Back in Bilbo

Bilbo is the Basque (Euskera) word for Bilbao. Curiously enough, it is also the name of a Hobbit in Lord of the Rings. I don't think there is any connection... but you never know.

I am back in Bilbao again, after 5 weeks in Barcelona. I used to think that Barcelona was my favourite city in Spain. 4 weeks of a highly intensive, highly stressful course, and then one week of Semana Santa there has changed my mind. I really like it still, but as Jen and Alice and I discussed last week, there is something slightly bizarre about it. Bizarre things happen there, people are slightly off-kilter.... Sarah agreed. She's from Holland as has been studying there for a while. It's as if everything is slightly tilted. If you turn your head to the side a little, everything looks and seems normal, but if you look harder, and put your head straight, you realise that things are not quite.... I don't know how to explain it.... I still would love to visit every so often, it's such a cool place, all the Gaudi stuff makes me happy when I look at it, and I would love to get a chance to visit MACBA and the Picasso Museum. Walking down from Tibidabo to Barcelona was cool too.

Tibidabo, now that was a surreal experience that totally summed up the weirdness that is Barcelona. Outside of the city, on the highest mountain in the area, 512 metres above sea level, there is a place called Tibadabo. We made a day triip of it on Friday, even though it was kind of cloudy out. By all guidebook reports, it would be an interesting view of the city and there was a cool church and an amusement park up there. I envisioned a mountaintop with a park and places to walk and sit, and this cool church, and an interesting amusement park.... Well. Not quite. We caught the Tibibus from Plaza Catalunya and after an infinitely long ride (I think it was half an hour) on a crowded, hot bus (the driver had turned on the heat, and some of the passengers kept closing the windows), we arrived. We got off the bus and it appeared we had landed in hell. Not in the fiery brimstone sense, but it was a public holiday, and everyone and their 6 children had decided to go to the amusement park. It hadn't opened yet, so there was just a 'line' - or rather a moving, screaming, shouting mass of excited children and frustrated parents. There doesn't seem to be much space on the Tibidabo peak.... the entrance to the church is right next to the entrance to the amusement park.... of course there was no line for the church... not even on Good Friday! So we squeezed through the people and walked up. There are actually two churches built one on top of the other. I don't quite understand why they would do this. The end result is an old-looking stone bottom bit, and a weird light grey granite monstrosity on top, towering overhead, topped by a figure of Christ with hands outstreched, which can be seen from all over BCN. So we climbed up. The weather was crap, we couldn't see a lot of the city for the fog. Looking up, the Christ statue emerged eerily out of the bottom of a cloud. The view straight ahead was of the top of one of the amusement park buildings, and a lame ferris wheel, an even lamer roller coaster, a sketchy looking merry-go-round and some other rides. The scary thing is, these rides are built into the side of a mountain. They look like the slightest gust of wind will blow them over the edge, crashing into the city below. We were there in time to see the gates open and the people rush in from one line to form another to go ont the lame rides. Kinda sad really.
We stayed there for all of about 15 minutes, at which point we had had enough. We had gotten a map from the info desk with a route to walk down the hill through the woods. We didn't quite know where the path ended, just that it was near Barcelona. The estimated time for the walk was somewhere between 30 minutes to one hour and 30 minutes. The fact that a possible 1 hour and 30 minute walk to an unknown destination was preferable to the idea of that bus again gives you some idea of how hellish the ride actually was.
The walk was beautiful, except for the first 10-15 minutes of it, which was on a road not designed for pedestrians, crowded with cars of people going up to join the lines at the park. But once we got onto the bike path, it was all good.
I still don't know how long the walk was, it was nice to be outside though, and walking, and not inhaling exhaust fumes or secondhand cigarette smoke, and not seeing buildings. Very nice.

I'm sitting here in Bilbao now with the view of the mountains, clean air, blue sky. I'm not missing Barcelona at all and it will be a while before the Gaudi buildings call me back for a short visit.