Barcelona Photoblog

February 01, 2007

Barcelona Waterfront: Hotel Arts and Mapfre Tower

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.


January 31, 2007

The Castle of Cardona

























Remember we talked about the Spanish War of Succession, well this picture was taken in the castle of Cardona, the last redoubt of Charles VI of Austria's supporters before being occupied by Philip V's bourbonic troops in 1714. High upon a hill of the Cardona valley, known by its salt mines and near the Cardoner river, this historical romanesque and gothic castle built in 886 by Guifré el Pilós, used to be the house of the Dukes of Cardona, one of the most powerful families in the Crown of Catalonia and Aragon. 

It is a real joy to stay up there on a bright day, sitting on the grass right next to the base of the surrounding walls to look over the neighboring village and the salt mines or to climb the ramparts and explore the ruins like this sort of firing hole from where the rampart was protected. There is even a wonderful place to stay inside the castle which recommend: El Parador de Cardona.

January 30, 2007

Berries

Berries
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Today I resume my garden shots. I want those of you who are experts on botanics to find this out for me. I would like to know the name of this berry. Hey, it is not another competition. You have time enough to participate in the absolutelomo contest (I have to choose two winners now, so you see it is not that difficult to take the prize, and one thing is clear someone is going to take the Holgas). As to the berries, I took them in the garden of a hotel in Riells near Barcelona. It was early morning and the light was superb. I want to thank those of you, especially Isabella and Curly who helped me with the name of those flowers in a previous post: cyclamens. Also Ruth for suggesting the flower was a primrose in the Bird Hawk Moth post (thanks Mark for correcting my mistake). So come on lend me a hand with this one.

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