Barcelona : Day 7 : 21 Oct 2008

Casa Mila or La Pedrera was on our list for day 3 in Barcelona. This was another Gaudi building, modeled after Montserrat hill. You will notice this when you looked on its outer side. Brown in color, wavy and curvy in shape, and rocky in texture. The queue was not long, and many of them were students. Too bad, we were not. If not, it would be cheaper by half. Our ticket was E9/pax.


> Outside Casa Mila

It was an apartment building owned previously by Mila family, and they let Gaudi to work his wonder. It is difficult to describe this special building in detail, so showing pictures will be the best method.


> Ground Floor


> Inside Casa Mila


> At the Attic

The best part was the roof top. There were many star wars-like helmet that were actually decorative features for the stair-well, lift shaft and chimney. A clever use of his creativity to dress up something unpleasant.





One of the best spot is highlighted below. Standing at the correct spot, you can have the helmet features next to you, and Sagrada Familia as the background. Just make sure no one suddenly pop up behind you to spoil your picture.

Flag on the sky

Noticed the moon and star this morning at 6.45am. When tilted slightly, you will notice it looks like our flag, with exact colors (blue and yellow) minus the stripes.



> Zoom view

Night View of Genting

Tonight is not so hot, and it's quite windy.
Got a very clear view of Genting and seems like rain is coming soon.
Tried to photograph the lightning and Genting as background.
Some previews below.

Barcelona : Day 6 : Part 2

Another delicious rice dish to introduce was negro arroz (squid-ink rice). It was black in color, a bit salty with some seafood taste. From far, it looked more like burnt rice. It was served on a flat, black wok. The bad thing was, we only managed to find the francaise, microwaved-type rather than those cooked originally. The menu del dia (menu of the day) came with bread and tortilla (potato omelette).

After this meal, our next stop was Parc Guell. It can be reached by metro on green line, and stop at Lesseps station. The park was a bit out of town, and it was located 20 minutes walk from the station . By following the main street and climbing a slope, we ended up at the main entrance of Parc Guell.

According to the stories, it was a failed housing project by Gaudi for Eusebi Guell. Since it was doomed, Gaudi did not abandoned it but turned it into this fairy tale park. Few interesting features; Gaudi salamander, Gaudi house, and tree-like humanoid columns. You can find a Gaudi salamander clone in Singapore, at the Sentosa Island. More specifically, behind the giant Merlion.

Getting into Gaudi house cost E1.80/pax, but we did not as I had been there in my previous trip. It was a hot day, so we did not stay long. But it seemed like those visitor was enjoying the sunlight. This was the main difference between us and them; we looked for shady areas but they were out looking for the sun. We were not used to this weather and heat because we were in much colder Paris few days earlier.

Barcelona : Day 6 : 20 Oct 2008

Our Barcelona travel league started with a visit to the Temple Expiatori De La Sagrada Familia. This, to me is the BEST of Gaudi-designed building. Again, this was my 2nd visit, but it did not differ much compared to year 2002. The construction was still on going, and the scaffoldings were everywhere; inside and outside. This building was featured in a Taiwanese drama, Meteor Garden 2, and I believe not many people knew that this building existed. More so, in this less-explored-but-famous Catalunya city.



To those who wants to know, it is a church and is still the most visited, people-accessible construction site in the world. Construction started in 1883, and in 2008, it was only 60% completed. There's another 18 years to go before we can see it completed. That is our target, to visit Sagrada Familia again in 2026.


> Sagrada Familia's History


> Sagrada in 1900s (23 years old)


> Sagrada in 1930s (58 years old)


> Sagrada in 2008 (125 years old)

To get here, we took the metro purple line from Passeig de Gracia and stopped at Sagrada Familia station. Entrance fee was E10/pax, and the main entrance was at Passion Facade. The opposite side of this squarish building is known as Nativity Facade. Highly recommended to check out this website to know it inside out: www.sagradafamilia.org.


> Passion Facade: Main Entrance


> Nativity Facade

Inside Sagrada Familia, it gave a feeling of being in a concrete forest. We were only allowed to walk on the perimeter, as the centre court was under construction. Gaudi got the inspiration from the forest, and the idea was explained in the 3rd picture.



We went up to one of the towers at Nativity Facade side, and the elevator to the top cost E2.50/pax. It was up by elevator, and down via spiral stairs on foot. The position we were at could easily be 20 stories high. This tower overlooked to the east side of Barcelona, and we saw the bullet-like Torre Agba Tower.

Barcelona : Day 5 : 19 Oct 2008

Skipping the balance days in Paris, I jump straight to introduce my next destination; Barcelona, Spain. This was my 2nd time to Barcelona, the first time was in 2002. Not many people knew this city, and to those who know, they can be categorized into 2 groups; the football fan and the architect. Football fans surely know FC Barca and Nou Camp, and the architects know because of Antoni Gaudi. I knew and explored out of curiosity.



