This time around, our cruise did not leave until a Tuesday, which meant we could take our time driving down and still have some time in Barcelona as well. It was wonderful.
We take a route that leads us almost due south through Germany, cross into Switzerland at Basel an then turn and cross into France just past Geneva. This cuts off a good chunk of French tolls while adding only 20 or so minutes to the total drive. We still pretty much "rushed" through the German and Swiss sections. Switzerland is such an expensive place, we cannot bring ourselves to stop there for a lunch or snack, and it was a pretty blustery day that did not lend itself to picnics.
Once in France, we quickly decided to set the GPS to "no tolls" and enjoyed a meandering drive through some quaint little towns and nice valleys. Dave had two rooms booked for us at an inexpensive hotel near Marseille that evening--and we figured it would be small and we might as well spend the time on the drive as in the room.
This turned out to be a very good call! My regular readers will recall that the "find a cheap, local hotel game" worked GREAT in Venice only a few weeks prior. Yeah, you win some you lose some LOL This would go in the loss column.
We arrived around 8:00. It was already dark and the parking lot was very dark--not lights in it at all, I kept expecting a motion detector to come on as we drove in, but nothing. We parked, walked to reception, and rang the bell (there were no lights on in there either). Someone did come out soon to check us in and take us to our rooms. Our rooms, which we had booked as "discounted with no TV" in fact were with no BATHROOM. Funny thing is, we had double checked that we WOULD have a bathroom, knowing a shared bath can be pretty common in this area. Oh well, it was only one night and the place was pretty much deserted, so not a big deal. In fact, it turned out that there was only one other couple there. That was a good thing because the shared bath was one room with a shared toilet and one with a shared shower (every room had a sink, and a bidet actually). I counted 15 rooms in the corridor--sharing with 15-30 people would have made for long lines!
The rooms themselves were small and very musty when we got into them. The first thing we did was open the windows wide to air them out, while we went out to get pizza. We were kind of in the middle of nowhere, but there was a pizza place on the corner. It was take out only. Dave drug one of the outdoor plastic tables in a rear garden behind the hotel into the one breezway that had a motion detecting light, an we sat there to eat. It was pretty comical, every 60 seconds the light would cut off and one of us would jump up and wave our arms around to get it on again. It was a pretty fun meal in its own way--though I would have been nervous being alone with the kids in such a dark, isolated area had Dave not been there as well.
The rooms (they were small, by the way, had the double beds been replaces with two bunks this WOULD be a youth hostel--it must have been at some point), smelled better--though they were still musty; upon a closer look there was mold IN the walls in both rooms; which explained the smell and Marika's cough all night, and Rio's need for his inhaler. It was only one night, so it was FINE and a bit of an adventure (actually, the always cheerful Rio, who even liked the HoJo Hell Hole in Utah, thought it was a fun place to stay. He liked the nice person at check in an eating in the breezeway with the light going on and off). Had we planned a longer stay we would have had to find something else though (then again, we would not chance a blind stay at a very low cost place for a longer term trip).
Sunday morning, we woke early and got the heck out of the moldy place early. We continued on with "no tolls" and found an adorable little pastry shop to stop at for breakfast an hour or so into the drive. My camera was still packed away, so sadly I have no photos. It was straight out of a movie adorable though--with a super friendly owner who was so nice to us with our lack of French. We pigged out on eclairs and other pastires, hot coco and coffee and also bought baguettes and "chocolate rolls" for later in the day. In very un-German like fashion, the large grocery store across the street was open on a SUNDAY morning, so we ducked in there for water bottles all around (we had all decided we were not comfortable refilling ours at the moldy former youth hostel).
Before we knew it, we were in Spain, and it hit us--we were passing by Figures on a day the Dali museum would be open, with time on our hands!!!!!!!! The only other trip we had time to stop, it was a Monday and the museum was closed. Which is how we found ourselves here at 10:30:
The museum (the back of which is behind me in the photo above) was designed by Dali himself in the ruins of the Municipal Theatre (damaged in the Spanish Civil War) that is in his hometown. It is considered the largest surrealist piece in the world, as the entire building is really a work of art in its own right. Like most of Dali's work, parts of it are gorgeous and parts are just odd or even unsettling.
Even though it had been open a while, this place is a big draw and we had to wait about 15 minutes in line just to get tickets and go in.
The kids sat by the statue out front while we stood in line. You can tell the crowds were bothering Marika a bit--so she was trying to stay out of them as much as possible.
I am not sure how to describe the museum, so I will leave it at: this is worth your time and money to visit if you can. I really do not think you have to be a fan of Salvador Dali's work to appreciate this place. SO be prepared for lots of crowding though--it was hard on Marika. She loves the art and really wanted to see it, but felt so stressed by the crowds that it was pretty anxiety provoking for her. Below is a sampling of thigns from the museum that we thought were particularity interesting or nice:
Marika analyzing the details
I really need to look this piece up--there is a lot going on with it
Rio and I discussing the piece in the courtyard (shown directly above this photo)
I loved this little painting of a girl in Figures
This whole room was really striking-the blending of the old building and new art and glass dome was striking (in a good way).
Dali doing pixalation before it was a "thing" We all liked this one a lot. You can read about it here if you are interested:
Valazquez (whose Las Meninas is the first painting I recall really being wowed by in person, when I saw it in Spain at age 15).
Another very interesting feature of the museum: so far as I know Dali is the only artist to be entombed among his own work in a museum of said work (maybe not, I have not looked it up--but I have not heard of it otherwise). Here is his tomb. Unlike the museum itself, it is very simple (or, you could say the entire museum is the tomb, in which case it is not simple at all)
On a related note; I think it is interesting that Dali was baptized in the church that is literally next to the museum. So he started and finished his life in nearly the same place.
After a few hours in the museum, we were ready for lunch. I had a picnic with cheese and fruit (plus our morning purchase of bread and rolls) in the car, so we got those out and had a nice lunch at a nearby park:
All in all it was a very nice day. We arrived at our "almost in Barcelona" hotel (the Holiday Inn Express that we often stay out for a great price) right about 6:00 pm. As luck would have it, friends we met online, who would be cruising with us arrived only about 15 minutes ahead of us. It was great fun to meet them and we all walked into the small town of Molins Del Rei and had a wonderful dinner together.
--Hadley
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