Bob:

We had leisurely breakfast in the dining room with Dave, Rick, and Brigitte. None of us were in a hurry because we all had hotels booked in Barcelona and we knew we could not get into our rooms before noon at the earliest. As it turned out, we were pretty much the last passengers off the ship and we took the shuttle in to the southern end of Las Ramblas near the harbor.

Las Ramblas is the main street in the old section of the city and is usually crowded with pedestrians, but we arrived on a cool and rainy Sunday morning, so it was cool almost deserted. Our hotel was the next major street east from Las Ramblas, so we said good-bye to our cruising companions and pulled our suitcases east to Via Laietaria and then searched for number 61, which turned out to be many blocks to the north. Since going north meant going steadily uphill, we were pooped by the time we reached the Hotel Montblanc, and we were none too happy to hear that they didn't have our room available. They were apologetic, however, and provided a free taxicab to the St. Moritz Hotel about 3 blocks further north where they had made substitute reservations for us. We were really looking forward to relaxing in our room, but it wasn't ready so we stored our luggage with the concierge and took off to roam Barcelona a bit.

Monika:

Bob:

Unfortunately it began to rain in earnest as we walked down Las Ramblas and I was getting soaked, which was exactly the wrong thing to do as my throat was sore and I felt like I was coming down with a cold. Las Ramblas was an interesting street with a large pedestrian mall in the center surrounded by two one lane roads and then finally a sidewalk on either side in front of the stores. Although the rain had drastically cut down the pedestrian traffic on Las Ramblas, there was still a hodgepodge of vendors trying to sell things. I was surprised that several pet shops had set up business right there out in the open, offering birds, rabbits, mice, ferrets, iguanas, turtles, and small fluffy rodents that might have been chinchillas. I could not imagine tourists purchasing animals given the near impossibility of ever bringing them home alive, so I guess they were selling to local folks.

Monika:

Bob:

Returning to the harbor end of Las Ramblas, we saw signs for a Maritime museum and decided to give that a try. Right in front of the Maritime Museum was a large wooden-hulled submarine from the mid 19th century, a curious vessel that apparently had successfully operated as an undersea fishing boat somewhere along the coast. I had never heard about that development of the submarine at all. Picking up some English-language audio guides, we worked our way through the museum. Since most of the explanations were in Catalan and Spanish only, I progressed through it far faster than I would through an English or German museum.

The most surprising exhibit in the museum was a full-sized war galley such as that used at the battle of Leponto in the 1400s. That crucial battle had ended the Ottoman Empire's domination of the Mediterranean and so was a crucial turning point in world history. There was a curious "ghost" video projection inside the galley so that you could see what it would have looked like when it was full of slaves pulling at the oars (4 slaves to each oar). The audio coverage was also very accurate about the absolutely vile and disgusting conditions aboard such a galley for the galley slaves. One thing I couldn't figure out was if this galley was actually the "real deal" one that had fought at Leponto, which would make it 500 years old, or a full-scale reconstruction. I suspected the latter, but it was still impressive.

Other exhibits covered the development of sailing ships, the transition to steam power, and the rise and fall of the luxury liners, but they never said a word about the rise of the cruise ship! The development of fishing craft and different types of fishing were also covered with examples of the fishing boats, and they didn't pull any punches about the destruction caused by the bottom-dragging method. In general, the ecological effects of fishing were treated in an open and unbiased manner.

Monika:

Bob:

The Maritime Museum also had a special exhibit on Leonardo Da Vinci based on the original scraps from his notebooks, updated with the most current knowledge that modern scholars have uncovered. The original source was called the Codex Atlantica, but that was just an early compilation of Leanardo's work. For this exposition the curators had carefully constructed 10-20 of his machines as scale models, and it was fascinating to look at the reality of a machine right next to Leonardo's plans and drawings.

As we went through the exhibit and I learned more and more about Leonardo's inventions and designs, I started to feel smaller and smaller. I mean, there are geniuses and then there are Geniuses, and Leonardo was Genius with a capital "G". Some of the things Leonardo did were refinements of previous work or can be traced back to other things, but so much of it truly seemed to come from nowhere and be truly original and unique. I mean, OK, he refined ball bearings to have equal-sized ball bearings inside of races that reduced friction and wear. Well, I might have thought of that. But he also invented a 3-spead transmission that was awfully close to the type of constant mesh transmissions used in motorcycles today. Well maybe I would have thought of that, maybe.

But then he also designed innovative hydraulic systems for doing various kinds of tasks, parachutes, some types of flying machines, a parachute, a military tank, a way to measure the circumference of the Earth, a lantern that concentrated light, and a lot of other stuff just too numerous to list. I mean, how many things does the typical person invent in a lifetime? Well, by the time I'm half way through the exhibition, I realize that there is no way I could have ever thought of all this innovative stuff. Not in a million years. And of course he took a few minutes off from his inventing to paint the Mona Lisa masterwork, so he was a fantastic artist, too. Did I mention his anatomical studies?

There was only a short section at the end about his private life, but Leonardo definitely was not a family man. He responded to a relative's newborn son by sourly commenting that the boy would just grow up to be a competitor to his father, which is a pretty cynical viewpoint. I was not surprised to read that he hated academics because they had overweening egos (generally true) and competed with him for support and patronage, which he understandably resented. I was surprised that he also told bawdy stories, but that just seemed to make him a little bit more human. In summary, that was an absolutely great exhibition, so see it if you get a chance.

Monika:

So we just walked back up Las Ramblas to our hotel. More vendors and people had come out since the rain had stopped. Entertainers ranged from mimes, through soccer players, to music

Bob:

Monika: