I wonder what caught these two's attention?
Was it his soulful performance?
Or his lack of head?
Or his bubbles that captivated many?
Whatever it was, I'm sure they already paid all their attention to these two beautiful structures.
This is at the main terrace, a focal point of the park. It is surrounded by a serpentine bench that goes almost around the entire terrace. You can see the towers of the Sagrada Familia in the background. It's the one in the left side.
The bench is decorated with mosaic tiles on both sides.
I see some gargoyles.
If you love tile mosaic, baby, this is your paradise.
Love the brown hues.
Can you see the bumps? Gaudi designed them to easily keep water out of the bench when it rains.
Park Guell is a magical place. I have never been to anywhere like it. I've never been to a park where I have to climb up a hill just to get to the entrance.
On this first part, I will show a part of the park called the wave portico. I don't have to say anything else, just enjoy the pictures.
I knew nothing about this park, except that we penciled it in our itinerary after my husband remembered seeing it in one of the Spanish movies we have seen. I can't remember which foreign movie it was (we love foreign movies), but apparently the movie made more of an impression to my dear than it did to me. But I am very thankful that he remembered this place.
For more information, check this out, or this, or this.
You probably have guessed that this Barcelona series is not a chronologically presented. And I'm sorry that I did that. It was lack of foresight on my part.
While sightseeing on top of a double decker bus, one notices a myriad of interesting attractions. And while I oohed and aahed at the fabulous architecture, this sight did not escape my curiosity. So I took photos. 
I noted the sign on the bikes - BICING - and googled it and learned what it's about. It is a community bicycle program in Barcelona (like the zipcar or share a car program in many world cities). Paris has a similar bike program as well. Bike "stations" are conveniently located near a metro station.
How to participate in this program? Sign up for a yearly membership. For more info, here's the website . If you don't have a translator, the wiki page is very helpful. 
I applaud programs like this. I wish other cities will adopt this program (I don't know much about logistics in launching projects like this). I don't know if this venture is applicable to the city of San Franciso (too hilly), but I'm sure other cities can surely benefit from it.If you are a foodie, chances are you have heard of Barcelona's foodie mecca, Mercat de Sant Josep de la Boqueria or simply La Boqueria. I first heard of it from Andrew Zimmern's show, Bizarre Foods. La Boqueria is located at the Ciutat Vella district of Barcelona with entrance from La Rambla not too far from the Liceu metro station. 
The entrance alone titilates the senses. 
Here's why Andrew was drawn to the market. They sell heads, testicles, brains, and a lot more that falls under the category of bizarre.
Some people might consider this bizarre as well.
How about this? This looks like a fun way to fillet a fish right? I am guessing this one's a bacalao.
Barcelona is a busy seaport and the fishing is good. Some shell fish I have not seen before.
The sweetest stall in the market- literally - it sells candies, chocolate confections etc.
Olive oil - took a bottle home.
Mushrooms look yummy and so pretty.
Foie gras - took a small package home :)
They have a wide selection of cheese - took three small packages of cheese home.
A taste of bacalao, a good snack while exploring the market. They have a stall that sells a slice of pizza and a glass of wine - sweet!
Friendly storekeepers like this one who with her very little broken English and our almost non-existent Spanish and zero Catalan we managed to stay and "chat" with her and found out that it's a dream of hers to visit San Francisco because she has heard a lot of good things 'bout the city from friends. I guess both cities have a lot of similarities that both cities' residents would enjoy and appreciate. 
I had Sagrada Familia as my must visit. My husband had Picasso Museum.
On the second day of our stay, we planned to hit Park Guell and Picasso Museum. It was a day of art overdose :) After getting back to Las Ramblas (we keep coming back here) from Park Guell, we decided to go to the museum on foot. Taking the train and the bus on our first day, I was eager to explore the city on foot.
I saw a lot of narrow alleys like this one. This leads straight to the museum. The guy in blue (on foot, not on bike) was actually in a few of my pics. I didn't realize that until I was sorting all the pics to post here. Do you think he's a local thinking I'm a crazy tourist snapping furiously?
Finally we found the entrance. On the left is the ticket counter, on the right is the stairs that lead to the second floor (or first floor by European standards) museum. The museum I found out is housed in five adjoining medieval palaces. Sadly, no photography allowed. I could have shown you that one luxurious room that appears as if it was used as a parlor in the old days. I really wanted to shoot the room which after all had no paintings on it, but I played it safe and obeyed the rules.
I hardly knew who Picasso was, but the museum has extensive collection of his works. My full attention was captured by his works. I am ashamed to admit this, but when visiting museums, I never really pay attention to the written words, or explanation, description, etc. I am a visual learner, but here it was different. We spent a lot of time going from one room to another, reading voraciously on the descriptions of every picture. We had an amazing time.
Below is a gift shop, no surprise there. I had a marvelous time browsing through all the Picasso related items for sale.
From prints to mags, from tees to pens and a whole lot more - they have everything you wanted to bring home :) They made sure of that.
Being a first-timer in Europe, I was in awe of the medieval architecture. 
Love all the stone and arches. Sorry about the sub par quality of these photos. We used up a lot of batteries in three days in Barcelona alone, and we haven't even got on the cruise yet. Which means we had a lot of photos that didn't really turn out well. Photos captured from dying batteries just doesn't turn out pretty, duh!
When we took the hop on hop off bus, our plan was to stay on the bus until all the spots have been seen and only then would we "hop off" to take a closer look. But when we spotted the domes of this structure, we couldn't resist hopping off.
This is a beautiful structure. Did not go in as we were pressed for time, but we managed to spend time exploring it's grounds.
From the museum, this is the view of Placa d'Espagna.
The museum sits high on a hill or something that we could see the rooftops. I always wanted to to be high enough to see the rooftops :) I know I'm that shallow!
This wide staircase has a vibe of Gaudi with all the tile mosaic on the both sides. I don't know if they were Gaudi's. Behind the benches is an escalator, we took that instead of the stairs. 
This is the back of the museum. Couldn't help taking a shot as we hopped on another bus.
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