Spain - Park Güell, Barcelona

It may seem that I was in a gingerbread house wonderland... but no. I was in Park Güell, Barcelona, and when people say "Barcelona", it has to be Antoni Gaudi.

We entered from the back side of the park. There were hundreds of stairs to climb before we reached the gate, and the gate is not the entrance to what I would call the gingerbread house wonderland (or officially, the Municipal Garden).

One sad thing I found was this graffitti:

I'm not sure why. I saw a number of locals jogging in the park, but they don't seem bothered by the tourists. Anyways, I don't find the locals unfriendly to tourists. At the very least, I don't feel any hostility towards the tourists. Maybe it was just a prank. I mean, if you truly love a place and don't want tourists to - let's say - destroy the properties or something, then you shouldn't vandalize it right?

Well, here's a little snippet of the gingerbread houses from the top of the park.

Man, even from far away, the structures are just so gorgeous!

To view the Municipal Garden, you'd have to pay 8 euros. Otherwise, the entrance to the park itself is free. There was a relatively short line to enter this attraction (as compared to the line to enter Sagrada Familia).

If you bought the ticket, you'll be provided with a guide map. I didn't really use the map because you can't really get lost in the Municipal Garden. The Municipal Garden itself is not very big.

 The first weird structure in the Municipal Garden was this viaduct. Very typical of Gaudi: it's not something I can understand, but it made me amazed nevertheless.

And then there is a fancy pavilion close to another entrance of Park Güell. It's just really hard to deny that this looks like a fancy gingerbread house with white sugar icing on top.

Oh, and that's not all. The terrace was stunning!

It's really full of wonders.

I had the chance to take a close up photo of the famous salamander (or also known as el drac). Apparently, this salamander was once vandalized in 2007, and then was restored.

I think it's really worth the money, time and effort to visit the park. We spent only about an hour here because we only had 2 and a half days in Barcelona.

Gaudi's works never stop to amaze me.

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Spain - Palau Guell, Barcelona

From the front entrance, it was a bit difficult to tell why there were so many people queuing up in front of Palau Guell, or Guell Palace. However, the more I explored the interiors, the more amazed I became, and the highlight of the experience was actually on the roof top:

If you are a student, you can get a discounted ticket for 8 euros per person. You have to buy the ticket before you go into the waiting line. It took us about 20-30 minutes before we entered, and we were there during the weekday. I suppose you should be prepared to wait longer during the weekends.

The ticket comes with free audio guide. First, we were guided to the basement, where they used to keep horses.

The pillars have a really strange funnel-like structure. They looked a little bit like mushrooms to me.

As we approached the first floor, I saw this beautiful glass art in front of an old piano. It was slightly before noon, and I saw this beautiful ray of sunlight passing through the glass, illuminating the hidden picture in the middle of the window.

I think it was a very brilliant play of natural sunlight. And the tints of colours reflected off the glass stains at the border of the main picture made it even more picturesque.

The interiors were filled with detailed crafts.

And on the top floor, you could see how Gaudi created the colour combination in his design:

Might be quite interesting to figure out why this pattern was chosen. By any chance, is there an algorithm to this pattern? A pattern in hexadecimals?

But anyways, as I mentioned, the highlight of Gaudi's work is on the rooftop.

The first thing I thought to myself... WHAT THE MARTIANS ARE THOSE??

They look like cones in colours and various shapes. None of them are the same. As you have seen in the first pictures, there are even cones with weird shapes that remind you of a tree, or a rainbow ice cream swirl, or... a rocket?? A durian?? Those things are just so... weird! Why would you place these kind of structures on the rooftop anyways?

But I guess that is something an art enthusiast can answer. I love to see beautiful designs, but when I have to ask an architect to build me a house, I probably wouldn't think of requesting such random structures on the rooftop.

And this.. just looks like a communication tower built to make contacts with extraterrestrial being:

His works are simply stunning. I still don't get why they are shaped like that, or why they are placed on the rooftop in a somewhat random arrangement (I see no connection between the shapes and the colours of the "cones"). I guess I really have to dig into this topic or consult an art specialist to have a better understanding of his works.

Unbelievable structures, yet stunningly attractive and beautiful.

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