¡Mi hermana esta aqui!

Saturday morning I was up bright and early and off to a hotel downtown to meet up with my latest Canadian visitors! This was none other than my godfather, Doug Seegmiller, with his better half, Barb, and 3 sons, Thomas, Robbie, and Marcus. These guys were only in town for Saturday and Sunday, as Sunday night they left on a week long Mediterranean cruise. I actually hadn't seen any of them in a year or two, so it was great to catch up over a nice hotel breakfast [Thomas and Robbie haven't changed very much since last seeing them, but Marcus is at least a foot and a half taller, and now stands way above his older brothers!].

This group, although understandably jetlagged after arriving in BCN at noon on Friday, announced that I was their new tourguide for the day and would follow me anywhere, as long as I didn't go overboard on the amount of walking. I showed them how to use the metro system and we were off to Sagrada Familia first. After a quick trip up to the top of one of the towers via the lift (some of the group were a little uncomfortable at that height), we took the metro down to Barri Gotic to see the old cathedral. We wandered around this neighbourhood and over to El Borne. It was decided that the lineup for the Picasso Museum was a little too long considering the limited amount of time for touring, so we went to the Maria del Mar church instead. After a nice drink at a cafe patio we walked back into Barri Gotic and had lunch at a restaurant called Los Caracoles (famous for their snails). I'd heard about this very old spanish restaurant from many guide books and other visitors coming to see me, so it was great to finally have a chance to try it out. None of us were disappointed with our meals, and the atmosphere of this old place was very classic and traditional, like it hadn't changed at all over the last 100 years. Finally, after lunch we crossed over to the other side of La Rambla and walked around through the stalls of the main BCN openair market. I think seeing this place is a important experience for anyone visiting the city. I go there every chance that I get, and could probably spend forever walking between the stalls. The smells, sounds, and look of the different fresh seafood, fruits, vegetables, meats, nuts, and spices, is amazing. Fresh figs are in prime season right now :) Doug and Barb then wouldn't let me leave until they'd stocked me up with lots of groceries to feed myself and my new guest for this week,....

Yes, that's right, the Wilson sisters are reunited for the next 10 days! Saturday night I went and picked up Katharine at the Barcelona airport!!! I felt like I was in a movie waiting for her to come through the gate. She was in fine form having just barely caught her flight leaving from London Stansted, mainly because she'd taken a tour of London with some people she'd met on the train into the city,... email her if you want the details of that adventure. Somehow, even though she's been working so hard this summer (haha), her tan is even darker than mine. When we got back to my flat the Sants festival behind my building was still in full swing so we went down to see what crazy events were taking place. I'm really glad that she got to see this festival, because it will probably be the least-touristy thing that she does during her stay. We were definitely the only foreigners (besides the other iaeste people that we met) dancing away to the spanish bands and drinking Caiprinihas in the middle of the street party.

Sunday morning it was cloudy and overcast in Barcelona, so we took the train from BCN to the next large city going south, called Tarragona. We were joined by my flatmates and Bartec's dad and sister who are also staying with us. The city beach is really nice and long, soft sand, and not very crowded. The water was the best that I've seen since arriving here; perfectly clear, clean, and cool. We stayed pretty much all day as there wasn't a cloud in the sky, and left around 7pm. While we'd planned to go out that night, we decided not to since we were both exhausted from too much sun.

On Monday while I was at work Kat got her first taste of the city as she toured around on her own. She managed to see La Rambla, the market, the cathedral, and the areas around the port. After work we met downtown and went and saw Antoni Gaudi's Casa Mila (a.k.a. La Pedera), which I had yet to tour. After many pictures on the famous roof top of this popular house we made our way down Passaige de Gracia, did a little shopping, and went to the restaurant La Fonda for dinner. The food is always so good there. Here are some pictures of us at La Pedera.

Finally, I must include a huge thank-you to Doug and Barb for treating me to breakfast and lunch on Saturday. The fruit and seafood from the market was wonderful! Kat and I feasted! Those fresh figs were phenomenal :) You guys were a lot of fun to tour around with, and I hope that I didn't make you walk too much. It was great to see you all, especially on the otherside of the world. Bon Voyage!

Gracia Festival & F.C. Barcelona

PART 1
Over the course of the summer just about every other neighbourhood in Barcelona, and the surrounding towns, celebrates by throwing an annual festival. The amount of effort put into each one varies, but in general it’s astounding how elaborate the decorations are for almost all of them. One of the most famous ones in downtown Barcelona is called Festa Gracia, and I was lucky to spend 2 days taking in this experience. You may have already heard a little about this through Jenn Hedayat’s blog (see link), but while she saw much of the beginning of the festival, I was only able to catch the events at the end of the week long event.

The first night was a Friday night, and I wandered the streets of the Gracia neighbourhood with my flatmates, Karolina and Bartek. We found lots of people salsa dancing, tons of live samba and jazz music, and even a couple of spanish punk/ska bands. There arout 20 or so streets which have been decorated, each around a different theme, and it was so much fun to walk down each one of them and take in the atmosphere. Here are some pictures of my favourite ones.

