Tuesday we took a tour of Barcelona. It was amazing. Our tour guide was from America so we were able to understand him and he gave us a lot of helpful hints to getting around Barcelona. Below is a picture of an old bull ring that they turned into a shopping mall. Barcelona used to have 3 active bull rings but bull fighting has now become illegal in Barcelona. There is however one active bull ring still open till the end of the year which is when the law becomes in effect. Hopefully we will be able to go there while we are here and get to see one of the last bull fights in Barcelona ever. Our tour guide said bull fighting became illegal because of two reason. Partly because it is inhumane to kill these animals but also because of a political reason. The old Spanish dictator loved bull fighting and saw the bull as the symbol of Spain. Strong and Brave. Once this dictator was over thrown the people of Barcelona wanted to get rid of everything that reminded them of him so naturally his symbol is something they want to get rid of. The smaller towns in Spain, like Sevilla, will most likely not get rid of their bull fighting for a long time because it is so built into the Spanish culture but Barcelona is so new age that they wanted to get rid of it.
Sagrada Familia is Barcelona's most famous piece of architecture. It was designed by a famous artist of their's, Gaudi. He is famous for putting a lot of detail into his work and using a lot of materials and textures. He put a lot of work into the cathedral but will sadly never see the day it is finished because it has been under construction since 1882 and isn't projected to be finished till 2026. Our tour guide said that date will not likely be the end date though because it is only half way done as of today.
Once Sagrada Familia is finished it will be the tallest building in Barcelona.
The building depicts the stages of Jesus' life.
The sun rises on the first side. This side is the nativity scene. It shows basically the entire journey to his birth.
The sun sets on the death phase. This side is bare and sharp. It shows the passion of Jesus Christ.
We stopped at the top of this huge hill where I took a picture of the city of Barcelona. It's a lot bigger than I thought.
After the tour we had a little reception on top of a very nice hotel. The view was amazing.
The food however...lol. As always it's hard to get used to their food. The sandwiches they served us had that ham again and sun dried tomatoes. They also had tomatoes and little white balls of cheese. Not sure what kind of cheese but it had a weird texture. All in all the tour was amazing and I learned so much about Barcelona :)
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