David's Diary: Saturday, February 16, 2002

Cathedral Visit and Another Roman Wall

It is interesting how much we fall back into old patterns. We seem to do school on weekdays and take the weekend off. As today is Saturday and there is no formal school, we decided to visit Tarragona's cathedral. After arriving at the main gates, we found them locked. We were about to assume that the Cathedral was closed to visitors for the day, when an older Spanish woman stopped to talk to us. While we didn't understand her Spanish and she didn't understand our English, we did understand each other. She pointed to the Cathedral doors and then pointed to a small sign leading out of the square in front of the Cathedral. The sign had an arrow pointing down a narrow side street. We thanked the nice lady and followed the arrows which led to the cloister behind the church.

Cathedral Museum

Like the Cathedral in Barcelona, the one in Tarragona had tall naves supported on thin columns. Between the arches were numerous small chapels and some almost as big as a regular church. We wandered around following the guidebook we got upon entering. Even Kevin and Allen were interested as we felt the cool interior and the warm colors in the chapels.

A Cathedral visit includes entrance to the museum that sits off the cloister. The museum is in two parts. The first has numerous pieces from the 12th- to 14th-century, including a tiny baby Jesus figure standing with one foot on top of a skull and the piece shown above of Hercules slaying the devil. The second part had numerous Roman remains, some dating from the first century AD.

Roman Wall

By the time we finished our visit it was time for lunch. As we walked down the hill from the Cathedral we passed a restaurant that featured a Roman wall inside. We couldn't resist going inside and finding a table right next to a 2,000 year-old Roman wall. The wall forms one of the walls of the restaurant and Jocelyn couldn't believe that we could sit down and eat lunch right next to it. As a bonus the food was good and the prices reasonable.

Tarragona Streets

After lunch we walked back to the boat through Tarragona's narrow Roman streets. Seeing these streets always makes us think of horses and carriages and people working their way past each other as they go about their daily lives. On this Saturday in February the streets are deserted as everyone is inside having their lunch or watching TV.