No. 8 Tinkle: Gran Hotel La Florida Barcelona
It was supposed to be a romantic retreat at the end of a work trip to Barcelona. Gran Hotel La Florida is perched on Tibidabo, the crest of earth where Barcelona broke off and almost slid into the sea. When MTM lived in Barcelona, it was an abandoned ruin, a ghostly shell that blighted the view of the carnival lights that strobed next door.
In 2004, he took me to Barcelona. He had to sit on architecture reviews with his friend Miguel Roldan, leaving me to wander that glorious city on my own for a couple of days. When MTM’s working stint ended, Miguel took us to a sprawling Spanish lunch in the Eixample.
It was delicious.
It was morcilla.
I ate every bite of the bloody mess.
MTM’s work stint ended, and we took a taxi up to Gran Hotel La Florida for our final two days. The ruin had been transformed into a decadent oasis overlooking the city, the Mediterranean sparkling in the distance. Our marble clad room had its own balcony. If we left the French doors open, we could almost hear children screaming on the spinning carnival rides.
And the bathroom. My God, the bathroom.
We had a perfect toilet and an equally infallible European convention, a bidet. The shower was a platform with waterfall sides that diverted the water into a hidden drain below. The sink was littered with expensive products for my face, my legs, my teeth, my hair. I wanted to split myself in several pieces and spend simultaneous time in each place.
Mostly, I spent my two days at Gran Hotel La Florida clutching the toilet. In agony. The closest I got to the carnival was driving the porcelain bus.
It turned out that blood sausage did not agree with me. Or it was poisoned with bacteria from the bowels of hell. Either way, I spent more time with that toilet than I did with my poor abandoned husband.
I’d still go back to that bathroom. Just don’t try to make me eat the morcilla. Ever. Again.
This post is part of the series My Top 10 Tinkles. If this is your first visit to my urinary extravaganza, please click here to start the series at the beginning. Thank you for reading my blog, for sharing it, and for spending time here.
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Many thanks! I will come over and check out the requirements.
Morcilla….Morticia….same thing when lovebirds hang in Barcelona. Here are the lovely MTM and Queen A enjoying their stay.
Ha. I always wanted to wear Morticia’s dress when I was little. Not that it was appropriate for a kid.
I met the bidewt for the first time in Spain. Valencia. Honestly I thought it was a foot spa. Oh we young foolish things!
They can be very useful as foot spas, though, Jim.
When I am in a foreign country, I always drink wine with my meals. It kills any bacteria. Also it is a good excuse to drink wine.
Honestly. Do you think I DIDN’T have wine with that meal? I even had more that night for good measure. It wouldn’t have helped if I drank a whole vineyard.
I wonder if anyone has actually camped out in the bathroom…I want to go visit…the bathroom.
Oh, the things I could’ve done in that bathroom if I’d been well………..It was one of those camping out places.
Even if the company was great but had to be in the next room the surroundings were fine.
I wasn’t great company. Not at all.
Maybe you’ll get to return some day and next time Just. Say. No. to the sausage…..
I’m sure we will go back to Barcelona. MTM loved living there.
Tummy rumbles are never fun, especially when in Barcelona. At least you were in posh accommodations, Andra.
They were less posh when we checked out.
“bowels of hell”… genius, and disgusting, but mostly genius! Nothing says romance like a little uncontrollable intestinal gurgling.
I was pleased with that one myself, Tori.
Ok I looked up the blood sausage link and urgh! I do not think I could have eaten that. So if my husband is reading who eats everything sausage just say no to blood sausage. Please.
It’s vile. I cannot imagine him eating it.
I love it that you could take time to appreciate the beauty in your death throes. I can’t even imagine the bacteria crawling around in a blood sausage. But GOD I bet it tasted good.
And I just tested — if I try to use my real e-mail address, I still get vanished.
Miguel’s wife Merce was so impressed with me because I devoured an authentic Catalan dish with such apprective gusto. If I had known what I was eating, I never would’ve ordered it. But, everything was in Spanish, and nobody translated.
Erm, I’d give this one a ‘eww’ rating, Andra.
But at least you got to enjoy the luxury of the bathroom, which is always a bonus!
I give it an ‘eww’ rating, too, Tom.
Gak!!
It was a lot of that sound, Cameron.
Oh! I ache for you! There is nothing worse then food poisoning in another country! I couldn’t imagine Spain no matter how wonderful the royal flush was…
In spite of that experience, I still loved Barcelona. I would go back again and again.
Ah, European toilets. I’m on home ground there…posh, scented,cool stone, sophistication, very Day Of The Jackal
I feel very sad that you missed the city to have a conversation with the toilet, though: horrid. I did that once, in Lyme Regis, Never got to stand on the long jetty with my big black cloak billowing, and the charm of the tiny toilet cubicle was limited..
As I walk into the clackety squeaky scaly shower on its last legs on our ground floor, silently cursing my husband for not being a city broker who can give me a power shower and wet room to-die-for, the words of these posts are resounding clearly through my consciousness. We need a new tinkle. It is decided.
You must return, Kate, and stand in the wind in your cloak. That is an experience every woman needs to have once in her life.
As to your second paragraph, just wait for tomorrow’s installment.
That’s gross. I have, and will, eat all kinds of things, but that looks like zombie food. The bathroom sounds fun though.
I never thought about it as zombie food, but I think you are right.
Oh, no! What a waste. I’m totally jealous of that shower, it sounds fantastic.
MTM actually studied that shower for reproduction someday because we liked it so much. However, we didn’t think we could replicate it in the humid climate in which we live.
True to your stated intentions–”when too much is just enough!” I was luxuriating with you in your spectacular and glorious view from above, and then we plummeted to the, dare I say, bowels of you-know-what! I definitely think you need a do-over trip to Barcelona! I personally stay away from any food with the word “blood” in it. I am queasy just thinking about it! oxo Debra
We will definitely go back to Barcelona, Debra. MTM and Miguel are quite a pair to see together, one of those friendships that is from the soul.
You are so lucky…what great travels you’ve had in your young life (bummer about the illness, at least it was a clean comode) ~
Mostly in the past decade. I never went anywhere until I was 33.