Barcelona is a very tempting city. Once you get there,
you are immediately conquered by the large terraces
in the sun, the beaches and the hills covered with vegetation
which seem to overhang over the city.
Markets with colourful stalls, tapas bars, bullfight
… Here, all contributes to create an environment
full of entertainment.
After 1992, the Mediterranean atmosphere is stronger
than ever. For the Olympic Games, the four kilometres
of littoral were emphasized. Very modern districts like
the Olympic Port were born. The city is open to the
sea.
Dominating Barcelona, the large statue of Christopher
Columbus makes us think of the time of the big discoveries.
Barcelona was then a great commercial power. The Generalitat
Palace is one of the sites of that flourishing time.
While strolling in the old part of the city, you will
discover the richness of Barcelona’s Romanesque
and Gothic inheritance. It is very impressive the number
of churches, big or small, chapels and convents.
Barcelona surprises because it is full of contrasts.
Is it really a city or “the truth overlaps the
imaginary” wrote the poet Pierre Lartigue. By
using polychrome ceramics, brick and iron, the modernists
architects, among them Gaudi, modelled the city in a
very strange manner. They have given the city a ferial
dimension. Picasso, Miro and Tapies were artists under
the spell of the city.
The charm of Barcelona is indefinable. One oscillates
from the astonishment to the admiration. “The
city of the prodigies” written by the Catalan
writer Mendoza, can offer a first approach to Barcelona.
Also follow the traces of Pepe Carvalho, the orphan
hero by Manuel Vasquez Montalbán. In love with
the city, it will be an excellent guide for you.
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