Adios Barcelona!

Nice hair, boys! We were ready to start the next leg of the sabbatical. But first a couple things I've neglected to mention from our Barcelona stay, both appalling for me to forget, since they were highlights for our family. First off, the Picasso Museum was great. I hadn't realized how much he'd tried every style of painting, how influenced he was by other painters, or how young he was when painting took over his life. We all loved his respectful but wild homage to Las Meninas. If we hadn't just seen Velasquez's masterpiece in the Prado, I'm not sure we would have been as enthralled but it was fascinating to see how Picasso altered and shifted each piece. The kids were running around trying to figure out where the dog was, etc.

Another glaring miss in my posts was the City Museum of Barcelona which was a surprise hit. You take an elevator down (2000 years they say) to the archeological excavation of Barcino, a Roman settlement found near the cathedral. They've set up boardwalks so you can walk on top or among the roads, building remains, and specific sites such as the laundry, wine presses, etc. The Romans clearly played a lot of games and game boards are etched into the stones here and there. And of course it's always good for the kids to learn fun facts such as that the Romans used urine to clean their clothes. Here's hoping they forget that before school starts.

We'd worked out the first piece of our next leg: 3 days in Cadaques, an artist colony/beach town where my publishing friend Norma Fenoglio (thanks N!) lived for many years. She often encouraged me to visit but a year before we arrived in Spain she'd moved to Argentina, so unfortunately we missed seeing her. But we took the road north from Barcelona nearly to the border with France to see this gorgeous town on the Costa Brava. More to come....