I have a Reader’s Digest coffee table book, featuring 100 most
awe-inspiring places in the world, that I loosely browse through, every time the
thought of travel comes to my mind. While some of the places are off limits, because
of rigor or safety concerns, a lot of them are ones that I aspire to visit someday.
In the past, the book has taken me to places like the fortressed town of San
Gimignano in Tuscany, over spending more time in the famous but crowded Italian
cities.
I had been planning a trip to Spain, one of the top-most
visited countries of the world, for a while, but it was yet to happen. When I opened
the two-paged contents of the book, to see what featured in it, as worth
visiting in Spain, I was surprised. Towards the top, of the alphabetical contents,
was the Alhambra, the Moorish palace in the Spanish region of Andalucia, in the
south. As I went down the list, there was only one other place in Spain, that
featured in the top hundred – Boqueria Market in Barcelona. I wondered why out
of so many famous places in Spain, it was a market that featured in the list,
other than the Alhambra.
After checking some routes and even making an initial
booking, I decided to skip the Alhambra during this trip and waited to see what
Boqueria Market had to offer.
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| Spice store inside La Boqueria |
And Lo Behold!! Situated on the most famous road in Barcelona, the Las Ramblas, I realized as soon as I stepped in La Boqueria, the reason behind the featuring in the top 100 Best places to visit. The market is a visual paradise of gastronomic offerings of varied colors, textures, tastes and a lot more, in very aesthetically decorated storefronts. The welcoming facade, greets visitors with a rainbow spread of marzipan in delightful shapes, followed by candy, fruits, fruit juices, a variety of snacks, vegetables, fishes, meats – everything that one may want to eat and all standing such, as if only meant for decoration. I for sure enjoyed my fresh fruits and tomato-mozzarella-basil empanada. My daughter was thrilled by the chips made of rolling a potato in a skewer, with a special cutter, that cuts it in a continuous roll of chips, without slicing individual pieces apart. The visual feel of La Boqueria, is hard to do justice to in words, so I am sharing a few pictures to showcase some of the delightful shops.
