We’re now in Tucson, staying with Di’s best friend from high school, Dell, and her husband Jerry. Their house looks out on the Catalina mountains and a landscape of cactuses and dry country trees. It’s springtime and the cactuses and other trees are all in flower.
Today was a travel day, from Barcelona to Helsinki then straight on to Los Angeles. Our bags were safely transferred to the LA flight despite our first leg being 15 minutes late.
Our flight took us over Greenland (which must have been named in Summer - see the photos below) then across Canada and down to LA. We arrived in LA just 1 hour after our departure time in Helsinki. Jet lag here we come!
Yesterday we flew from Bologna to Barcelona, we had ashore walk around the block but didn’t really do any sightseeing.
Today we visited La Sagrada Familia, the amazing cathedral designed by Gaudi in the late 19th century. It was started in 1882 with Guadi taking over the design and construction in 1883. Building stopped in 1926 with Guadi’s death and then the Spanish Civil war and wasn’t resumed until the 1950s. Construction was slow because of Gaudi’s intricate designs plus the fact that the building is fully funded by donations. An Australian/New Zealand Architect became involved in the project in 1979. He introduced computer design and computer controlled stone cutting which has greatly increased the speed of construction, such that it is expected to be completed by 2026. As you’ll see from some of these pictures there is still plenty of construction going on with cranes hovering over the site, but internally it mostly complete. I don’t have room her for all my photos but they are all on on my website.
The front of the Cathedral features carvings depicting the nativity and the other side of the cathedral has carvings depicting the crucifixion. Inside the pillars are shaped to remind you of the plane trees in the streets around. The stained glass windows are amazing and the high ceiling gives a sense of majesty and awe that befits the worship of the one true and living God.
One of the many beaches alongside the city
Bologna has managed to preserve the gates of the old city if not its original walls. Some are in better condition than others. These are the few that we passed by.
Bologna is a beautiful city with many well preserved buildings. Today we took the hop on, hop off bus that goes around the city pointing out important locations. Before that though, we walked through the city where there was a May Day rally happening with 100s of Unionists wearing colourful uniforms rallying to March through the city. One interesting fact we heard was that there are more public burial sites of professors in the city than anyone else. Clearly a Bologna has been a great centre for learning. It’s the home of Guglielmo Marconi, the man who discovered that radiomagnetic waves could be detected from a distance and therefore could be used for radio communication - clearly one of the most significant discoveries of the 20th century.
