We had booked to stay in Barcelona for two nights after the cruise and were fortunate to get into Tripadvisor’s  #1 recommendation for ‘Specialty Lodging’ which was situated close to the downtown area. We were even more grateful for the beds when we learned that the following night two of the league’s top football (soccer) teams, Real Madrid and Barcelona, were playing at the Barcelona stadium in front of a crowd of more than 100,000 fans.

Standing outside the B&B’s front door, we weren’t sure that we had arrived at the right place as there were no signs on the outside of the building. The owner later told us this was to stop people ringing the bell in the middle of the night looking for last minute accommodation as it was so central; just to the east of Las Ramblas in an area known as the gothic quarter.

Our time in Barcelona would become a bit of a ‘spot the Gaudi design’ as we spent the days admiring the wonderful unique designs of the famous Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi.

We walked from our B&B through downtown Barcelona to the main bus stop to get to our first stop: Park Güell – the garden complex with architectural elements on the hill of El Carmel. It was designed by Gaudí and built in his wonderful Modernism style between 1900-1914.

Of course, no visit to Barcelona is complete without a look at the famous ‘Unfinished Masterpiece’: The Basílica i Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família. Although originally designed and begun by another architect, Gaudi took it over shortly after construction began and added his own mixed style of gothic, modernism and art nouveau. The basilica has since been deemed “the most extraordinary personal interpretation of Gothic architecture since the Middle Ages.”

We took the lift up inside one of the steeples for a great view of Barcelona and walked down the spiral stairs.

I saw this church last time I was in Barcelona but for some reason never went inside – perhaps at the time I was really skint and watching my pennies.  This church is unlike any I have ever visited before and I would even go as far as saying the most beautiful I have visited. Gaudi’s love of nature is on display everywhere you look. On the exterior stone snails, lizards and crocodiles replace the more traditional gargoyles, and colourful fruit mosaics are atop the steeples.

His eclectic mix and use of sculpture, carpentry, wrought ironwork and ceramics are amazing and, unlike most churches in Europe, the interior is filled with natural sunlight that pours through the huge stained glass windows.

The internal stone columns supporting the roof mimic massive tree trunks and ‘branches’ splay out at the top to support their load. The square base of each column evolves into an octagon as it rises, then a sixteen-sided form, and eventually to a circle. The three-dimensional intersection of the columns (a square cross-section column twisting clockwise and a similar one twisting counter-clockwise) represents the helicoidal growth of the leaves of an oleander tree.

We also spent some time in a small room in the church that explains in detail the inspiration and comparatives between nature and structural design elements,  such as catenary arches, spiral stairways, conoid-shaped roofs along side tops of trees, curves of leaves, internal structures of seashells and geometric elements in nature such as polygons turning the visit into a school lesson in itself.

A labour of love throughout his life, Gaudi knew that the project would never be completed before his death and, reluctant to draw plans, he instead used casts and detailed 3D scale models. Still not due for completion until the middle of this century, they seem to be making good money courtesy of the hordes of tourists who arrive in droves to look at this masterpiece and contribute substantially towards construction costs via the entry price.

We walked 10 blocks to another two Gaudi designed multi-storey buildings Casa Milà  and Casa Batlló.

We finished off our day by walking through La Barceloneta to the beach to allow the girls to work off some of their energy, climbing on the playground and running on a beach sand for the first time since Turkey.

Tickets for the football game that night were selling for €400 a piece, and our B&B host promised that if Barcelona won the game there would be ‘many babies born in nine months’ time’. As we retired for the night, we couldn’t help but notice the calm that had settled over the city and lack of cheering coming from the pubs and taverns scattered around our neighbourhood. Our suspicions were confirmed next morning on the way to the airport by the taxi driver who advised the final score of 2-1 in Madrid’s favour. Maternity wards all over Barcelona breathed a collective sigh of relief!