Barcelona day four

We no longer have the tourist bus now as our 2 days are all used, so we will be on foot. We had planned to leave our visit to the Santa Maria church until today as it was in easy walking distance. This was a lovely old church and inside a lady was playing the large organ which really added to the experience. Inside this massive church it sounded awesome. We just sat and soaked it up for a while before moving on.(see video)
We had heard about a bar called Dunes Irish bar that served a true english breakfast so after seeing where it was from our bus we had decided to visit it today for brunch. It was nice and cool inside and it was great to get a real breakfast for a change. Croissants each day were starting to loose there charm. We explained to the Irish Manager at the bar that we had found out about his bar on Trip Advisor and he was very pleased to hear this.
Our next stop was also not far away and it was the Barcelona Cathedral. Two buskers were playing Spanish guitars outside and were very good.(see video) The Cathedral was one of the first churches that Gaudi had designed and was currently under renovation. Strangely as these renovations were going on there was scaffolding erected that gave access to the roof, so they were allowing tourists to visit the roof. It was interesting to view things from this perspective (see pics).
After a quick visit to a food market we thought we would head down to the beach for the afternoon and headed back to our Hotel via a street that Sheree though we should go down. We stumbled across an exhibition on the clothes of ‘Maria Brillas’ who was a big part of the privileged Barcelona elite during the 1900’s. It was free to get in and was very inspiring. Marias granddaughter had donated 341 pieces, 183 dresses and 158 accessories . All Marias clothes were designed and made by ‘Pedro Rodriguez’ a master Spanish Couture. Maria was married to a distingused business man from Girona, ‘Joaquim Ensesa’ so she was confronted with considerable social pressure to be the perfect host and praise worthy member of her family.
Maria had a very close relationship with Pedro Rodriguez and only ever wore his clothes which he personally made for her. Almost all of her wardrobe consisted of designs by Pedro.
They were exquisite to see and as Sheree said she looked about her size so most of the beautiful dresses and accessories may well have fitted Sheree. (see pics)
There was also an exhibition on the influence of technology and human integration but unfortunately several of the exhibits were not working. However those that did were fun.
The Picasso Museum was just a few doors down but there was a very long queue so we decided to give it a miss and head to the beach.
We spent what was left of the afternoon just lying on the beach even though it was overcast it was very very nice.
We did not get back home until quite late and decided to shower and go out for tea at around 10:00pm??? Yes we know it’s late but we are in Europe and even at the restaurant we choose, families with children were sitting down at the same time as us.
Sheree wanted to try the traditional Paella and I got a combined sea food dish. When they arrived to our table they were huge!! So big in fact that we just could not eat it all and as Sheree said ‘just one of these would have done’ (see video)
It was well after midnight when with very full bellies we wondered home on this lovely warm evening.