Dry Reeds on Delta de L'Ebre Beach, Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain

Sometimes an abstraction can be created out of the most unusual things. It is all in your head or on many occasions inside mother nature's head which is more complex and experienced. Any odd root, next to the soil where it is supposed to grow is no big deal but what if we put it upside down against a seascape? It is very common to find dry reeds along L'Illa de Buda beach, Deltebre, Tarragona but this sort of Martian scene, is in fact part of a natural park, 320 km² of wetland on the Mediterranean coast which is a paradise for birds and well known for its rice crops, its paellas and the history behind agricultural villages near Ebro river mouth.

Three Girls at Barcelona Beach

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Altafulla Beach on the Costa Dorada

100 kms away from Barcelona and 11 from Tarragona, Altafulla beach is one of the most beautiful on Costa Dorada (golden coast), an old fishermen town that still keeps its charm in spite of the menacing new buildings and the presence of a well known camping site in the area. There is a castle that dates back to XI around which Altafulla expanded and some remnants of Roman villages that are also worth mentioning. The sea was rough due to a heavy storm the night before but it was a very pleasant morning anyway. Check Altafulla on Google Maps.

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Boats on Sant Pol de Mar Beach Near Barcelona, Spain

A glimpse of Sant Pol with some fishermen boats lined up on the sand in the middle of the winter it is always a pleasure to the eyes. To know more about this beach and its town visit my previous posts: Sant Pol de Mar, Maresme Coast, Catalonia, Spain and Sant Pol de Mar, Maresme Coast, near Barcelona.

Sant Pol de Mar, Maresme Coast near Barcelona

Sant Pol de Mar is a small town of strong Mediterranean flavor, with white houses that adapt to the gentle slopes on the hills of Maresme coast.

In Catalan, there are two names for English name Paul, one is Pau and the other is Pol. Sant Pol celebrates one of its most important festivities on January 25th, which is St Paul's day.

Of all the beaches on Maresme Coast, Sant Pol is one of the cleanest and most attractive for tourists and locals alike. It is a very quiet town which I recommend to visit.

Today's picture was taken from the upper part of town and it shows as you see the train station and railroads. You can go from here to Barcelona or vice versa in 40 minutes all along the coast. There is a very well known restaurant which is a must visit: Carme Ruscalleda's Sant Pau

Twisted Shapes: An Approach to Rebecca Horn's Sculpture

This metallic cubic sculpture was made by the artist Rebecca Horn and it is a distinctive feature of La Barceloneta beach next to the quarter by the same name. Before showing my first photograph about this work I had seen it portrayed in a thousand ways. If you try to capture it as is, early or late during the day, when there is no one, it may look rather dull but the presence of people add up to the structure a little bit. It occurred to me that this man in that strange pose and the arched building maintained some awkward parallelism. On second thought now, I think that his fortune might be as twisted as the building itself, I just wish I was in a mistake. I remember someone said here that sometimes we tag people with our pictures without even knowing what their real conditions are. That is absolutely true.

ou get a better idea in this Google Earth Map View of La Barceloneta Quarter and the tiny metallic sculpture by the beach.

Sitting by the Sea: Take your Turn

Come rain come shine you always see someone laying on those concrete chairs facing the sea at Barcelona beach. Although they might look hard and uncomfortable they are pretty demanded so they'd better implement some kind of parking meter system nearby to make room for all. If you take a closer look notice that some of them really mean to stay for long. Maybe because it is winter I managed to find some empty chairs so I was about to run and stretch there till next summer.

Barcelona Beach: RACC Helicopter

During past Pirena 2007 dog show on the beaches of Barcelona I spotted this RACC helicopter. It called my attention that some fishermen were there already and didn't seem to be scared, in fact I thought it was risky for them. Given that you don't see copters landing on piers that often I took the snap and voilà. RACC stands for Real Automóvil Club de Catalunya, an association with more than a million affiliates, in fact it is the first insurance company in the car business in Spain. It is also related with the travel sector and widely known for organizing sports events such as rallies. I would like to talk about photography now, about the rule of thirds. Although obvious for many, we tend to forget it sometimes. It consists of tracing two sets of intersecting lines so we get a square in the middle of our image (some cameras have a grid). The subject should be in one of the corners of such box for emphasis. Another thing to bear in mind is the horizon line which can be aligned more or less with the top or the bottom of the square whether you want to highlight the upper part or the bottom of the image. Maybe I should have lower the camera a little bit!

Reflected on the Apple of my Eye

First of all Happy St. Valentine! to all lovers in the world. It would be interesting to know which cities in our Daily photo group do not celebrate this day, if any!. Today I resume the reflections topic but this time on people eyes. Who better than the apple of my eye, my other love, my daughter Sara. Here is a closeup of hers by the beach in La Barceloneta.

Barcelona Waterfront: Hotel Arts and Mapfre Tower

Here is a dusk image of the walk in front of Barcelona's Olympic Village. On the right you can see the Mapfre Tower, which is an office building and Hotel Arts. In the background the famous El peix d'or (Gold Fish), by Frank O.Ghery and on the left from this point on, a leisure area full of restaurants, always plenty of tourists, with good, bad and very bad restaurants.

I apologize for any inconvenience Blogger might cause you whenever you try to access my archives. I had in mind to change topic and call it "Shame on Blogger" but they don't deserve that much attention. Now there is a major bug in the beta bloggers' pages, something called error code bX-vjhbsj, which either won't let you see archives or crash the whole site. Unbelievable in this day and age and so far after many thousands of claims yet unsolved, and worse, not even faced in public by staff.