At noon on Sunday we went to a square in Gracia where Castellers were performing, which are 'human castles'. These were amazing, but scary to watch as I was so afraid that someone would fall (especially the 5 or 6 year old girls who's role it was it climb to the very top). I was extremely impressed with the strength, focus, and balance of each team who's trust in one another was essential to completing the tower. I don't think these pictures actually capture how incredibly high these structures of people were. I found myself holding my breath as the last people climbed to the top and completed the tower and started to come back down. Just amazing! While I really like this event, and it gave me dejavue back to the grease pole climbing days (Queen's Eng.), I'm still not sure if I agree with having such young children involved. Regardless, what a tradition,...

Correfoc. This event is absolutely insane, and I wish I knew how it had developed into such a typical spanish tradition. This craziness involves about a hundred or so people dressed as devils/toros (bulls), completely clothed from head to toe, carrying large staffs with sparkler firecrackers attached at the top. These people dance through the street spraying everyone, themselves and all of the spectators, with sparks. Every 2 seconds a loud bang goes off right beside you, that never fails to make me jump even if I know it's coming. Between each group of sparkler twirlers there's a great drum band that you can't help but dance to. Also they have some large floats of dragons or other animals which are rigged with more firecrackers that they light and spin around in the middle of the street. The atmosphere is very exciting, and so entertaining! I went to the Gracia festival correfoc last Sunday, and then I saw some of the Sants festival correfoc last night as it started in the park right behind my building. People here are just obsessed with firecrackers and apparently there are no restrictions on where and when you can set them off,...

PART 2
Should you visit Barcelona in the near future (mum take note) there are a few areas in which you should know the basics, and at the top of that list is futbol (aka soccer). Because of this my coworkers have taken it upon themselves to give me a crash course, and I’ve decided to pass on to you the main points that I’ve picked up.

#1: Barcelona has 2 futbol teams: F.C. Barcelona (Barca for short), and RCD Espanol. If you support F.C. Barcelona then you’re called a ‘Culé’, and if you support RCD Espanol then you’re ‘Periquitos ’. Also if you’re the arch rival and you support Real Madrid, then you’re a ‘Merengue’. (tickets to a game against Madrid is vitually impossible to get)

#2: The Barce team colours are Red and Blue, and the jersey’s are vertical strips of these two colours.

#3: In my opinion, if you need to know any name in this sport it’s Ronaldinho. He’s a Brazilian player on Barce’s team, and is probably the current best player in the world. He’s the most entertaining to watch on the field, not only because of his fancy footwork and perfect plays, but because he always has a smile on his face and you can tell he loves what he’s doing. This is the name that you’ll see on the back of just about every single Barca jersey.

#4: The home stadium of F.C. Barcelona is called Camp Nou, which can seat 100,000 people in total. (see pics below)

Okay, this past Tuesday I joined about 20 other iaeste trainees for a match at Camp Nou of F.C. Barcelona verses F.C. Bayern Munich. This specific game was the annual 'Gamper Cup' which is a single annual match, originally started by the man Gamper who owns the club and selects the team. Each year it's against a different club, and it's technically a 'friendly' game.

We arrived at Camp Nou at around 7:30 and we were up in our seats, very high up! :) by around 8pm. They were lots of fire works as each member of the Barca team was introduced at around 9:30pm and then the game finally started at 10:15. Two 45 minute halfs. The first goal was scored by Ronaldinho in a penalty kick; he makes it look so easy; as if it takes no effort what-so-ever. 2 more goals were scored in the first half, and then one more in the second half, making the final score 4-0 for Barcelona! What a game. My first, and hopefully not my last.

Love at first sight

Imagine the scenery of Whistler, BC, without the commercialism, combined with Georgian Bay, only replacing the fresh water lakes with mountains and glacier waterfalls. I am in love with Chamonix Mont-Blanc. I am incapable of fully describing my surroundings of this past long weekend, and so I’ve posted a number of pictures. However, even they barely do justice to what it was really like in this piece of heaven.

Friday night I took a 12 hour bus ride from Barcelona to Annemasse (which is a French town located across the boarder from Geneva, Switzerland). At 6am when my bus pulled in I quickly met up with Alain who was waiting for me at the train station which is across the street (I only mention this because it was quite lucky, as we really weren’t sure where the bus would drop me off in this town). From Annemasse it’s a one hour drive back to the Magnan’s chalet in Chamonix. They are located just outside of the city in an area called Le Bois Rond / Taconnaz, on the base of Mont-Blanc mountain. Their chalet is one of the 2 original buildings built on their road, as it was constructed in 1714 (see pic). Over the 30 years that the Magnan’s have owned it, they’ve done some slight renovations by raising and redoing the roof, but it’s essentially the same building that it always has been. The below pictures are of the chalet and then the views that you have looking up at Mont Blanc from their front door.

Saturday morning there was some rain and overcast, and so Alain and Miche showed me the town of Chamonix and we walked around the market which takes place every week on Saturday morning. After lunch back at the chalet, the four of us (Myrna, Alain, Miche, and I) went to visit the Church of Notre Dame de Toute Grace, which is a beautiful little church created through the collaboration of pieces of art from many different famous French artists.

