Gràcia

On Monday I was in BCN on my own for a few hours and decided to wander around Gràcia a bit, it's a cool neighbourhood that I hadn't really explored.

Unfortunately I hadn't gotten very organised on all of this, so I pretty much wandered in and wandered around.....

Gràcia was a separate village from Barcelona until relatively recently, and it still has a totally different feel than the rest of Barcelona.  6 story buildings are gone, most are 2, plaças abound, and lots of funky little stores.  Honestly, it looks a lot like most of the smaller towns outside of BCN, just has a funkier air than most of those do.

Here's a few photos, these are truly quite random, simply what I came across, and what seemed different than I had seen elsewhere.  As Gràcia apparently also includes Parc Guëll, clearly I missed some of the spectacular....but I wasn't after that either, more a feel of the place.

I stopped for a while and read my book, it was a LOVELY day, and I could sit outside on a bench to read.  So I did.  Afterwards I seem to have focused more on the graffiti, mostly cause the buildings were all pretty much the same.  Though in fact the graffiti was very similar to much of what I have seen elsewhere in the city.  There may be relatively few artists and they are traveling widely in the city.

I posted earlier about a Catalan poet and author, Salvador Espriu, there was a show at the CCCB and I saw sculptures inspired by his work in the cemetery in Arenys.  Seems he lived just ouside Gràcia.

More later!