Simrishamn

Every summer the southern Swedish public transport offers a summer card that allows you to travel anywhere in the southern region for two months at a really low price. This year we decided to check out the east coast and visit Simrishamn. We packed up some lunch and the family and headed out. Charlie hadn't been on an adventure in a while and he was ready to go.

The train ride was good. Charlie fits well and always makes friends. We hear comments like, "fint hund" and "stor hund" (nice dog and big dog). We are proud parents so we always smile and say thanks, while inside we are thinking, "yeah, he's the best." Other dogs are crazy. This little guy across the way was having a fit, which always confuses Charlie

 

The train station is very near the water. So a short walk had us on the coast. It's a cute little coastal town with this ingenious restaurant concept. All the tables were full. Maybe because it was pretty chilly and really windy. It's always nice to find shelter.

Charlie loves the water, and was dying to go swimming. He's scared to jump into water though, so we weren't worried.

 

 

 

He did get a chance to stick his paws in the Baltic.

 

The waterfront is set up well for walking and water watching, picnicking and such. There is also a nice path along the beach. The beach was beautiful, but there was only one person on it. It's funny to think that I live closer to the beach than I ever have, but it's so cold (even in July) that no one is on it.

 

After lunch and a long walk by the water, we made our way back through the streets of Simrishamn.

 

 

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Zaragoza and Madrid

On Sunday morning after our week in Barcelona, Chris headed back to Sweden. I was on my way to a conference in Zaragoza, which is southwest of Barcelona. There's a high speed train that leaves from the central station. I waited on a friend of mine from work to arrive before leaving for Zaragoza. It gave me about 6 more hours in Barcelona. After Chris left, I went to the usual breakfast spot, then promptly headed to the beach.

 

 

After a couple of hours I decided it was time for lunch and went back to what had been my favorite place to eat during the week, The Chill Bar. It is one block from the Sagrada Família, so it is super easy to reach by metro. It is a dive, hole in the wall kind of place. There are 4 sidewalk tables with a handful of tables inside. There's no AC so all the outside tables were taken. It couldn't have been more perfect, sweltering heat and hummus in a run down dive.

 

At least they got a fan for me

The week in Zaraagoza was great. The weather stayed great and the tapas continued. Around the corner from the hotel was a pedestrian shopping street with a beautiful old church. I spent a lot of time with my friend Zoë. We went to talks at the conference during the day and walked around in the sun during the afternoon.

 

 

 

 

There are a lot of very interesting shops

 

Zoë

 

Not your traditional tapas

I even got my hair cut and colored while I was there. My Spanish friends had told me to be sure and get my hair done in Spain, that it was way cheaper, and they were right!

 

We had a lovely view of the city from our hotel rooftop and spent time hanging out there before dinner each night.

 

 

At the same time of the neutron scattering conference, there was a high pressure conference in Madrid. It is only a little over an hour by high speed train to Madrid. On Thursday the morning session was on the research I did as a grad student. A colleague of mine and I hopped the train in the morning. After the morning session I took the metro into the heart of Madrid. A good friend, Maddi, went to university in Madrid. I emailed and asked her if she had any suggestions for lunch. By an awesome coincidence, I was on the street and only one block away from the place she suggested, 80 degrees. It is a tasting menu restaurant with very reasonable prices. I had tomato gazpacho, mushroom gnocchi, and vanilla pudding, delish!

 

I had a quick walk through some cute shops, then went back to the college campus where the conference was held. I spent my last hour napping in the sun. I had to soak up all the warmth I could, I was headed back to cold the next day.

 

 

I felt lucky for two weeks in Spain, and I could have easily stayed two more!

 

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Barcelona: the food

Tapas is the food to eat in Spain. By the end of my week with Chris, and my next week with colleagues, everyone was tired of tapas. Except for me. I love tapas and could eat them everyday. A typical tapas menu has cured meat plates, cheese plates, bread with fresh granited tomatoes, croquettes (fried balls of beschmel), fried peppers, potatoes bravis (fried potatoes with spicy read sauce) and Spanish omelette (potato and egg).

Chris ate tapas his first night out while I was in the room and he loved all the food he got. The next day we went for tapas together. I still wasn't feeling 100% but that didn't stop us from ordering a table full.

The first day we went out for breakfast we found a little cafe close to the hotel. We sat outside that morning, and just about every other meal after that. We were outside as much as possible. We each got a coffee and a chocolate croissant. The croissants were to die for and so we settled in to eat breakfast here every morning. In both Italy and Spain I could get decaf coffee everywhere! After we sat there for a while one the first morning Chris asked, "What is it you think Spaniards eat for breakfast? Coffee and cigarettes?" It sure looked that way. Every morning we sat there people around us would drink multiple espressos and smoke cigarettes.

The night that Chris was not feeling great, I headed over to the beach for dinner. There's a row of restaurants that sit on the beach. They all have a generous patio for sitting, it's the kind of place I could spend a whole vacation hanging out at. I passed one place and saw a man eating mussels. That was all I needed to see.

