Sunday Sept 7th Barcelona

I woke up at 5am and could NOT get back to sleep! It was awful of course, Tim was sawing logs. I put on my iPod and listened to it for a couple of hours. By the time Tim got up I was ready to fall back to sleep of course! We ate some snacks in the hotel room and then headed out. We wanted to hit the Sagrada Familia http://www.sagradafamilia.cat/ A cathedral designed by Gaudi, unfinished, it is still a work in progress. We walked there...passed a library, not open though! We also passed the Arc de Triumph of Barcelona...very beautiful. Tim found a bocce court in the park! Anyway, we arrived at the Sagrada Familia and paid to get in...so much to take pictures of! We looked through the cathedral, then stood in line to ride the lift to the top and walk around the top. The view was incredible. Then we went out to see the Gaudi side of the cathedral, also amazing! We left the cathedral to hit the Picasso Museum, decided to take a cab so we would have plenty of time to walk around. We take the cab and end up waiting in a long line for the Picasso Museum. Turns out that it is free the first Sunday of the month...and so we waited to get in. The Picasso Museum was incredible. Much of Picasso's early work, you could see the transformation once his work was influenced by other artists. He had some incredible works from when he was 15 years old. Once through the museum, we went to a cafe for an incredible sandwich and some coffee. We return to the hotel for an afternoon nap and then we head out to walk the Barri Gothic region. The cathedrals and alley ways are incredible. We go into the big cathedral from last night, and then we wind our way through the alleys to other places. We got some ice cream, we see a open air market selling cheeses and meats. We end up near where we were last night, stop at an outdoor cafe from some sangria, it was really nice out. Then we head down the waterfront opposite of where we went the previous night and see the Columbus monument, there is a flea market going on there...lots of neat old things. And, then we head up Las Ramblas...this outdoor shopping area with cafes all up and down the road. There are tons of shops and artists booths. Tim and I stop to get some tapas and sit and people watch. We also got some incredible dessert churros y chocolat...very yummy! Then we headed back to our hotel a totally different way...passed a Hard Rock Cafe...I just HAD to go in! I got a t-shirt, the girl in there was so fun! She wants to come to America! We told her that Barcelona was pretty awesome! We then got to the hotel and crashed!