Clouds over most of Spain and Portugal. Hot and muggy in Barcelona.
Found the hotel, showered and changed and went wandering through the Barri Gotic.
Pedestrians rule here, with cars squeezing though as needed. Here are cell phones, and McDonald's and KFC, and even kopakelli.
At 1:30 or 2pm the city starts shutting down. The shops close and everyone shifts to the restaurants or goes promenading down Las Ramblas. Las Ramblas is a paved area between the two lanes of the street, filled with stationary shops, restaraunt annexes, and street artists, the sort who sketch and paint, as well as living statues, who point their faces and clothing silver or bronze or gold and pose.
At 4 I gave up and went back to the hotel to siesta. I got up at 7, in time for the evening promenade and the night busking in the Plaça de Catalunya.
As the night wears on, the people forsake the pedestrian lanes and the garbage collectors move in. There are also people rooting through the garbage left on the street (recycling) either homeless or travelling people. Others sleep in the out-of-the way parklets. And kittens come out to beg.
The moonlight express starts making its rounds - a tourist train (rubber-tired) that meanders through the now-empty lanes, spouting commentary in several languages.
I slept without the air conditioner, to prove that I didn't need it. But since the hotel is on an automobile alley, there was a stream of traffic - a convention of mopeds (at closing time?), the garbage truck, a water truck, and God knows what else.
