4/22/22 Last Day in Barcelona, Sail Towards Valencia

Today we started with a panoramic view of Barcelona from the only building left from a World's Fair in 1929 located on Montjuic (the Jewish Mountain formerly used as a Jewish cemetary until the Jews were expelled, converted, or tortured during the Spanish Inquisition in the 1400s. All the buildings were planned to be temporary and were cheaply constructed, but due to popular demand, the Palau Nacional was saved and is now a museum of Catalan art. Apparently, it regularly needs refurbishment because it was never intended to last this long

From there, we wandered around on foot looking at old buildings until it was time for lunch.

After lunch, we had a tour of Casa Mila, an apartment building designed and built by Gaudi. Mila had been impressed with work Gaudi had done just up the street for Casa Battlo and wanted something even more impressive. It did not turn out well for Senor Mila. His intent was to create a 16,000 square foot residence on the floor above a street level commercial space and then rent out 4,000 square foot apartments (4 per floor) on the upper floors. Gaudi apparently had a vision (and cost overuns) that Mila did not concur with and he refused to pay the vast sums Gaudi demanded. Gaudi took him to court and won, bankrupting Mila, who never was able to move into the building. Gaudi turned around and donated his win to the municipality because the money was never the point. 

The building is majorly strange. From outside to the roof and attic, it is like nothing I have ever seen. We were able to visit one apartment set aside for tours. There were a lot of chopped up rooms, but the bathrooms were amazingly spacious for the time. Gaudi created an underground car park, which was considered very strange at the time, and this was the level where we started.

Exterior with a LONG Catalan flag

Above and below: Model of exterior and
the interior courtyards. We started in the
larger courtyard.

The larger inner courtyard. We are standing
on the driveway.

Garage door.

Art work painted onto the ceilings.

Looking down into the courtyard from the roof.

The tall tan structures are chimneys.
The white structure is tiled and is an
entrance to the attic. The 'eyelid' windows
are in the attic which was used for laundry.
The window design allowed them to be
opened for drying without letting in rain.

 

 

 

One of the advantages of the upper backside apartments
was the view of the neighboring building exterior lounges.

We entered the attic which looked like going into the belly of whale or a snake.The ceiling  levels undulated like the roof above. When it was used as a laundry, the brick structure of the attic was covered and painted white. Later, it was divided into several apartments. In this iteration, the brick structure is highlighted.

Another model of the building

The view out of one of the eyelash windows

Floor plan of the main apartment. It is hard to see how
it would have been useful with so many walls not
apparently making separate rooms.

Gaudi also designed furniture which is
actually very ergonomic despite looking
uncomfortable.

Next, we walked down to a top floor apartment, which was furnished with period furniture not the type that Gaudi designed.

Even on the door frames, Gaudi resisted
straight lines.

The bath seems quite spacious for the
time.

The primary bedroom

After the tour, we went back to the ship and quickly set sail for Valencia. Unfortunately,the sea was quite rough and I was concerned that I would be in no shape to have dinner at the captain's table. This is an honor for the travelers with the most OAT trips, and we were #2 on the list. I put on my seabands and lay down for a while and decided to give it a shot. Fortunately, the pitching on the 2nd level where the dining room is was significantly less noticeable than in our 4th level cabin and we had a pleasant evening. As soon as we started to climb the stairs, we were reminded of how bad it really was and immediately went to bed even though it was only 8:45pm.