Now, changing subject...today was the theme day in the City Daily Photo group. It is about " What really annoys you in your city". Obviously my image is not related (it must be that I like everything :), but I highly recommend you browse this list to find real curious things and of course to support all the effort behind our daily work.

(Albuquerque, NM (USA)

(Dubai (U.A.E.)

(Evry (France)

(London (UK)

(Sequim, WA (USA)

(Seattle, WA (USA)

(Stavanger (Norway)

(Joplin , MO (USA)

(Nelson, New Zealand )

(La Antigua (Guatemala)

(Nottingham UK )

(Not Strictly Seattle, )

(Bandung (Indonesia)

(Vantaa (Finland)

(Hyde (UK)

(Madrid by Dsole (Spain)

(Oulu (Finland)

(Saarbr?cken (Germany)

(St. Paul [Carol] )

(Sydney (Australia)

(Tokyo (Japan)

(Kyoto (Japan)

(Trujillo (Peru)

(Shanghai (China)

(Nice, (France)

(Naples, Florida (USA)

(Hong Kong)

(Quito, Ecuador (South America)

(Cottage Grove, MN (USA)

(Paris, (France)

(Auckland (New Zealand)

(Newcastle upon Tyne(England)

(Houston, TX (USA)

(Sydney by Nathalie (Australia)

(Mumbai (India)

(Anderson, SC (USA)

Lonesome Biker at the Beach

Taking someone against the sea is a very common shot cause it usually works fine. I got this lonesome biker reading at the beach near La Barceloneta quarter. It would be a very boring picture (ok, it is boring already I know) if it weren't for the light falling on those boats on the horizon. Here I show you an aerial picture of the place and to compensate for the lack of "interestingness" of the post I leave you with three Barcelona clips I found at Discovery.com. Enjoy them and have a nice weekend.

Rider Girl in Barcelona

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She looks like a model but this was totally improvised. I was having dinner at Escriba's, one of my favorite Barcelona restaurants, in the terrace just in front of the beach and there she was with her slim figure and biting her tongue in the afternoon sun. The shot was not that bad but it had some golden counter light which made it right for a black and white image so I post-processed it with Photoshop CS2.

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Pirena 2007: Dog Sleigh Show by the Beach

Last weekend we went to Nova Icaria Beach in Barcelona to witness one of the weirdest events you can think of: dog sleds racing on the sand!. It was the Pirena 2007 show. Skillful mushers, huskies, harnesses...but no snow, not even a flake!. In fact it was quite warm. We arrived late so we couldn't enjoy the whole thing. At the end there was a side contest where participants made their trained dogs run through a set up circuit of hurdles, tunnels and slides such as the one in the picture. Some of them went really fast so I had another chance to practice speed photography.

Romancing the Stone

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Also taken at La Barceloneta was this odd arrangement of rocks, some of them in stacks facing each other like some sort of primitive totem on a forgotten primitive island. It is not strange that I often stop and fall in love with a sunset at Mar Bella beach, it is not weird then that I sit there and start "romancing the stone" silently with my camera. Remember that old song by Eddie Grant?:

'I'm romancing the stone, never leaving your poor heart alone
Every night and every day gonna love the hurtin' away
I'm romancing the stone, never leaving your poor heart alone
Every night and every day gonna love the hurtin' away'

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Lonely Bike at Barcelona Beach

Another one for the road. This time we've got a solitary bike chained to the railings overlooking Bogatell beach, one of the many small sandy inlets separated by piers along Barcelona coast. As you probably know, for many years our city ignored the sea as a leisure spot, and the many industries, warehouses or fishermen's barracks acted as a curtain that kept the shore away from citizens.

Opposites

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I don't have much time today cause I had a hard time cropping and postprocessing this image taken somewhere along Mar Bella beach. I hope you enjoy the site and remember there are old posts of mine with information about Barcelona beach.

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The Old Man and the Sea

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Yet another shot of the beach in Barcelona city. I was trying to capture that quite restrictive sign post using the sea and the rocks as a background when this old man suddenly appeared on the corner of my eye. I had nothing but the sign in my picture and that was not too much appealing so instead of taking some steps back which would make the man notice I zoomed out and included him in my picture to improve composition.

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Couple at the Beach in Barcelona

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Today I am in a bit of a hurry but of course I won't let you without your daily picture of Barcelona. This time I chose another romantic image in the same line of a very recent post: Love Me Tender. As you can appreciate the world could be falling appart and they would still be holding each other. I think they call it love, an ancient "illness" as old as humanity itself.

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Barcelona Beach: An Ever Changing Waterfront

This was the way the beach looked at the beginning of November 2006, the waves had swallowed most of the sand as it happens every year. They want to build some new barriers to stop the sea from altering the shore, a group of 15 piers acting as artificial dams and as every rule has its own detractors, now surfers oppose and claim for their rights.

Beach Volleyball in Barcelona

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This picture I took the same day as in previous post. Some of you were wondering about the time of year and the weather. Both images are from November 1st. But temperatures are not quite different today the 24th. Let me see, 20º C. Forecast for tomorrow, sunny and 22ºC. Beach volleyball is not one of my favorites but I enjoyed the game for a while. Nice for practising sports photography.

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