Weekend in Barcelona, climbing Montjuic

(Weekend of Oct. 3-4)

First, this is a picture of the longest my mustache got over my mouth before I started trimming the top. But that was a while ago. My goatee is pretty thick in the middle, but I trim the chin.

Second, I had a laptop accident. I'm ultra careful about my computer, and drinks or food by it, and I had a little metal cup (pretty bottom-heavy and stable) that was sitting at least two feet away. I reached for something towards my computer and knocked the glass across the table and spilled all over the computer. Hours later, after running to school and hardware store (literally running) to get screwdrivers, I took half the parts out of the back, cleaned and dried it, and took off half the keys to clean under them. Here's the keys off. I really hated myself after this one. Being as careful as I am I still totally screwed up. But everything is clean and working fine except the backlighting under the keyboard, which I hafta clean again. Will take hours of key removal. Again.

Awhile ago now, I went with Britta and her parents up Montjuic, a large hill with a castle on top, and came down the other side.

This is the cable car we took UP the mountain.

This is from the top, from the castle.

Also from the top, you can see the monumental Palau down below that we saw later.

The city down below, you can see Gaudi's Sagrada Familia.

The drawbridge of the castle, that still works- there isn't a moat anymore though. Just grass and flowers.

The harbor, where they have cruise ships, from up on the mountain.

The industrial side of Barcelona, backside of the hill. Amazing.

The castle. You can see the wedge-shaped spaces where the canons sit to shoot people.

These guns are from like WWI or WWII. Crazy.

Some sort of helmet, but clearly not wearable.

Another door to castle, with cannons and guard house or something.

Me in the guard gate.

Its 0 meters to go that direction.

Stadium again in the distance, with Calatrava sculpture thing in the foreground, giant plaza and such. Huge, for the Olympics. Damn you Rio de Janeiro.

The Barcelona Olympic Stadium!!!

The Olympic Torch.

When we got down we were in Plaza de Espana where we saw the fireworks- here's an old bull-fighting ring that is being renovated I guess.

Here is a view the opposite direction, up the steps towards Palau Nacional, where they have a huge art museum as well. We got there just in time to be sitting on those steps up there to watch the water fountain show with music. Pretty cool. Monumental looking!

More water fountain. Pretty cool.

Water fountain, boulevard, towers in the distance with bullfighting ring.

The towers close up. Where we stood to watch fireworks the other night.

Near the Palau is this, the Mies Barcelona Pavilion- one of the most iconic pieces of modernist architecture. Unfortunately kind of underwhelming, but it was pretty important back in 1929 when it was built!