Barcelona Day 1 & 2

We took a later flight going out – we usually go for the Crack-of-dawn flight, but this time it was 2ish, so we should have gotten to Barcelona (BCN) 5ish, then to the hotel 6ish . . .but the plane was delayed over 3 hours, so we actually got to BCN 7ish and the hotel 8ish . . . and that only with the aid of a young German woman who took pity on us as we groped with the map on the bus to town . . . we woulda just taken a taxi from there to the hotel, but she tutored us in the subway, so that was a big help the rest of the week. But instead of the leisurely fine seafood dinner or paella we had been looking forward to, almost as much as getting out of the frozen wastes of PRG, we made a mad dash over to a restaurant row on La Rambla Poblenou, a sort of promenade common to BCN – undoubtedly the root of the word Rambler, too . . . we walked up and down without finding the restaurant we were looking for, so we doubled back to the most crowded place we could play – my Mom always went by the cars parked out front(you want to eat where the cars you would drive are), but in European cities, you have to go by the faces of the people inside, just whether they look happy or not-- according to Mrs -- so we went into a little Lebanese place. It was a little smoky, but the food was pretty good, and the kind we can eat so late at night – hummus, lamb, salad & falafel -- turns out 9 pm is still early for dinner there . . . ! course they don’t each lunch till 2pm, too.



We’d left on Friday because I needed to work (remotely) on Monday. Knowing that, Saturday we hit the continental breakfast early and then the streets of BCN. The weather was beautiful by PRG standards. So we trained over to THE La Rambla, the biggest, most famous one in BCN, which is so crowded with tourists, tour-groups, street-performers, vendors, that you can hardly wiggle your way thru. Mrs was eager to see her first Gaudi – I GOT to believe this is where we get the word GAWDY from. We were a little disappointed – but we didn’t wait in line to peek inside with every body else . . . we kept walking, all around the old town BCN . . . on one side is the fashionable side, on the other is the seedy side . . . Mrs followed me down one alleyway on the wrong side, but that was enough for her, the rest of the time was on the fashionable side, with the cute shops . . . 8^) . . .


BCN must be around the same age as PRG, but it seemed so much cleaner to us . . . maybe it’s really disgusting in the heat of summer but pre-spring seemed glorious to us, even in a light mist at times. But one old castle looks pretty much the same in BCN or PRG, unless Gaudi is involved, of course, but they did have these old Roman Walls they have taken pains to preserve. You might have found them interesting for all the different stone work and materials they used. I know it took a long time to do stuff back then, but it looks like they just used what was at hand, or tore down older buildings (hard to believe back then) for materials . . .

Well after the slim nourishment of the continental breakfast and walking all morning, we were ready for some lunch, and eager to try some tapas. We walked around a corner and there was this place, Wine & Tapas, so we gave them a try. We were wowed. I had sangria; Mrs just wine, but she said it was just fine. The olives were so good, olive-oily instead of vinegary if you know what I mean, and the artichoke hearts were excellent . . . but the sun-dried tomatoes and the mushrooms were FABulous! We wanted more – this was a pre-planned plate we ordered for simplicity’s sake – but, we followed thru on the “plan” for a light lunch and headed out for more hiking when we finished just one serving.

Off that main Rambla there’s a famous open-air market with produce, meats, and seafood. It was a sight. It’s like the grandcanyon, tho’, just one fabulous vista after another and none of it looks as good in a picture as it did there . . . but still, here they are. . . .8^D . . . I wish I’d just gone ahead and snapped everything I saw, so I could show the skinned rabbits and goats, the “sweet breads”, the exotic fruits and veggies, but all I took is what we love, the seafood . . . now, the Sydney fish market was pretty awesome, and they had some strange looking stuff there, but this market seemed bigger, and more adventurous in the size of stuff they had . . . in that first picture there are Barnacles, lobster, prawns, crabs, and conchitas (they seemed to have labled them caracola) . . . the thing is, those crabs were still moving . . .so were the prawns and lobsters . . . and some of the fish were still twitching . . . that giant octopus in the middle of the bottom picture wasn’t moving, thank god, there would have been a riot, I bet.

So, tho’ we had eaten l ate for us, it was early for the BCNs . . . as we walked around in the early afternoon we noticed them all shutting up shops – they were going for their siestas – Who Knew!?!? I just saw these knockers on the way back to the train on the way back to the hotel. Funny.

Lemon Leaf Thai

What a surprise this was. Our daughter made an off-hand recommendation when we walked by last weekend, but we were very pleased with the whole experience . . .

First we had Kung Thot Almond (tempura shrimp covered in almonds), served with a spicy dipping sauce . . . it was excellent . . .

Actually, first, we had a tasting spoon they offered: Rumaki with satay peanut sauce . . . it looked to me, instead, like a California Roll (sashimi) deep fried and served with a soupcon of satay sauce – nonetheless, it made an excellent start and went very well with our standard Thai food accompaniment, Bohemian Sekt Demi Sec.

For the main course we had Kai Phad Phed, the weekly special, red-curry chicken with lime leaf. When I ordered it from our very charming waitress in my pidgin Czech/thai, she tho’t I said Kai Phad Ping, which she explained was the same thing but with ginger, but I corrected her . . . when she went away, Mrs & I smiled at each other, knowing already that we would have to return to try the Ping . . . Mrs is Mad for anything ginger . . . 8^) . . . The dinner was almost spicy enough for us – certainly more spicy than the norm in CZ – there were little red pepper slices in the curry, but they didn’t seem to be those lethal little red Thai peppers, but some other . . . I didn’t even get the hiccups.

I had to have a dessert, too. I ordered what I’d seen delivered to other tables without being sure what it was. The waitress just called it Pineapple. It was deli-thin slices of pineapple piled up into an island surrounded by a lagoon of crème fraiche and strawberry puree, with a pinnacle of mint. It was worth it just for one bite of strawberry-crème-pineapple-mint.

This was all good enough to move up to at least 2^nd place on our list of Fave Thai Spots in Prague . . . the ambience is the best of any Thai restaurant and the food is definitely crowding the Siam Orchid in the corners, if you see what I mean. . .

Update . . .

Still excellent!

Mrs' favorite Spicy Salad.

A spicy green curry . . .the kind you (by which I mean me!) eat faster and faster as the heat in your mouth grows, un-diluted by our customary Bohemian Sekt, till at last it is gone and only the heat remains . . .

we haven't gone the Lemon Leaf just for the pineapple desert yet but it could happen . . .

Real Italian Pizza

Big Red reports from Tivoli, Northern Italy

 

now this is pizza...and good too

 

Czech Cubist Art at the National Museum

agggh. I lost the artist name.

The best Kvetaak I ever had . . .

dang this blog software sucks bigtime . . . that picture has been rotated right side up, but it still shows sideways here . . . I loved it . . . it had a taste most cauliflower lacks, the texture was the same, and the look is so-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o alien!

Worker outside Chodov Train Station

Don't know what, don't know why, there it is . . .

On Namesti Miru