In all the years I have been visiting Barcelona, and more specifically the Zoo, which is housed in the park, I have never explored the park itself.
This year I did, and I have been missing so much.
The Citadel itself was built and then destroyed, restored and destroyed again on several occasions for various reasons, not least because it was seen as a much hated symbol of central Spanish government by the Catalan people. Only the Chapel (now the Military Parish Church of Barcelona), the Governor's palace (now a Secondary School), and the Arsenal (now home to the Catalan Parliament) remain with the rest of the site now forming the park.
On the day I visited, three of the Gigantes i Capgrossos (I have blogged about these before here) were being received into the Parliament buildings, along with their associated bands and groups.
After the puppets entered the building I wandered off down a different path.
And got lost.
As the park is 70 acres, this is not hard to do!
I continued wandering round knowing that, assuming I could find one of the exits, I could find my way back to the nearest metro or train station.
The park has a bandstand, I have always seen these as a peculiarly British thing, but evidently they are not.
It has a boating lake, something else I had seen as essentially British, it was a minimum of two people in a boat so I couldn't show off my (lack of) rowing skills.
There are plenty of play areas for children and plenty of little outside cafes where you can get a cold drink.
And then there is this....
It is the Cascada, it looks huge and it is fantastic. It was first inaugurated in 1881 without sculpture or detail and was thoroughly criticised. The addition of the modifications, including the fountain, continued until 1888, the building has remained the same since.
It was erected by Josep Fontsére and to a small extent by Antoni GaudÃ, who at that time was still an unknown student of architecture. The aim was to loosely make it bear resemblance to the Trevi Fountain of Rome.
Quite randomly, down one of the paths leading from the Cascada, there is a model of a mammoth.
The park as a whole is well worth a visit, there are free wi-fi areas available too now.
I will definitely be spending more time there from now on.
It has been two years since I last visited Barcelona Zoo and a lot of changes have taken place. As I mentioned before, there is an ongoing programme of refurbishment and renovation, and having left a two year gap between visits (instead of annually) I can see a big difference.
The whole place feels lighter as soon as you enter, even though you can't really see much difference from the turnstiles you can feel it.
The rather small pen where the camels were housed is now home to mongoose, which are much more suited to the size of the pen.
The Montserrat display, with mostly goats, sheep and vultures, has had a facelift, this is still ongoing with areas being closed off, but it is still a vast improvement, the smell has certainly gone!
One of the dolphin pools is now inhabited by seals. There is a large display detailing the dolphins and whales that can be seen in the Mediterranean, I knew there were dolphins as I have seen them, but I had no idea that there were Sperm and Fin whales too.
The 'Savannah' area is being renovated too, most of it was still closed off, but you can see that the elephants, rhinos, hippos and giraffes are going to be much happier when it is all finished.
Part of the monkey/ape area is closed off, but there was one Chimpanzee that really did scare me. He looked straight at me and grinned a really weird grin. I moved, Quickly.
Apart from the lions and tiger, the big cats have been moved out to allow refurbishment of their areas.
After many years of visiting, I finally saw the Red Panda.
You still exit via the gift shop, that hasn't changed.
I will give it another two years before I visit again, the changes are more dramatic.
Now that I have returned from my annual holiday to Spain I have the usual problem of what to do with my unused currency.
The best thing to do is keep it for your next trip and when I was in a position to travel more regularly than I currently do, this was my default position.
However, this is not an option for everyone, or me now, so what to do?
I have €290, plus change, to convert back.
If I was to buy €290 today, it would cost me £212 (courtesy of the Post Office Travel Currency website), however changing it back would only net me £181, a difference of over £30, and this is pretty much the norm for all tourist exchanges.
Most of these High Street exchanges highlight the fact that they charge no commission, (years ago there used to be a commission charge of around 2% to change money back, but the rates received were higher), however, using a buy back rate that is 15% lower than their selling rate appears to me to be a commission by another name.
Another option is to sell the currency onto any friends and family who are going away. This works better if the exchange rate has dropped slightly since the original purchase, if it has gone up then they would get a better deal with a fresh exchange.
In the past I have sold my Euros on eBay, but their fees were much less in those days.
The option I am considering this year is to use a specialist currency buy back operator, the drawback with this is that Euros would need to be posted, obviously by an insured route. At today's buy back rate, my €290 would net me £204, less the cost of the postage. This is clearly much better than using a normal exchange.
It would be so much easier if all UK personal bank accounts accepted both sterling and foreign currencies with no additional charges.
I spent Saturday morning walking around Dinosaur Adventure in Norfolk in glorious sunshine.
There is plenty of parking, although a lot of it is on grass, so if visiting after heavy rain, try and get there early!
