and I solved this puzzle... it was hard... but it was fun! especially during the 6 hours I had class...
Not that you want to try it... but the real squares are the ones without squigillies... (thats a new word!)...So after classes... I randomly decided that I shouldn't take the subway back to Onix... that would be boring and uneventful, plus I would be standing for most of the 45 minute trip and thats not good on my (broken) toe. So clearly a better idea is to walk back from the University to Onix. Jokes aside, I really just felt like I was missing what was going on in the world by taking the subway. I was and I wasn't. I may do it again taking a totally different route, but I'm just gonna write down what I did and where I went. I had a few goals; I accomplished them and a few goals I forgot about.
If I knew I was going to write this I would have taken more pictures while leaving the University and when first getting onto the Diagonal. Speaking of which... I didn't really know how I was going to walk back, I had no map... I did know that the Av. Diagonal diagonaled the city and some knowledge of the area surrounding Onix with some basic idea of the direction(s) I needed to head. Turns out that that is all I needed, but perhaps a little bit more planning/knowledge would have saved me 20/30 minutes of walking time.
Anyway I knew the Diagonal was basically next to the metro station I've been getting off of to go to school, so thats where I started my paseo. The first really fun thing I ran into was an awesome building (I like black and blockyness apprently) that was apparently made by "La Caixa" (A major bank in Catalunya).
I just liked it alot, so deal with it. It was located a mile or so beyond the metro station, and was pretty much my first point I wanted to reach. Across the street was a crazy buildling though... I mean I knew the spanished liked their hanging gardens... but this is ridiculous...
Then I spotted the ever popular (not my favorite place in the world, but apparenlty everyone else's) a Starbucks.
The Starbucks as it turned out, was just before the Maria Cristina exit on the Metro (one metro stop down from where I get off/on for the university). One more plaza (major intersection) down the road... we had a Carte Ingles (basically a giant department store) and a Decathlon just below it.
And we keep walking... the Diagnonal is a mess of shops and residences... almost all of Barcelona has shops/commercial things on the first level and residences on the second level. Not any of this American zoning and requiring cars to get around... (this is another rant). As I contemplated this, I got myself to another plaza which was one of the larger plazas in town.
And right next to this awesome green space was this cool building that curved due to the plaza it was adjunct to.
And we keep going. Moving right along, on the right side of the road I see this eye catching building showing its dominance over the plaza...
And just as I snap that picture another set of strange colors catch my eye from across the plaza. I make my way over to the building, which happens to be the Bank of Zurich, which has these awesome red tiles and funny castle like thing at the top.
At this point I start feeling like I've walked far enough down this Diagonal thing, plus there are so may cars and the electric trolley that I could ride for free (with my month metro pass) was taunting me, so I felt like I needed to turn. On the block before I do I see this crazy Gaudi'ish balcony (I say Gaudi'ish because of the candle melting way the balcony looks, which reminded me of the Sagrada Familia).
I get to the corner, only to be confronted by a giant building owned by BancSabadell, which had a pretty impressive facade on the street...
I turn on that street follow it around for a little while... get deflected by some construction and that places me parallel with some awesome looking apartments...
I keep walking for a while... at this point I start to get the impression that I need to know where I'm going before I end up in tim-buck-to, but before I knew it I saw a street name I recognized... of course I failed to consider that perhaps this street was part of the grid of Barcelona and a rather long road. The road I ran into was Rhamblas Cataluyna.
Any road with Rhamblas in it, is basically a giant avenue just for people to walk down. Its awesome, another thing to mention... at NO NO point was I the only person walking along the sidewalks... walking IS the thing to do... although I think I'd get a bike if I lived here.. speed is nice too. Anyway I'm veering away. I followed Rh. Cataluyna forever... I start getting antsy about where I'm heading and hop a street over, which happened to be Av. Cataluyna (go figure) looking for a bus map. But before I have a chance to sour my paseo with real directions I see buildings that are familiar. This mainly because I have reached plaza Cataluyna (which means I have definitely not chosen the optimal path, hah).
This is the plaza I've been walking to for weeks, to visit the famed Las Rhamblas where the crazy FCB (Football Club Barcelona) riots took place when they won the Champions League (The League of Leagues of Europe, crazier than the World Cup for Spain). This is also were we start (Plaza Cataluyna on the red line metro) our nights out, for dinner and some sangria. So I'm all of a sudden back in my element, 2.5 miles away from Residencia Onix, I know where I am and where I'm going to (or at least I thought). Landmark #1..
She's pretty hot... and apparenlty Carte Ingles also thinks so, as she is in all their billboards, EVERYwhere. I start my slow progression back toward Onix, I'm about 1.5 hours into my walk at this point and I find my head remining me I wanted to go to Carte Ingles to get me some sour cream (aparently it is an Ingles thing only, if you don't get that... english...) for my potatoes. So I hit up that store grabbing some Mozarella cheese, two things of sour cream (I think..., it was near the milk) and in my search for a good burgundy red wine for the sangria I grab a bottle of 1.5euro wine.
Ok... getting out of the english zone... I start walking back. And Landmark #2. TelePizza, one of the few delivery joints in Barcelona... (ah-hem... everyone walks because their awesome!).
I keep it going, a couple more intersections... I could have taken more pictures at this point, but I had seen all this stuff before so it wasn't too new for me.
And we hit Landmark #3, sorry for fuzzy picture, I just took it while I was walking... its the Urquinaona stop, one before the Arc de Triomf station on the red line. And we keep going, another mile or so. And Landmark #4.
A close reader would have noticed I took this picture from the left side of the road... Woops, this was a mistake. I should have turned right on that road. Now I was on my way to the Arc de Triomf, which turned out to be a good thing, because I didn't have any pictures of it. I hung out by it for 15 minutes taking plenty of pictures of it for a nice compilation... Which did happen. But this is just a single picture.
Next step is getting back to Onix from the Arc. First you reach the Barcelona Nord Bus station (right across from the Arc's red line metro exit).
Oh and Oh from this point you can see the back of Onix... and I'm back after my 2.25 hour walk.
Finto ;) Created: 23-5-2006