Music Palace, the Palau de la Música Catalana. It has stained glass mosaics, an inverted dome, and classical columns with crowns of flowers. The building was created by Lluís Domènech i Montaner in 1905-8. A Socialist politician, he wanted the center to be for the people and put the Socialist red rose all over the building. Perhaps an early feminist, he also covered the front of the first row of the balcony so that men could not look up to gaze at women's legs!

Such an artistic city would of course have world-class museums. I must admit that much of the ultra-modern stuff leaves me cold. I did get a kick out of Alexander Kosolapou's 1980 "Coca Cola It's the Real Thing, Lenin," a white profile of Lenin on a red background in the Museum of Contemporary Art. I thought it a good joke and an antidote to the pretentiousness of many of the other exhibits. Not that MACBA is alone in that!

There was also some humor in the terrace gallery of the museum devoted to the work of Juan Miró, another child of Barcelona.

We took an extensive tour of the Picasso Museum, with a brilliant collection of his works through many years. Sorry, no photos allowed!

One day in between forays in the Gothic Quarter, we relaxed at lunch at the casual CentOnze Restaurant of Le Meridien. CentOnze means One Hundred Eleven, a reference to the hotel's address at La Rambla 111. Large windows open onto the Rambla, the district's major thoroughfare, so you can watch the stream of humanity pass. The menu offers a few main courses to keep prices low in the prix fixe. The fish atop ratatouille was as succulent as it looks.

Our big event dinner the night before we left was at the rooftop Arola Restaurant of the Arts Hotel at the port. It is run by master chef Sergi Arola who is also in charge of the Michelin 2-star Sergi Arola restaurant in Madrid. He has eateries as well in Santiago de Chile, Lisbon, and Sao Paolo.

Arola is casual, with seating inside behind large windows open to the terrace or on the terrace where we sat. Sergi Arola explained, "We try to adapt Barcelona food and style. Barcelona is a completely relaxed city. It's popular to put some things on the table family style at the beginning and then order another plate -- or not."

A "sustainable menu" is limited to dishes made with products sustainable within 100 miles. I cheated a little by ordering a delicious carpaccio of perch and then turbot with apples.

In the background Brazilian music could be heard. "My brother is the DJ!" declared Arola. The music was lively, but not too loud. When we looked out toward the sea, we saw a huge sculpture of a metal fish by Frank Ghery

Later, as the dinner crowd became an after-dinner drinks crowd, a musician with an electric guitar appeared to play jazz. I found that pretty sustainable, too!

IF YOU GO

Getting there: We took the high-speed train from Madrid. If you are traveling around Spain or elsewhere in Europe, the best thing is to get a Eurailpass from Rail Europe. If you know your times of travel, you can make your Spain reservations while in the U.S. via the internet and print them at home, and so avoid standing in lines at Spanish rail stations. If you do stand in line, it's not necessary to have your Eurailpass and passport with you. A nice surprise: the trip from Madrid to Barcelona is almost like going by plane before austerity: you get free wine and snacks!

Guides:

DK Eyewitness Travel's "Top 10 Barcelona" carefully selects the ten best sights and provides detailed information about them.

Michelin's "Must Sees Barcelona" provides step by step walking tours by neighborhood, valuable if you want to sight-see in depth.

Barcelona Turisme's "Barcelona: The city, map by map," published by the city tourist office, gives the highlights of each part of town, including cafés and restaurants.

Government Tourist Office: Plaça St. Jaume.

Barcelona Card: Discounts or free entrance at museums and other sites. For 2, 3, 4 or 5 days for adults and children. Turisme de Barcelona information offices and via  

Articket: 22 Euros to visit each museum once. At the museums Turisme de Barcelona information offices and via the internet.

Metro: get 10 tickets; note that "T" in a triangle on posted directions means "tram."

Gothic Quarter walking tour: 10am to 12noon in English, limit of 30 people. Get tickets at the Tourist Office in the Plaça St. Jaume and via the internet.

Cathedral: 8am to 12:45, 5:15pm to 7. Till 6pm Sat and Sun. Free in am. Metro Liceu and Jaume.

Sagrada Familia: Calle Marina & Calle Sardenya, April to Sept 9am to 8pm, Guided tours at 1 (English), 3 and 5. Metro Sagrada Familia.

Palau de la Música Catalana, Sant Pere. Metro Urquinaona.

Joan Miró Museum: Avenida Miramar, Parc de Montjuic. 10am to 8pm, till 9:30 Thurs, till 2:30 Sun. Metro to Paral-lel, then free funicular.

Picasso Museum: Calle Montcada15.  10am to 8pm Tues to Sun. English guided tours Tues and Thurs 4pm. Metro Jaumel.

Le Meridien: CentOnze Restaurant, La Rambla 111, 34 (0)93 318 6200. Special menu 16 Euros. Metro Catalunya or Liceu.

Arola Restaurant: Arts Hotel at the Port, Marina 19-21, 34(0)93 221 1000. Metro Ciutadella Vila Olimpica.

Rail Europe: http://www.raileurope.com/. http://www.raileurope.com/train-faq/all-about-train-travel/at-the-station/e-ticketing-at-the-station.html.
Government Tourist Office: http://www.barceloneturisme.cat/.

Barcelona Card: http://www.barcelonaturisme.cat/.

Articket: http://www.barcelonaturisme.cat/.

Gothic Quarter walking tour: http://www.barcelonaturisme.cat/.

Sagrada Familia: http://www.sagradafamilia.cat/sf-eng/.

Palau de la Música Catalana: http://www.palaumusica.org/.

Joan Miró Museum: http://www.fundaciomiro-bcn.org/.

Picasso Museum: http://www.museupicasso.bcn.cat/.

Le Meridien: http://www.lemeridienbarcelona.com/.

Arola Restaurant: http://www.hotelartsbarcelona.com/. artsrestaurants@ritzcarlton.com.

Photos by Lucy Komisar