La Rioja Region, aka "The Spanish Wine Country":

 Zaha Hadid's addition to Tondonia Winery

 Loved the door going inside.  Angled and the hinge is in the center of the frame.  Beautiful!

Frank Gehry's hotel in La Rioja

Supposed to relate to the colors of the grapes and the colors of the leaves... but not sure that I buy it.  It looked very out of place in its context.  I LOVED the Guggenheim Museum, but this Gehry project was definitely not my favorite.

Calatrava's Winery in La Rioja

One of the most spectacular buildings I have ever seen.  It relates to the mountainous landscape and it uses really complex forms in a very tasteful way.  Unfortunately we did not get to go inside, but the exterior was breathtaking.  It overlooks the vineyards, also shown in some pics below.

Bodegas Baigori: Winery that we had a 4 course lunch and a full fleight of wine at.  I have never been in a winery before, but this was a good place to start.  This winery was built 10 years ago, and it is built into the topography, which is a fairly steep hill.  You enter the winery at the top level, and then you make your way down [the hill] and the winery.  Their philosophy is all about the gravitational forces being used in the wine making process.  The building is modern, made of mainly concrete, steel, and glass.  Once you make your way through the whole wine making facilities, you pass through a HUGE room full of wine barrels.  To get through this room, you cross a bridge into the restaurant which casually looks out to the La Rioja region.  Simply SPECTACULAR.

 This is in the room full of barrels lookin over to the restaurant.

 The view out to the mountains in the distance

 After lunch, jumping for joy

 Lauren and me in front of the winery

Hola a todos!

I have now been in Spain for just over one month, but it seems like I got here just yesterday.  I am having the best time!  On the 22nd of August I arrived in Barcelona and set forth on my amazing semester long adventure.  I arrived on a Wednesday and we stayed in Barcelona until Friday and then started our Central and Northern Spain journey on Saturday morning.  The first day in Barcelona started out with me venturing to the beach from my hostel before all of my friends got here and then wandering around Place de Catalunya.  Before we left on our trip, we had a day of touring in Barcelona with our teacher and saw a few wonderful areas of the city.  Saturday morning we traveled to Madrid, Toledo, Bilbao, San Sebastian, and La Rioja.  I will start posting pictures from this first month and

When we got back to Barcelona we immediately moved into our apartments which are very close to the intersection: Via Augusta and Santalo.  The area is a rich area of town where it is way less touristy and very close in proximity to our school.  It is up a hill, so hopefully I will get muscular thighs by the end of this trip!  There are cute little shops, restaurants, cafes, and markets right around our apartment.  It is such a cute area.  It is also just a few blocks away from The Diagonal (a main street with walking/running/biking paths on either side) so it is a great place to be.

First Few Days in Barcelona:

This area is known as Gracia.  Very close to our new apartments and the hotel we first stayed at.  The streets are narrow and it used to be very common to have a store on the first floor and then live above your store... LIVE/WORK before it was cool and sustainable!  There are also many squares in this area that the locals really use.  At around 8 or 9, the whole square is full with people from the surrounding apartments chatting, drinking, and spending quality time outdoors.

I am intrigued by the way people use their balconies here in Barcelona.  Every district or area of town has unique ways that they utilize their balconies, but it seems that because of the lack of square footage that people have, they make up for with their balconies.  The "balcony" in a sense, becomes another room.

This was during "siesta", but here is one of the squares that I was talking about, in Gracia.

The very famous, Casa Mila, by Antoni Gaudi below.  During our first walking tour of Barcelona we took a tour through it.  Though everyone thinks of Gaudi as being extremely crazy and out there, he unlike other architects nowadays, respected the Cerda Grid in which Barcelona is organized.  Casa Mila still sticks with the chamffered corner at the corner of the block like the Cerda Grid is supposed to do.  It was also really interesting to see the inside.  No 90 degree angles!

View from the top of Casa Mila.

You could see Sagrada Familia in the distance.

Another Gaudi called Casa Batllo didn't Get to go inside though.

Madrid, beginning of our first trip:
 My fellow 5th year girls, Hannah and Lauren.  This is in the Puerta Del Sol, one of the most famous centers in Madrid.  Right where they are standing is the center (km 0) of the radial network of Spanish Roads.  It all starts here.

New Revitalization Project: "Madrid Rio" is along the Manzanares River.  Before the opening, which was about a year and a half ago, Madrid had no waterfront properties.  There used to be 6 lanes of train tracks along the river that are now buried, which allows for a lovely park along the river.  Along the park there are amazing playgrounds (not the ugly primary colored playgrounds found in the states), but playgrounds that are wonderfully incorporated under bridges, using natural materials, and that work with the landscape.  

See the next 3 photos:

 Reina Sofia Art Museum, addition by Jean Nouvel

View from open air patio on the top level of addition down to the entry plaza

Caixa Forum Museum Addition, by Herzog & de Meuron
 This was conceived as an urban magnet, not only for art-lovers but also for the building itself.  It appears to defy gravity and it consequently draws visitors inside.  The museum is housed in an 1899 power station.

 The faceted ceiling of the "floating" entryway

 Herzog & de Meuron's signature metal screen at the top of the building where a wonderful cafe is housed

 Main stairwell to each level of art galleries

 Entry staircase with the facets triangulations

 Lauren and me

Museo del Jamon (Museum of Ham)
A few of us decide that this would be a fun experience for lunch in Madrid.  We stepped in, got the overwhelming odor of Jamon and decided that Thai was what we wanted instead.  The ham is deliscioius here, but it is more abundant than any other food product and it gets a bit overwhelming at times!  The red green and blue things are legs of ham!  (And you see them EVERYWHEREEEEEEE)

 Museo del Prado and the new entry way (in the 2nd picture) designed by Rafael Moneo

 After a long day of walking and Museum tours, we decided to sit in a Park del Retiro and enjoy the scenary

Toledo Day Trip:
 Toledo Cathedral

1st Escalator Project by Moneo
Connects the suburbs of Toledo, which is a tiny medieval town, to the center of the city.  The city is on a steep hill, so the escalators make it possible for people to commute into the city easily.