A Memorable Christmas Day in Spain

As Nancy said, "Travel is not all glory -- even on Christmas Day!" As we were preparing to board our 5-hour train ride from Barcelona to Seville shortly after 7:30 in the morning on Christmas Day, a valuable rolling carry-on suitcase of Nancy's was stolen right out from under our not-so-vigilant-eyes. It had train tickets (which were quickly replaced in time), a VISA card (which had to be cancelled), an I-Pad, and all kinds of other valuables. But, after filing a police report on arrival in Seville, and after changing some passwords, we are ready to move on -- now somewhat wiser. The picture above is of La Sagrada Familia (the sacred family) in Barcelona -- the "dream" and largely the creation of Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi at the end of the 19th century. La Sagrada is certainly the only "modern cathedral" we'd ever seen, and it still isn't finished after 100 years of construction!

Nancy is pictured after we both took an elevator up one of the towers. The view of the city from there is normally quite impressive; however, fog was hanging over much of the city at the time. The exterior of the cathedral has extensive sculptures of biblical scenes (the one pictured below is a nativity scene).

As in most of the cathedrals in Europe, La Sagrada Familia had many beautiful stained glass windows. However, toward the rear of the sanctuary the windows were mostly just of plain glass -- offering the promise of much more beauty in the future. The genius of such a modern cathedral, Antoni Gaudi, took over as chief architect in 1883, just a year after the work was commissioned. He died in 1926, but the work has continued ever since -- as evidenced by the cranes and the scaffolding in the picture above. After arriving in Seville and getting settled in our hotel, we took a long walk and ended-up on a hop-on-hop-off bus tour of the city. One "hop-off" for us was at Montjuic (Mt. of the Jews) where we took a cable car to the fortress at the top, with panoramic views of the city. -rw