We took the easyJet from Paris Orly airport and landed at Barcelona El Prat airport. Our first surprise; no immigration checkpoint after exiting the plane and moving into airport. This was because travelling within EU nations is seamless nowadays. Going to city centre, we took the commuter train, Renfe which was located outside the airport. One good thing was the location of this airport that is within the city centre zone. So we only need to buy a T-10 ticket that was valid for 10 rides within city centre. From Aeroport station, we changed to metro green line at Passeig de Gracia and then stopped at Liceu. We stayed at Hostel Mendoza, at the centre of La Ramblas, just in front of the station exit. It was a double room that comes with an internal shower for E50/room. Very very convenient...and within budget.. Our first time seeing such room.



La Ramblas is famous boulevard for a few things; mannequin street performers that worked from day till night, souvenir stalls, and the bad one; pickpockets. We were lucky not to meet them. While walking along this street with hundreds of people in the same direction, you'll also meet another hundreds walking opposite of your direction. There were many souvenir shops along both sides of this street, and all of them were owned and manned by South Asian people. Main items were football jerseys and Barcelona souvenir.

Since day 5 was half spent, the remaining half of the days were used to preview the city scene. We walked north-bound to Rambla de Catalunya and further on to Passeig de Gracia. Target to find the tapas or paella restaurants listed in my guide book. But we surrended after half an hour and turned back from Casa Battlo to Catalunya to look for a nearer restaurant.

It was 6.30pm, and we were worried dinner time was not up because Spaniard is famous for their late beer time, 6pm and dinner, 9pm. Anyway, we followed our own rules, dinner at 7pm. We chose what we must have; seafood paella (rice dishes) and sangria (fruity red wine). Conclusion: Satisfied and happy!!



At the south end of LR is the sea and port area, Barceloneta. You can find the Mirador De Colom (Columbus column) and 3D Imax theatre.

Hong Kong 2006

This is a short one on my trip to HK in 2006, just for the benefit of some friends who plans to visit HK. Basically, to introduce what I found to be the interesting and not to be missed stuff. It may cover the usual things that you can find in the internet, but I hope these info provide some alternatives.


> Breakfast: Coffee, Polo Bao, XiMut Tea, Condensed Milk Toast


> Dinner: Pork Rice, Curry Fish Ball, Porridge, Shark Fin Soup


> Dessert: Mango Pudding at Hui Lau San


> Avenue of Stars to look for your fav stars hand print. Prepare a jacket as the place is quite windy and chilly.


> Night show at 8pm opposite of Avenue of Stars. Don't expect to see fireworks, and don't need to take video. Just enjoy with naked eyes.


> This place is near Mongkok. Remember this place (marked in the map) if you are looking for Chao Tau Fu (Pungent Taufu). Just bypass the 1st stall you see because the 'good' smell actually comes from the stall furtherdown.


> Madame Tussuad museum at Victoria's Peak. Remember to approach the line on the left to buy a combo ticket (tram & museum), then proceed to queue on the right. After Madame Tussuad, take the escalator to the top for HK night view, looking towards Tsim Sha Tsui. It will be difficult to get a good spot for photo taking because the best spot was taken by those professionals. Better to start learning to snap pictures at night to not waste the chance to capture the beautiful night view.


> HK Disneyland fireworks every night. First timer should visit Disneyland to know how a Disneyland looks and feels like.



> Try the world's longest escalator, located at Central (Chung Wan) area. While enjoying the upward movement experience, drop out near Wellington Street and look for Lyndhust Terrace Street. HK last Governor, Chris Patten's fav egg tart shop.



> Out of HK, try Lantau Island (Tai Yu Shan) for the Giant Buddha. From HK, you can take the metro. Then, going to the hilltop the quickest was by cable car. But queueing for the ticket may be a turned off. So, be prepared to go for plan B; using bus. The ticket to Giant Buddha included a vegetarian lunch at the nearby temple.



> Going to Macau, you have 2 options; going from Tsim Sha Tsui or Central. Better to opt for Central as we found the boat to be more stable while docking, and price was cheaper. Once in Macau, you can use the bus to move around. Just enjoy the scenery while waiting for your destination to be announced by the driver. The first place to land should be Senado Square (San Ma Lo). This is the starting point to look for pork bun (chee yuk bao), steam egg (dan daan), double layer milk (xiong pei nai, only available from 3pm), and portugese tart.

Things I missed:
> Getting onto a tram
> Going to shopping centres in Causeway Bay (Tung Lo Wan)