Photo journal - and the last installment on Barcelona

As you know by now, Hubby and I spent 5 days in Barcelona. While there, I finished up my 42-day holiday running streak, which included running with local runners and spectating at the Cursa dels Nassos (a New Year's Eve 10k).

But running only took up a small portion of each action-packed day! So here's the photo-journal (read: short with pretty pictures) wrap-up of the trip!

We ate copious amounts of jamon, pan amb tomaquet (aka "pan con tomate" aka "bread with tomato"), and "copas de cava."

Browsed the markets.

Wandered narrow alleys.

Toured centuries-old churches.

Appreciated the street art.

(for more street art photos, click here)

Tried to understand Gaudi.

Finally started to understand Gaudi.

(for more photos of the Sagrada Familia, click here)

Took an aerial tram ride in 20mph winds...

(...and would not recommend trying this at home!)

Ate LOTS of food, especially mariscos (seafood)...

And drank every vermouth drink I could get my hands on.*

Dark vermouth, slice of orange, and a spash (each) of
campari, soda, and some other, clear liquor.* 

*If anyone knows the name of this mystery vermouth concoction, please do tell! I'll forever be grateful! I'd never had it before. The waiter called it "vermouth c_____" but i don't recall what the second word was!

Barcelona street art

Cursa dels Nassos - New Year's Eve 10k in Barcelona

From the Barcelona Casual Road Runners meetup Hubby and I learned about the New Year's Eve 10k: Cursa dels Nassos, or the "nose run" or "race of the noses."

Follow your nose!

Running noses?
Yes.
It's a bit of a Catalan joke...
According to local tradition, on Cap d’Any (New Year’s Eve)

"look out for L’Home dels Nassos, the man who has as many noses as days of the year – it being the last day, the sly old fox has only one – who parades the streets and throws sweets to all the children he sees... At midnight everyone stops swilling cava and starts stuffing 12 grapes into their mouths, one for every chime of the bell." (Source: Catalanculture.com)

On the last day of each year, locals joke that they've seen a man with "as many noses as days of the year." Because, of course, with only one day left in the year we likely have all seen someone with one nose! So to celebrate this inside joke, 10,000+ runners take to the streets to run an evening 10k.

As you can imagine, with several thousand runners, this race is not for the claustrophobic. The course is crowded from start to finish. But the scenery and general good humor make up for the crowds.

If you run it, keep an eye out for people running with fake noses stuck to their outfits, or dressed as chickens (and spectators cheering "corre pollo! corre!" -- "run, chicken! run!"), and dozens of other humorous costumes, including this clever play on Rudolph pulling Santa's sleigh:

I must admit, the Santa reference was a bit of a surprise to me. Barcelona has no chimneys, and Epiphany is a bigger holiday than Christmas, so the Santa concept has never gotten much traction here.

Either way, if you're in Barcelona for the holidays, this 10k is not to be missed!

Running with the locals in Barcelona

When traveling, I like to meet up with a local running group if I can.
Aside from the obvious the benefit of getting a nifty tour of a city, running with locals usually offers insight into the area that goes far beyond what I can read in a guidebook.

The Barcelona Casual Road Runners did not disappoint!

At Parc de la Ciutadella after a run
with the Barcelona Casual Roadrunners

Hubby and I joined the Barcelona Casual Road Runners for a fast-paced, ten-kilometer run the 29th.*
I should note that the word "casual" in the title reflects their attitude, not their pace!

On the run, we explored sections of the city that Hubby and I might not have seen any other way (and certainly would not have thought to venture into at night). While the run began and ended at the Parc (a fairly common tourist destination), the 10k route took us a bit off the beaten path. We ran through the Parc, along the beach, around a hotel and shopping center, past the Plaça de Colón (which is particularly beautiful at night), and through streets and paths back to our starting point.

Statue of Christopher Columbus
in the Plaça de Colón, Barcelona (by day)

In the days before we met up with the Casual Road Runners, we passed dozens of fountains (like the one below). Every street, it seems, has numerous statues with spigots. But until running with the group I didn't realize that people use these as drinking fountains. (This knowledge was key later in our trip after a very long, blustery, and dry hike up and around Montjuic with no other source of water in sight.)