The most touristy part of town is La Rambla. It is a tree lined pedestrian mall that's almost a mile long. On this road is La Boqueria, a large open air market. If you are looking for ham, you must go here. You can even buy it in ready to go single servings. Spanish ham is delicious and it's a special skill to be able to slice the ham from the leg. Spaniards buy these legs and sit them on their counter. They last a few weeks, and every time they want some ham, there it is.

 

 

 

There is more than meat in the market, but let's be clear, there are lots of stalls that sell pork. Along with your single serve ham portions, there's also single serve cheese portions.

 

 

 

We have a friend, Enric, that grew up in Barcelona. He had suggested a paella restaurant on the beach. Between the time we made reservations and the actual trip, a group of friends went to Barcelona for Enric's wedding. They took his advice to eat there and agreed, it was the best paella ever. We were really looking forward to that night.

The restaurant sat right on the beach and it was an open air style dining room. The food was amazing and we were certainly happy we went. We had a nice big salad, bread with tomato, and seafood paella.

 

The last night we were there for dinner we had a picnic by the sea. We had Spanish ham, cheese, fresh bread and tomatoes. It was just about perfect. Chris doesn't love the sand. When we got to the beach and I saw that there was a pier of sorts with rocks, I thought that it would be perfect; I could be by the sea and Chris wouldn't have to sit in the sand. The only down side to that was the rats. Oh well, at least the view was beautiful, the food was delicious, the temperature was perfect and there was a full moon rising. After dinner we sat and watched the water (from a different spot), then walked back to the metro along the beach.

 

 

 

 

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Barcelona: the city

I love Spain. I love the people, the culture, the food, the way Spaniards speak English, I just love Spain. Which meant that I was so looking forward to our week in Barcelona. Unfortunately it didn't start off great. When we woke up the last morning on the ship. I wasn't feeling great and pretty quickly that turned into a stomach bug, so for the first two days I was out of commission. The third morning was great and we had a really good day on a hop on hop off bus. But tragedy struck again when Chris got a stomach bug and then he was stuck in the room. While I was sick Chris did some roaming and while he was sick I did some shopping, but finally we got it together for the last two days and really enjoyed our time in Barcelona.

Hop on hop off bus

 

 

The city is beautiful. There are a lot of fountains, sculptures and art installations. Most everything that is built has had an architect commissioned to do it, even the communications tower.

 

 

 

Communications tower

 

 

Church in the Gothic Quarter

 

We saw this building on the hop on hop off tour. We learned that it was built super eco friendly and that at night it was lit up by some thousands of lights. So we went back. It did not disappoint.

 

 

The streets are very wide and the sidewalks are the size of streets. The cars and pedestrians are very well separated (completely opposite from Amsterdam). There are some parts of the city that have small ally like streets, of course, but much of the city has large medians and sidewalks.

The weather was perfect and Barcelona, like most cities in Spain is very alive all the time. We found a spot on the beach with concrete lounge chairs. A few nights in a row we sat there and watched the beach and listened to the ocean. Families are out late, most people eat dinner around 10 PM; the restaurants don't open till 8 PM. One night while we sat watching the night go by, I watched small kids climbing on this rope structure. It's maybe 15 feet tall. They would just scramble right up to the top. Recently a friend of mine was telling me about a book he had been reading on physical activity. About how as we get older we have set ways of doing and thinking of things, but kids don't have that yet. They accomplish things by instinct. I decided I was going to climb this thing too. On my first attempt, I only made it half way up. I got back down and went back to my lounge chair and started studying how the kids did it. About 30 minutes later I was ready to try again. Straight to the top I went!

 

There's me on the top

 

A better view in the day time

Barcelona is well known for an architect named Antoni Gaudí (1852-1926). He was born in Catalonia, the northeast region of Spain. Most of his works are found in Barcelona. He is known for modern architecture and the use of many types of media, most notably for trencadís, which is using scrap or waste ceramic pieces. This makes his work easy to spot and very colorful. Seven of his works have been named UNESCO world heritage sites. He was commissioned to refurbish the cathedral we saw in Palma de Mallorca.

 

Two of his works are Sagrada Família (a Roman Catholic basilica) and Park Güell (his home for a time). The Sagrada Família is a monstrosity. Everyone goes on and on about this church. I wasn't so impressed. The inside is suppose to be amazing, but we had no interest in standing in a queue for 2 hours to see it. Maybe another time. It was such an enormous undertaking for Gaudí and he was commissioned to do so many things, that he never finished it. In fact when he passed away, it was only about a quarter complete. In 2010 they thought to be midway through the construction, and now the estimated completion date is 2026.

 

 

It takes up one city block and is so tall that it is hard to get a picture it. Park Güell on the other hand was very unique and worth the hike up the hill to see.

 

The curvy part at the top of this structure is one long bench.

 

 

The view from up there is stunning. You can see the Mediterranean and all of Barcelona, including the Sagrada Família (well, of course you can that thing, it is enormous).

The park is huge. It is located on Carmen Hill on the north face of the Collserola Mountain range. Eusebi Güell commissioned Gaudí to create this park with urbanization in mind. It was completed in 1914. There are a number of houses in the park as well as walking paths.

Under the bench looks like this.

 

 

 

We had a really nice walk around the gardens. We stopped for a minute and enjoyed some flamenco dancing. The guys were really good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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