Barcelona, Part III: Casa, Café, Crema

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And we’re back with the third installment of photos from Barcelona. (Previously, parts I and II. Next, part IV.) This time, I didn’t let the rain daunt my spirits. It was a busy day, so naturally, I took hundreds of photos.

Bagels and Coffee

Another day, another chance to caffeinate. I met up with Doug, Diana, Jacob, Rachel, and some others in the hotel lobby, and we went out in search of some good coffee. Our first stop of the day was Roast Club in Eixample. Unfortunately, a lot of other people had the same idea, and the place was packed to the gills. So we moved on to another place, which also had surprisingly good bagels for being so far from New York: the appropriately named The Coffee House. Not to be caught undercaffeinating again, some of us broke off and went to a Fililino cafe called L’Ube Kape, where we had some delicious ube lattes and confections.

Casa Batlló

Up next was another of Gaudí’s masterpieces: Casa Batlló. Diana, Doug, Jacob, Caelin, and I regrouped and walked over. While not as epic or imposing as Sagrada Família, it’s still one of the most unique pieces of architecture I’ve ever seen. There seemed to be hardly a straight line or corner in the entire place. The doors were made of smoothly contoured wood. The walls were adorned with a cracked-looking gold leaf pattern. Everything was blobs and swirls, globes and shells, nets and water. The top floor even had skeleton-like vaulted arches.

At the end of the path was a strange “artificial intelligence” show, which I could take or leave, but was mainly just a bunch of dancing photos. I’m not sure how that related to AI at all, to be quite honest. But I guess even the estates of great architects have to keep up with the times, however superficially.

Old Town, empanadas, synthesizers, more coffee

From there, we wound our way through the narrow streets of Old Town, stopping at La Fabrica, a tiny but tasty empanada shop, for a midday snack. We continued wandering around, diving into thrift shops and taking in the abundant graffiti and balcony foliage. We stumbled upon a synthesizer shop called Elevator Sound, where we fiddled with some modulars for a bit, and the friendly shopkeep taught us a thing or two about them. Before heading back to the hotel, we grabbed—you guessed it—another coffee, this time at another Hidden Coffee.

Hotel, Finestres

Since we’d been walking a while and it was raining again, we took a bus back from the coffee shop to the hotel, where we ran into some more people from the wedding, including our friend Su, who I hadn’t seen in years. We all chatted for a bit in the hotel bar, and I decided to join their group for dinner. On the way, we stopped in at a street-straddling bookstore called Llibrería Finestres, where I salivated over some beautiful photography books.

Bodega Joan

Though it was still raining, we continued on to our final desination of the night: Bodega Joan, yet another tapas bar, where we sat together at a long table all the way in the back. I briefly broke from my tortilla de patatas habit (how fast they form!) for some delicious vegetarian paella and crema catalana, a custard-based dessert quite similar—some might say identical—to crème brûlée. Then, satisfyingly fed and exhausted from the day, we headed back to the hotel once more and went to sleep.

Thanks for checking out part III. Previously, parts I and II. Next, part IV.

Want to be in photos like these or buy prints? Send me an email. I’m no longer on Instagram, so if you message me there, I won’t see it. You can also drop me a line on Signal, Mastodon, or Bluesky.