A very interesting airport (designed by Santiago Calatrava) greeted us to modern Bilbao.
Bilbao has an interesting mix of old and new. It has a great stock of turn of the century buildings (they look like they should be in northern Europe or the American Midwest though, not Spain) and many modern buildings along their waterfront.Some of the interesting older buildings.
Bilbao was a decaying old industrial town until a group of famous architects were hired to 'fix it'. This was back in 1989 and now Bilbao is a huge tourist destination with the Frank Ghery Guggenheim and other modern structures.
A very cool foot bridge by Calatrava
New sky-scraping condos being built by it's (now) trendy waterfront
From the foot bridge we walked over to the Guggenheim (lets face it, the city's main attraction.)
This was another one of the those buildings I have seen for years so it was really cool to finally see. I was surprised at how much it was aging already (built in 1997). The metallic panels were looking dirty, I can't imagine how it will look in 2025 if they don't clean it.
(In a side note- the pannels were all made in Kansas City!! I learned this from the KC BizJournal)
We stopped in the cafe where Ghery's signature furniture is utilized.
The building is more of a sculpture than a great space for art. The museum's collection was lackluster and a lot of the audio guide was just about Ghery and his buildings, and his legacy, etc etc...bla bla...He's really not that great...
One of the cooler works housed in the 'tin foil temple'
A cool spider statue outside of the museum. We have two of these at our modern art museum in Kansas City. I've also seen one in Manhattan. It's cool to travel the world and see where these are.
The € Shot.
As much as I criticise this, I really do like it. It really does make a unique sculpture. Should every city have one (as they are all scrambling to have a Ghery building) NO!
Anyway, the rest of the city was very charming too. Here was an awesome modernista apartment building being renovated. (Would it be getting fixed up if the Guggenheim wasn't there...probably not)
The city's main square and traditional center...the river front is its new center
Well it was really cold and I felt like I had seen everything I wanted to so I decided to take the day train home instead of spending another day aimlessly walking around before the overnight train. I really wanted to see the scenery, too. It was a hellishly long train ride...11 hours...and I didn't sleep the entire time...The scenery was nice though-
Getting closer to BCN!!!
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