Wednesday in Barcelona

Still exhausted, still getting lost, but not quite so badly as yesterday. Sha too; we need more sleep! Had to stand on the crowded train to the city, but got out before the terminus and took the blue line to Gaudi's absolutely enormous Temple de la Sagrada Famiglia with its weird spires and sculptures, a pile of stone unfortunately mixed with scaffolding. Endless crowds of sightseers surrounded it. Again, we decided not to queue for hours to see inside, walked round the outside instead taking photos, unable to avoid including the cranes.

Back on the yellow line to the Vila Olympica. It's hard to know in which direction to walk, but having studied the map and surroundings we found the entrance to the zoo. To penetrate the park behind it, though, we had to keep walking along between the high brick walls and a line of plane trees. Trams were passing by. We should have caught one. At the first corner half a mile or so further, on the corner of Carrer de Pere IV we spotted the Santa Restaurant and stopped there to sample the lunch menu. Thank heavens I learned some Spanish before coming here, for most people shake their heads when you address them in English. Sha says she couldn't have come to the city centre without me! However, food vocabulary on menus defeats me, both in Catalan and in Spanish. I guessed that lacon was some kind of meat—it turned out to be pork, tastily served on couscous and Mediterranean vegetables. I had a glass of white wine and bottle of mineral water, also choc. mousse topped with rum flavoured cream. For Sha we ordered grilled salmon on pureed potatoes with peas, followed by fruit and gelato. Not bad for 12.50 Eur. apiece. The other diners were office types, most of whom sat down to eat around 3 p.m. This is why suppers are not served till 8. Such habits mean an awfully long gap between breakfast and lunch.

Sha had already spotted the park gate round the corner. We went through and saw a monument, a grotesquely mannerist pond like the ones around Berlin adorned with gryhpens and lions' heads. The Catalan Parliament stands beyond the statue of a woolly "mamuth". Some school parties here too; a girl accosted us in a state of excitement, wanting us to stand in a group photo. The more people she persuaded, the better chance she had of winning a prize. We stood beside a small dog for the shoot, before moving toward the Arc de Triomf at the end of an imposing wide walkway, the Passeig Lluis Companys. The Palau de Justicia was here.

The steps to the metro being repaired we had to continue four blocks through a vaguely Chinese quarter to the next station, Tetuan, which necessitated another several hundred paces down the long tunnels. The Sabadell train being a relatively peaceful one, we got seats again, thank goodness.

I left Sha to brace herself for George's three hour Conference Dinner, due to take place later in the evening, while I came on home up the hill to my relatively peaceful business district, meeting hordes of uniformed school boys from the local Collegio, coming the other way. I used my Spanish again to get a pot of tea at the bar, which I was drinking as I wrote this at a table with a view of the hotel piscina, palms and potted shrubs. Had supper here as well: crema de patates and trancha de pez (swordfish) con verduras.