There were two payment windows open and quite a queue forming, but a third window was quickly opened and the queue soon dealt with. This is definitely the first place I have visited where the entrance price is less for adults than for children. I liked that.
Buying my ticket on the day, I paid £11.95, booking online is slightly cheaper at £11.35, with a child's ticket costing £16.10 (under 3s go free).
Importantly, when travelling with children, there are plenty of places to eat and plenty of toilets dotted around the park.
As it was half term week when I visited, there were special events being held, including 'Guinea Pig Petting & Meet a Bunny', 'Snake Encounters' and 'Tortoise Time'. The park is home to small animals as well as big dinosaurs, including a Norfolk Black turkey who sneezed every time I walked past.
.
There is only one animatronic dinosaur, although roars can be heard across the park from hidden speakers. Quite eerie when walking under a huge canopy of trees.
There are other activities available at an extra cost, the Jurassic Skywire, the Deer Safari and face-painting.
The park is non-smoking, although there are designated smoking areas dotted around.
The park is on a hillside, some of the paths are quite steep which may pose a problem for anyone with problems walking. Wheelchairs can be hired.
If you are in the area and have a budding Alan Grant or Ellie Sattler in the family, it is well worth a visit.
This weekend I stayed at the Ramada Hotel at The Mailbox in Birmingham, and I was a little disappointed, both with The Mailbox itself and the hotel.
The Mailbox seems to be the place to be in Birmingham so I was expecting a little more from a hotel in it.
It is a beautiful walk up from across the canal and over the footbridge where lovers and couples have placed padlocks signifying their love but the hotel entrance was pretty difficult to spot.
I had booked an executive room.
This was my view.
Admittedly it is unusual these days to find a city centre hotel in the UK which does have opening windows, so that was a bonus.
The hotel was quiet, less so the other clientele. I was awake most of the night thanks to the next room who seemed to feel necessary to make as much noise as possible at 11pm, 2am and 4am. The noise outside started about 5am. As soon as my alarm went off at 6am everyone went quiet.
There is free wired internet available in the rooms but wifi is only available downstairs in the public areas of the hotel.
I would stay here again, but it would not be my 'go to' choice of hotel.
Last year you may remember that I had an issue with my holiday accommodation booking where I was moved to a cheaper hotel by Somewhere2Stay who refused to acknowledge that the hotel was cheaper than the one I had booked and paid for, they also saw fit to wait several weeks until the day before travel to advise me of the change.
During the course of my complaint and attempt to obtain a refund of monies owed, I discovered that Somewhere2Stay is a subsidiary of Monarch Travel Group Ltd.
Initially I said that I would not be using any Monarch Travel Group company again, but I relented once I realised that I would have to travel to either Manchester or Luton to fly to Barcelona if I no longer flew Monarch, so I gave them another chance.
Four days ago I received an email telling me that whilst they carry out a review of their schedule certain flights would be covered by Jet-Time, a Danish company. Apparently the planes used by Jet-Time are a different configuration to those belonging to Monarch so the extra legroom seat that I booked is not available, I have received a refund for the small amount that this cost me.
I have emailed Monarch with a few queries, to which I have yet to receive a response.
Although I have lost my extra leg room, do I still keep the pre-booked seat? (Paid for).
Can I still check in online? (Paid for).
Is the hold luggage the same, I have 23kgs, Jet-Time's website says that their limit is 20kgs. (Paid for).
Next year I think I will be travelling to Manchester for Vueling or Luton for Easyjet.
I was recently discussing holidays with a friend and the fact that we both hate packing came up. We both said that we wished we had enough money so that we can buy all we need at our destination and then leave it all there when we return home (*note to self, possible business idea here).
We complained about the fact that every electrical device we take with us needs a different charger, I don't use my phone when abroad, it gets locked in the room safe, so that is one charge I don't need, but there is still my Kindle, iPod, iPad and camera. Plus you have to remember the adaptor to change the plug to fit local sockets.
What did surprise me was that my friend did not keep a stocked holiday washbag, instead having to pack this after getting ready to leave regardless of the time of the flight. In the past this was not such an issue as it could just go into the carry on bag, but now space has to be left in the case for it to be squeezed into.
I have had a travel ready wash bag for as long as I can remember, and certainly since I starting travelling alone, which is 25 years+. It can also be used as emergency stock if I am at home and have run out of toothpaste or deodorant.
I treated myself to a new washbag this year, my last one have served its time well. It is labelled as a man's, but it was half the price and twice the size of those labelled as women's, and the toiletries won't know. It is massive so there is plenty of room to store my suncream and aftersun too, usually these are just stored in my beach bag in the suitcase pocket.
Do you have a travel ready washbag, or do you have to pack yours the day of travel?
