Our apartment is in the El Born neighborhood of Barcelona, which is trendy, hopping, vibrant and cool, just like Martha and me. It is also the home to the Santa Maria del Mar, the cathedral built in the 1300’s that was the basis of the book and Netflix series Cathedral of the Sea. Our apartment is about 100 feet from the cathedral, which is great if you can tolerate those stupid bells ringing all the time.
Anyway, Martha and I were walking in our neighborhood yesterday and saw a tour group standing in front of the Santa Maria del Mar. Everyone in the group had a plastic shot glass hanging around their neck and the tour leader’s clipboard said Tipsy Tours on it.
Turns out that Tipsy Tours is an alcohol-centered tour of Barcelona. Not judging here, but you don’t really have to come all the way here for this. The Tipsy Tours website has all 5-star reviews with comments about how wonderful Barcelona is, including “Got a little bit tipsy. Would have stayed out longer but the trains close at midnight,” and “It felt like we were having a bar crawl with friends,” and “Great tour with some questionable dancing. The stories are a bit saucy.”
On the other hand, The Santa Maria del Mar has an average rating of 4.5 stars. One of the negative reviews says “I purposely jogged to this place after reading a book about it. But there were a lot of drunk people around.” Of course there were a lot of drunk people around; they were taking a Tipsy Tour, having a great time and writing 5-star reviews. Why don’t you lighten up a little?
Speaking of which, I give our neighborhood a 5-star review for the ability to get a contact high by walking around. Marijuana is mostly technically illegal in Spain (perhaps more on this later) but it’s hard to go anywhere without walking through clouds of smoke from young adults taking hits on their porros.
And finally, it’s obvious that Lucy (pictured here in center and on bench) is very sad because she misses us so much.
No comments:
Post a Comment