Since I’ve been here many times, I’m not doing all the “regular” touristy things people do in Barcelona, though I still love to pop on my running shoes and jog circles around the dazed tourists in Parc Güell.

Here are a few things you can do — well, that I actually did — in the past week or so…

• Go to a play: If your Spanish (or Catalan!) is good enough, this is a great way to get a taste of the local culture (and a more pleasant kind of culture than stomach flu). Went to see Lorca eran todos, a play by comedian Pepe Rubianes (though this was not a comedy!). Not surprisingly (given the title), the play is about famous Spanish poet Federico García Lorca, and his murder by Franco’s Nationalists in 1936, at the start of the Spanish Civil War.
• Go to see music: There are tons of shows on, all the time. I already mentioned the fantastic Sara Bares dance show we saw. When in town, I always make a point of going to Tarantos to see a flamenco show. They have different artists every night of the week, performing three short (30-minute) shows for 5€ (you can see all three shows for the price). I’ve seen some amazing young performers here, but also some duds. This time, it was a great group called Alboreá. The only problem is that Tarantos sometimes gets packed with tourists who get as close as they can and take tons of flash photographs. I can understand the desire to document this exciting flamenco experience (I’ve done it myself), but with a FLASH? You could tell it bothered the musicians and dancers, but for some reason they didn’t say anything. If I were a scrapper, I’d have gotten into a fist-fight with one imbécil de tomo y lomo who even turned around several times and took flash photos of his girlfriend in the audience(!), blinding us all. Such antics really ruined the third set for us… ¡menos mal que hemos visto la segunda actuación!
• Go to a restaurant: In a (successful) attempt to save money, during this trip I ate most dinners en casa. But still went out a few times. Among the places that were interesting: Attic — though packed with tourists, it’s one of the few places I’d recommend on Las Ramblas (and in keeping with my “scrimping”, its quality/price ratio is high). We popped in because it was practically next door to the Club Capitol theatre where we saw the Lorca play. Rita Blue — funky bar and restaurant, also good value. We sat in the basement; very casual, and it was non smoking down there…what a treat! (In January 2006, Spain imposed a wimpy non-smoking law that doesn’t quite give bars and restaurants enough motivation to declare themselves non-smoking; but it’s a start). And tonight — off to the hip Plà, or maybe to Cal Pep — supposedly the best seafood in town!

• Go for a hike: for me, no vacation is complete without going for a hike…somewhere, anywhere. I need nature. On this trip I didn’t have as much opportunity, and my intestinal troubles wiped out one of the two weekends. This past Sunday we drove (about an hour and a half) to a trailhead near Viladrau in the Parc Natural del Montseny. We avoided some very nasty (and untied) guard dogs, hiked up the very steep trail to the shrine of Sant Segimon, where we encountered another nasty dog, a beautiful horse and some grumpy restoration workers. Apparently you used to be allowed into the mountaintop site, but now it’s closed to the hiking public. Luckily, a woman working there grudgingly allowed us to pass through and take a look at the shrine (and the view!). Then, since we’d made a very lazy, late start and the sun was setting, we had to race back down.
• See the sea: I love the ocean. Someday I will live by the ocean. In the meantime, I visit it whenever I can, even if it’s just down by the port to watch the waves, and even if it’s winter.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 7th, 2006 at 11h17 and is filed under Spanish, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.