Today the weather seems to have followed me from Seattle – it’s been overcast all day and a bit misty – but no bother! I made it out to see La Sagrada Familia, Antoni Gaudi’s famed work of art that began construction in 1882, and isn’t planned to be completed until at least 2020. It’s truly fascinating, the first thing that struck me was how great it was to see the differences in material quality and age from the older material to that which has been recently built. There are so many details – and everything is a detail – to the structure that it’s difficult to describe it all as a whole. I got there with just enough time to do a self-guided audio tour, which was handy. The take away from that was about how Gaudi wanted the interior to be perceived – perfectly, and as an extension to nature. The central columns are shaped like trees with their branches supporting the top of the building, and the windows are designed to allow just the perfect amount (and colors) of light in. The choir can seat more than one hundred singers, and the stones above them are harmonically shaped to perfectly direct the music throughout the entire church. There are also curious cryptograms and hundres of other peculiar puzzles throughout the architecture. I look forward to returning again once construction has completed – I’m sure it will be even more awe-striking then. I took a good number of photos here – and hope to have some uploaded soon. Uploading large numbers of photos is tricky over here, but hopefully I’ll get some up as I go along.
The second major thing I did today, actually before visiting La Sagrada Familia, is book a reservation on a Talgo train to Montpellier, France for tomorrow (Sunday) at 8:45am. That will get me on the way to Marseille (it’s necessary to transfer trains at Montpellier) where I plan to stay for two or three days before heading up to Paris to bring in the new year.
The reason my reservation is only to Montpellier, and not all the way to Marseille is because apparently they just make the reservation from your current location – so I’ll make another once I arrive at Montpellier. This gives me some flexibility, too – I think I’ll stay a night in Arles, which is a quiet and small town/region that’s highly suggested by several sources (Rick Steves, Wikitravel). There seem to be a good number of hotels/hostels/bed & baths available there – so hopefully I can find something decent (and inexpensive!)
Also – the photos that I’ve began to upload from my camera are now often geotagged automatically! This is very exciting, and is due to the Nikon GP-1 GPS attachment that my Mom, Aunt, and Uncle got me for Christmas. Thanks guys!
This isn’t really exposed on Flickr (that I’ve found), but you can get a map for things matching a certain tag – I’m tagging all of my photos on this trip with Eu2010 (among other things) so here’s an awesome way to follow the trail of my travels!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cdine/tags/eu2010/map/
I’ll add a link on the sidebar to the right so this map is always easy to get to.
Well, hopefully my next update will be from Arles, France! Auvoir!
Christmas Lights in Barcelona
It looks like you’re having a blast! That GPS thing is freakin’ awesome, it’s fun to almost wander around the streets with you. I remember a lot of those places from when I was there. Keep uploading.
It is awesome! I love it. There’s practically nothing you need to do – just wait a second or two usually, and it’s ready to go. If you leave it on constantly though, it’ll burn through a battery in a day pretty easily – but you can make it only turn on when the camera’s metering, which saves a lot of energy at the potential cost of longer lock times. Either way, it’s sweet!