After 2 days on the bus we determined we would explore and the first item on the itinerary was to be the La Sagrada Famila, this was the dream of Gaudi, and has continued since his death to be constructed.

However we failed to do our research properly and when we turned up at the ticket counter were told we should have booked, the only times free for entry were 6:15pm or later, and here it was 10am in the morning. That will teach us. So we booked for 6:15 and decided to explore the Gothic quarter, which was also on our list of wants for Barcelona. So it was off to the Metro to buy a T10 ticket each so we could use the metro for 10 trips without having to worry. Interesting system you only pay for getting into the system, you could ride it all day on every line if you wished and it would only cost you one fare and no one would care.

We took the Metro to Placa de Catalunya and decided to wander down La Rambla which runs straight through the Gothic quarter and is something of a tradition for the citizens of Barcelona, part way down we decided to have a look at the Mercado de La Boqueria, which is a fantastic market with lots of stalls selling tapas, and just about anything you could think to eat all beautifully displayed, we thought about trying to get into one of the tapas stalls but as we had had a large breakfast, and could not find a seat at any of them gave up.

We walked through numerous lanes seeing some very interesting sights as the photos will show. We managed to find a nice coffee shop near the cathedral and have a cuppa before carrying on through the quarter to find the other market on the map the Santa Catarina, well if we could put an analogy on them La Boqueria is Queen Vic market in Melbourne whilst Santa Catarina is Sth Melbourne market, nice but small and very yuppy.

Continuing our wandering through the quarter (you could be here for days and not backtrack yourselves) we found a small tapas bar for "lunner" and lucky we did because as soon as we sat down it started to spit with rain, and by the time our first dish arrived it was throwing it down.

We finished "lunner" at around 5pm and started to make our way to La Sagrada Familia basilica, luckily the rain had decided to pause whilst we made the journey and queued outside ready for our 6:15 admission. I am not going to discuss La Sagrada Familia as the few pictures posted here are the best of my ability and do not do it justice in any way. It is just spectacular and surely one of the wonders of the world.

Unluckily for us when we came out of the basilica the rain had really started with earnest, and no cab to be found we caught the underground to close to our hotel, only to come up in the middle of a huge thunderstorm. We survived, even though Jane is petrified of thunderstorms.