Breakfast

On Sunday morning, Kathleen told me she wanted a “real” breakfast and about the only place we had seen that looked like it served one was a coffee shop looking place on Las Ramblas. We had earlier asked Susan from our Cruise Critic thread to join us for breakfast so we were off at 9:00 to the breakfast buffet that I wish I could recommend but I can’t. Much of the food was cold, it was very crowded and very plain. I do remember that the name of the place had the word POM in it (apple in Spanish).

After breakfast, we and Susan went into old Town with our final destination being the Cathedral of Barcelona. As it was Sunday, there would be Sardana dancing (the national dance of Catalunya) in the square in front of the cathedral at noon.

Barcelona Cathedral and Sardana Dancing

We weren’t able to see much of the interior of the cathedral as it was Sunday and mass was going
on so we waited in the plaza in front of the cathedral for the dancing. About this time we realized that we were only a block from the Catalunyan Music Hall. It is one of the few buildings with a Modernista interior and they do English speaking tours three times a day. So we decided to see if we could get in on a tour that day.  Unfortunately all the English-speaking tours were already sold out so we added it to a our list of things to do when we are in Barcelona after we return from our cruise.
We then returned to the Cathedral plaza to watch the Sardana dancing. By that time, the plaza had become very crowded and it was hard to imagine that there would be any room for anyone to dance at all. But sure enough at almost exactly noon, the band set up and the dancing started. It was a very fun experience to watch the communal dancing.

After the dancing was over, Susan went off to take a Gaudi tour and we went to find our lunch. As we had loved La Rita so much the previous day we wanted to find one of its sister restaurants in the Old City. We actually found two of them and settled on La Quince Nites in La Placa Real. Again we were thrilled with the meal.


Another amazing lunch

Today Kathleen started with the goat cheese salad and I went with a stew of squid, pork, artichokes and mushrooms. It was outstanding. Today Kathleen and I switched and she had the duck (prepared differently) and I had a wonderful braised lamb shank. Of course for dessert
we both had the same Catalunyan dessert I had tried the day before at La Rita. It was prepared differently but it was just as wonderful. That’s the dessert at right.

After lunch we headed back to Las Ramblas and walked the balance of the way to the port and the Columbus monument. On the way we stopped to buy some artwork from a street artist as well taking pics of every street performer we saw. It was a long walk up Las Ramblas as the crowds had really thickened. With the streets as full as they were, it took us almost an hour to get back up to the hotel. Once there we found an even more crowded hotel living room with even more of our Cruise Critic friends. After a few great hours of conversation we finally gave up and went to bed. When I say “gave up” I mean that we were victim to what was and became the scourge of this trip, cigarette smoke. As most of you reading this know I (and to a lesser extent Kathleen) am EXTREMELY susceptible to second-hand smoke. There were three people sitting in one of the window seats smoking like chimneys and we finally were driven out of the room.

But that’s OK as we needed to get packed and to bed as we were boarding Century the next morning. And we wanted to be ready for that.

Click here to see Day 4 of Barcelona.