La Sagrada Familia

¡¡¡ESPAÑA!!! We won the world cup!!!! Holy freaking Toledo. It was absolutely insane last night. I got punched in the face among other things, plus met several interesting young spanish men drinking scotch straight out of the bottle as part of their victory celebration. Hard core. Andy, you would love it here. Actually, false, you would be the one trying to nurse your scotch out for an hour while the world erupted red and yellow around you. I'm going to wait a little while to put up photos and video from the game because other people were also taking pictures and I want to snag them from facebook before I craft my post.

I'm giving this entire update to Gaudí's Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. For those of you who didn't take 10th grade spanish, this is a cathedral that has been under construction for over 100 years. It's slated to be finished in 2026, so obviously I will be going back to Spain in sixteen years. This was truly one of the most astonishingly beautiful things I have come across in all my time in Spain so far. We tried to get in the first day we were in Barcelona but there was a long line so the next day we went back early in the morning. € 13 (or around that much) seemed pricy for us college kids, but it was worth every cent. We spent two or three hours in and around the church listening to the audio tour. It was really quite amazing.

This is the outside of one of the three doorways (only two of which are close to being completed). This is the Fachada de la Pasión and details the Last Supper through to the Crucifixion. The supports are supposed to look like bones and eventually there will be a large crest above it.

There are only four completed towers at the moment, but there will be eight towers similar to these plus one enormous dome in the center.

The inside was amazing. It took your breath away. The columns and ceiling are meant to give the feeling of being in an enormous forest, and the stained glass windows were just tremendous.

I was pretty enamored with the stained glass. I have always liked it, but I think these were some of the most beautiful I've seen so far.

The following pictures are outside of the Fachada del Nacimiento, or the birth story! It is quite different than the Passion doorway because the latter is supposed to be very stark and startling whereas this one is incredibly detailed. It was nearly completed during Gaudí's life, whereas the Passion doorway has been under construction since his death.



I can't wait until it is done!!!! It is going to be absolutely ridiculous when it is completed.