Public drinking fountain in Barcelona

In addition to teaching us about the drinking fountains, the other runners filled Hubby and me in on Catalonian New Year's traditions, including L'Home dels Nassos (more on that later) and "lucky grapes."

At the stroke of midnight on New Year's clocks around Catalonia chime 12 times. Locals eat one grape for each toll of the bells. The intent is to eat the grapes one at a time, but also to finish by the time the 12th bell strikes. This sounds simple, but consider the volume of 12 grapes and trying to finish them all in 12 seconds...

If you manage to finish all the grapes by the time the bells stop, you will have good luck in the new year. So, of course, we made sure we had a bag of grapes handy at midnight on New Year's!

And speaking of food... Barcelona takes its pasta seriously.

An homage to pasta:
Giant galet statue on a street in Barcelona.

The traditional Christmas meal in Barcelona is not complete without escudella. The dish is a stew of several types of meat, vegetables, beans, and a special pasta known as a "galet." The pasta is so famous that it is used for decoration in store windows and there are statues of giant galets on the city streets.


If only I had a fork!

Running with the Barcelona Casual Road Runners = most informative way to run a 10k in the city.

*Note: The Barcelona Casual Road Runners meet at 8pm every Tuesday and Thursday evening, at the entrance of the Parc de la Ciutadella. If you're ever in Barcelona, I highly recommend dropping in to join them!

Streak week 6

Goodbye week 6 of the Runner's World holiday running streak!
Week 1 was novel, week 2 made me feel hardcore, week 3 was tiring, week 4 was wet, week 5 was festive.
Week 6 was foreign. Hubby and I spent 5 days in Barcelona.

Here's my brief translation of the week in running:

36. Sunday - a quick Christmas mile around the neighborhood squeezed in between packing, last minute tasks, and driving to Atlanta.
37. Monday - the best hotel treadmill workout ever -- 400s and 800s at a 7:00 pace (in the biggest and most well-supplied hotel gym I've ever seen thanks to the Westin Atlanta Airport).
38. Tuesday - My first run in Barcelona was 15 minutes of trotting up and down the blocks near our hotel... after flying for more than 9 hours, losing half a day in the time change, and getting no sleep on the flight thanks to screaming babies and cackling drunk people. This, by far, was the hardest run of the streak.
39. Wednesday - 20 minutes along the Barcelona waterfront in my street clothes, because schedule-wise, that's what worked that day. (Yes. I wore black khakis and a floral shirt during this run.) I think this also counts as my first run ever in minimalist shoes. Only a few "real-looking" runners gave me the stink-eye for my odd attire.

Barcelona waterfront run.

40. Thursday - A 10k with the Barcelona Casual Road Runner's meetup. (A full report on my run with "the locals" has its own post.)
41. Friday - A horribly slow mile after a long and cold hike up and around Montjuic that started with hundreds of stairs, and continued all the way up and back down the "mountain." Plus, at the end of a long tourist-ing day I was exhausted and hungry. So we stopped for tapas and a cup of cava. Fortified with jamon and vino, I made my way through streets of Barcelona to keep the streak alive.

Steps leading up to the
Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya on Montjuic

42. Saturday - Hubby, our friend C, and I were spectators at Cursa dels Nassos, and did some running to and along the course to watch the runners.

Holiday running streak goal achieved!

And... the streak is over.

Yesterday, after 4,584 miles in an airplane (taking 10 hours and 45 minutes) and 320 miles in a car (taking 5 more hours), I seriously considered adding a 1 mile loop around my neighborhood before bed last night, but the original goal is accomplished.

And I really, really needed sleep.

Greetings from Barcelona!

Feliz Año Nuevo!
and greetings from Barcelona!

Gaudi's Park Guell in Barcelona

Ok. So, in all honesty, I put my web gadgets away for the duration of the trip, so the next few posts are really post-travel updates, but the short story is that 5 days of dining, running, sight-seeing, walking, more walking, more running, and more dining were fantastic.

And I kept the running streak alive through some "interesting" circumstances.

I'll tell you all about that once I unpack my suitcase and figure out what time zone I'm in.