Then we dropped by Myrna’s favourite antique shop on the way home to check out what they had. Their chalet is anything but flashy, and the decorating that they have done is with antiques that they have mainly purchased from this shop.

The chalet is beautiful. The fireplace is always lit, and it seems like there is always a vinyl record playing some classical music on the record player. The kitchen is overflowing with fruit and vegetables straight from their garden in Bouc-bel-air, and Myrna’s French cuisine has permanently raised my standards for quality eating. After many rounds of cribbage against Miche, the Maynard name was successfully defended :) It is a lot of fun to feed their dog Nemo from the table,… we should all hope to come back in our next life as a dog in the Magnan family,… it would be a good life.

Unfortuantely, Sunday and Monday were days with weather similar to that of Saturday. Fortunately, when in Chamonix you are very close to two other countries which make for perfect day trips. So, after lunch on Sunday the four us jumped in their 4wheel drive Suzuki and drove the 30minutes to Martigny, Switzerland. Some of the best Swiss wine is created from the vineyards on the slopes surrounding this small city. We went to a museum called Fondation Pierre Gianadda which was showcasing a collection from The Metropolitan Museum of Art New York. Once again, just like in Marseille, when I visit any museum with Myrna, as opposed to on my own, I learn so much more about what I’m seeing. It should be called Myrna’s Art 101 crash course for dummies. Of course a trip to Switzerland wouldn’t be complete without the purchase of some chocolate, and so on our way home we stopped just before the boarder and stocked up.

On Monday the weather had still not improved in Chamonix, but according to Alain it was a bit better on the Italian side of Mont-Blanc. So, again after lunch we jumped in the Suzuki and took the Tunnel du Mont-Blanc, to Courmayeur. This tunnel, which closed in 2002 because of serious accident but is now open, is 11,611 meters long running from Chamonix, France to Courmayeur, Italy. It takes about 20 minutes to drive through and it’s interesting to think that when you’re at the very center of the tunnel you’re at least 4km from the surface of the earth in every direction. Courmayeur is a very beautiful town that is similar to Chamonix, only Italian, so much more posh (and expensive). We stopped by a coffee bar for the most expensive, but delicious, cappuchinos any of us would be having for quite some time.

I should mention that Tuesday, August 15th, is a holiday in almost every European country and is therefore one of the few days that the locals who work in Chamonix have a day off in this prime summer season. This day happened to have absolutely perfect weather, and so the Magnan’s reserved a table for lunch at the chalet refuge de mayerers. To get to this refuge we drove away from Chamonix and MontBlanc and partway up another mountain. After parking the car we hiked up a bit farther to an altitude of 1600m where the refuge is located. From this spot you have the ultimate breath-taking view of the entire Mont-Blanc mountain range. This day was by far the highlight of my stay as I could finally fully appreciate how awesome these mountains really are. I was definitely the only non-french speaking person at this refuge for lunch as everyone else there, besides the Magnan’s and I, were locals. This lunch was probably the greatest meal of my life (not exaggerating at all). Wine, fresh bread, salad, pork, potatoes, cheek of the pig, cornmeal balls, cheese, tart, coffee, grappa,… what else could you ever need. I could have stayed up there forever taking in the scenery, eating, drinking, and watching the planes land on a small runway bringing in other people for lunch.

(Note, you probably don’t recognize this refuge, but if you’re an avid James Bond fan than you might remember it from one of the Pierce Brosnan 007 films)

Wednesday morning it was a little overcast when I first got up, but by mid day it was quite warm again. Alain and I took the red Mont-Blanc gear train up to one of the main glaciers called Mer du Glace (Sea of Ice). The train took about 20 minutes to get up to the base of this famous glacier which is a rather popular tourist destination. There are 3 different routes to get down to the glacier from where the train lets you off. Most of the people don’t want to walk, and take a small gondola lift to get down. There is also a relatively easy walking trail, and then last but not least there are some ladders that you can use to climb down. On the way up Alain asked me which way I’d like to go, and of course since the ladders sounded the most exciting I wanted to go that way,… well I didn’t quite realize what I was getting myself into until I was at the top of a 60 meter completely vertical rock face looking down. Needless to say this climb down got the adrenaline running. Throughout these travels I am constantly learning about myself, and what I am and am not capable of, and this day I was pleased to learned that I do not have vertigo and relatively speaking I’m not afraid of heights. (yay!) The views were absolutely spectacular from both the top and bottom of the series of ladders. Alain and I walked around at the edge of the glacier for a little while, searching for rock crystals, but as we hadn’t brought ice crampons with us, it wasn’t safe to go up on top of the glacier.

As you can imagine I was on a complete high for this entire trip. It was like I was walking through a National Geographic magazine for 5 days straight. Chamonix has now tied Georgian Bay for my number one favourite place in the world. At this point I cannot imagine that another trip will be able to top this one.

How did I ever get to be so lucky?