March 24, 2008
On the Monday after Easter (a holiday in Hungary), we went to the Corinthia Royal Hotel for their Easter brunch. The food was fantastic and the girls got to see this creepy looking Easter Bunny plus some real rabbits. They also got to spend some time at the arts and crafts table. It wasn't cheap (especially since we also had to take a taxi there and back because I couldn't get a fuse to stop tripping so, consequently, we couldn't open our gate to get our car out), but it was good food and fun.
None of us had ever been there before. I purchased an Ireland patch for my backpack over 10 years ago thinking that I would make a trip when I lived over here during college. But since I never made it over there, I have never been able to sew it on. Now I can.
Since it was St. Patrick's weekend, the St. Patrick's festival was going on, which provided a number of people dressed up in some sort of leprachaunish (assume this is not a real word) oufits. It also meant that there was a Dublin scavenger hunt for families and a number of other holiday exhibits (ie the St Patrick's carnival).
It derives its name from the abbey in Kells, where it resided in the past.
We continued our journey to the second famous Dublin cathedral, St. Patrick's Cathedral. At this point we had had enough and decided to head back to the hotel for the evening.
We stopped by Oscar Wilde's childhood home, right across the street from Merrion square (and coincidentally just a few doors down from a current store called "Morrissey's"... Wilde was a favorite of Morrissey, sometimes even referring to him by name in his songs ... see the song "Cemetery Gates"). It started to rain harder, so we decided to visit the National Gallery of Ireland. The girls watched the ipod, while we enjoyed the art. It was also there that we were reminded about the scavenger hunt, so from the museum we went to city hall to get our package. We were required to find ten different cultural spots around Dublin, answer a question about the place, and try to do it in the fastest time. We ended up going back to a few places we had visited the day before (Christchurch Cathedral among others), but it was great, despite heavy rain, as in each spot the girls were given some sort of prize (from free tickets to the carnival, to key chains, to getting their faces painted). They loved that. 
And Heather and I, although soaked, realized that because of this event we were able to run the streets with purpose.
It looked nice in the website (spacious, clean, and in a good location), but I figured SOMETHING must be wrong with this because of the price. We would often spend 100 Euro/night stopping at a roadside hotel on other drives we have made, so I was not expecting much. But to our surprise this was a PERFECT accomodation; three bedrooms, a large living area and a kitchen overlooking the living area. We had plenty of room and considering we were with the girls, we were in at night early, so we spent enough time in the apartment to be glad that it was as spacious and comfortable as it was.
We woke up Thursday morning quite leisurely, leaving late morning to walk to the Cathedral "Sagrada Familia". The most famous architect of Barcelona, Antoni Gaudi, designed this Cathedral, which began construction in 1882, with a very unique style of wavy lines. It is hard to spot a straight line in this design. Unfortunately, in 1926, while the Cathedral was not yet fully completed (the outside structure, XXX, and XXX were the only parts complete, leaving most of the inside unfinished), Gaudi was hit by a street tram and killed. The plans for the rest of the completion were destroyed by Catalin Anarchists during the Spanish Civil War (1936) and to this day it is still only partially complete. We went inside and it is a construcion zone inside, as they work to finish it. Supposedly it won't be fully built for many more years (I heard 2026!). It is a beautiful structure and from any point of Barcelona you can see it protruding into the skyline.
From the museum we made our way to Las Ramblas, the famous Barcelona streets where the restaurants, shops, and street performers make for a VERY exciting walk. We passed by a number of fun street performers (including our "silver man" from Berlin...see next post). Our Futbol star was our favorite. We probably watched him for at least ten minutes and he just kept that ball bouncing in the air, either with his foot, his shoulders, his head, or his knees. He put on and took off a shirt all the while keeping the ball moving through the air. He balanced it on his head and he juggled it through his legs over and over again. It was quite amazing. It did help that he was actually the only street performer with an actual talent, the others merely dressed up in interesting costumes and were able to stand perfectly still (I guess that is a talent, but not nearly as impressive).
It is the largest aquarium in Europe, and although pretty interesting, it did not seem that large to me, but the girls had a great time. I learned there are fish in the world that look like leafy sticks. I would have actually thought they were leafy sticks if they were not in an aquarium all by themselves with a big sign that says "leafy stick fish" (or something of that sort).
We didn't pass the lobby of this one, but enjoyed the architecture of the building if not the art inside. We made our way down the 314 steps (Katie counted) from the Museum to the Plaza Espana where we took the metro BACK to Las Ramblas, where we finished the walk from Las Ramblas de Catalanya to the Diagonal metro station.
After walking through some more "natural" trails and more natural areas of the park, we came to the area where Gaudi had built what from the top looks like a large clearing with his trademark artistic benches surrounding an open space where kids can run around, where vendors sell their Spanish wares, and where most everyone can just enjoy the natural beauty of the area.
But walking down from the clearing is when you realize that this "clearing" has been artificially built and sits on top a large number of columns that support the entire structure.
And as you continue to walk, you come across a couple buildings also designed by Gaudi that are also quite intriguing and unique. The two kilometer trek back to the metro didn't seem as bad, obviously, since it was mostly downhill. But all of the walking and lugging the girls around with one arm and a less than completely mobile wife, was completely worth the effort for the sight that we enjoyed.
We left early Sunday morning for the airport and it was a pretty easy trip back to Bratislava and then to Budapest (although after waiting FOREVER at passport control at the Bratislava airport, the border guard made a phone call, mumbled something to us about "go to Box 1". I didn't understand her at all, and decided to just ignore her. So we just walked out, got into our car and drove off. I hope that we are not put on the Slovakian "Watch list"!). It was a fantastic trip, despite four weeks of use of only one arm!