La Mercè, part two

If you watched the video from yesterday's post you probably have a good sense of the festival - LOTS of people, traditional cultural performances, concerts, parades, more than one person could do.

We should have guessed there would be a lot of people when arrived at Plaça de Catalunya in central Barcelona.  There were all sorts of booths and people promoting their tours by bus, foot, and bicycle.  Here is a tip - where there are a zillion people milling about it is a bad idea to take a bike tour that attempts to go through narrow passageways.  Sorry no picture.

As we attempted to walk through the narrow walkways we came to the entrance of the Cathedral of Barcelona, which I don't think we had seen before.  We were dressed modestly enough so they let us in.  I knew nothing about it and would like to go back with a tour or after reading a description, but I did enjoy the quick peek.

We followed the suggestion of allowing serendipity to be our guide.  After leaving the discomfort of the crowd we came across this stage (raised, with seats in front and standing room in back - much more inviting).

A live orchestra was performing while little kids in sheep costumes danced and larger kids dressed as shepherds danced around them.  Later adults in costume came out and performed different dances, but also in costume and with sticks that may represent a shepherd's crook.

We met D.'s former student at the central post office, which did not have a mailbox in front of it, but it was a great place to meet someone.

E. suggested we have tapas, which sounded great because we had done that only once before.  He has been in the city about two years and speaks fluently and knows what to ask for.  We were lucky that the restaurant was willing to serve us since it was only about 1pm and we were lucky to try some great food - something eggplant, something olive, a potato dish A. liked a lot, something cheese, a couple somethings tomato, and a little bread.

We followed that with a walk to the water and gelato.  What a great day!

We had no problem catching our train.  A. rushed home play with friends (electronically) and D. and I sauntered home, past stores, past the monastery,

and past the buckeye trees.

Maybe if we lived in town we would see the fireworks show tonight, which we heard is spectacular.  I don't know if we would have joined the Correfoc, which is a run in which people dressed as the devil set off fireworks.  I was glad to see that people can choose whether they run earlier with the kids or later with the adults.  What a festival!