I decide we should try churros for breakfast, and drag Iain to a café at the top of La Rambla. They are like small donuts in the shape of pretzels, and dunked in thick chocolate sauce. I love them but Iain isn't impressed.

Today we're taking a tour bus around the city, as we've definitely had enough walking. The Bus Turistic runs three routes that you can buy day tickets for, swap round, and jump on and off as you like. Had I realised how comparatively cheap the two-day passes were, I'd have bought these on Saturday rather than walking five or six miles of blue-bus route.

[Casa Batllo]

[Balconies]

[From the rear]

[Ground floor]

[Looking down from the top floor]

We catch a red bus from Plaça de Cayalunya and go back up to the Gaudi houses we briefly saw last night. Daylight shows the colours very differently to the way they were lit last night, and we take a tour of them both.

[Laundry]

[Laundry]

[Roof]

[Chimney detail]

[Front]

[Front]

The buildings are fascinating, intricate, and stunning. It's a bit of a Gaudi day as we're seeing lots of his work today; I love his style of design.

[La Pedrera]

[La Pedrera]

[La Pedrera]

[Balcony bit (taken in convex mirror)]

[Roofy bit]

[Top]

[Top]

[Roof]

[Chimneys]

[Stairs]

[Passion Façade]

[Passion Façade]

[Passion Façade]

[Interior]

[Mosaic making]

A red bus eventually turns up, having been delayed by demonstrators (another one!) and we get off at La Sagrada Família, a cathedral build-in-progress. I'm easily bored by multiple cathedrals/castles/etc, but this is very different. It's designed to be as natural looking as possible, and the ideas that have been put into this is amazing. We divert to a Pizza Hut for lunch (I know, but we got vouchers as part of the bus tour).

[North Face detail]

[More construction]

[Spires]

[Exterior of spire]

Back to the cathedral: there are supporting columns which look like trees reaching out of a forest, pillars upon the back of carved turtles, spires adorned with giant bunches of fruit, and endless other unique designs; you'll have to go and see it because I can't describe it. It's hoped to be completed within the next fifty years, and has been worked on for over a hundred; my Dad saw it thirty years ago, and was interested to hear how it has developed since. It's wonderful to see people working on the building, carving new features that will stand for who knows how many hundreds of years. This is one of the most wonderful buildings I've ever seen. I hope to come back and see it sometime in the future; maybe it'll be finished by then.

[Park Güell gatehouse]

[Park Güell]

[View of the city]

[Serpentine terrace]

[Dalí house ]

Another red bus takes us towards Park Güell, where we grab coffees at a bakery before the climb up to the park. This is another of Gaudi's wondrous creations, well worth exploring for a couple of hours, which we do. The park is filled with tourists and locals, enjoying the surprisingly laid-back and peaceful atmosphere for such a busy place.

[Humorous sign]

[Walkway]

[Walkway]

[The Lizard]

[Cat]

[Graffiti]

We pick up yet another bus, and tour round bits of Barcelona we've missed, which were lower down the priority list. For completions' sake, we swap onto a blue bus where their paths cross, intending to do a full loop and cover any sections we've missed on foot. Unfortunately, we're running out of time, and have to jump off and short cut from the harbour on foot. We've left it a bit late, and have to rush to get back to our hostel to pick up our bags and catch a bus to the airport. We check-in just in time and rush through to the

["Woman and Bird" sculpture]

[Plaça de España]

departure area to try and find last minute presents, and dinner. After the panic, and resulting sandwiches and junk food, we find that the flight is delayed, though there is no information as to how long for. Iain finds some better food (Barcelona airport is distinctly lacking; you have been warned), and we sit and watch over a hundred people queue for our plane. The Easyjet staff end their shift, and people continue to queue for an empty desk and docking area.

An hour later, the plane arrives, along with boarding staff, and is turned around incredibly quickly. We arrive back in Liverpool an hour late, and are home by 1am (2am in Spain, which is a long day). Unfortunately we have to be up at 7am for work.

Barcelona regularly makes it into the top few city destinations in the world. Definitely in the top three on my list so far.