The Dali Museum is AWESOME, in the truest sense of the word. We had such a good time there! Not easy to photograph, but we tried.

Exterior, before it opened.

Queue to get in, at 9.30am.

The atrium – Colin looks suitably awed!

The Cadillac.

And again! This was my favourite room.

An attempt to get the full height of the atrium. That is a boat on top of the stack of tyres.

This painting is enormous! Not beautiful, IMO, but very impressive.The second room, the stage of the old theatre, which was damaged in the civil war. Dali  spent years making it what it is.

A painting from his early years, before he developed his individual style

A bit later, and you can get the sense of what was to come.

A view of the atrium from an upper level. You can see that the white trim around the top is made in the shape of pedestal wash basins!

Another view of the atrium – I said it was my favourite room! Getting busy by then.

This is an actual room, we went up a staircase and looked through a lens to see it like this. It’s called Portrait of Mae West as a Surrealist Apartment.

Those are dead birds at the back.

There wasn’t much of what we think of as his “real” work – after he died, “they” came and took all the best stuff to the Prado in Madrid. You can glance at this painting, but to actually look at it takes a while – the detail is amazing. It’s called American Poetry.

Apparently he lived in the Museum for his last years, but we don’t know where. Did he sleep in this bed? I don’t think I would want to!

Looking straight up at a ceiling.

This is a stereoscopic work. The idea is to look at one painting with each eye, it then looks 3D. We couldn’t make it work. However, it does prove that the pink plastic chair on the beach at Port Lligat is art. I would say that Dali originally placed one of these chairs, but being natural materials, it wore out. They now have the pink plastic one. Also, this may be the source of the wash basin motif…

An installation.

The queue at 12.30pm. If you want to go, go early!

If you ask an artist what his work means, the answer is often “What do you want it to mean?” or “What do you think it means?” so what do we think this is all about? These objects cover the building’s exterior. I thought they were maybe cookies, or teddy bears. Colin suggested dog turds. Anybody else got any ideas?

So, that was the morning. We read Wikitravel on Figueres, and they advised us not to eat at the restaurants around the museum, but we were hungry, and we took no notice. Bad idea!

Colin’s Patatas Bravas. We are in Spain, they ought to be able to get this right! But, the potato seemed to have been cooked yesterday, and re-heated in a microwave, and the sauce tasted like Heinz Tomato Soup with a sprinkle of cayenne. Definitely a miss.

My Manchega Cheese with Tomato and Bread wasn’t too bad, but I don’t look overly impressed. The coffee was nice though.

In the afternoon, we went to Sant Ferran Fortress, the biggest castle in Europe. It was built in the 18th century, much later than we expect castles to have been built, and it is very different! The outer ramparts are 3km to walk round! and the locals use it as a jogging track.

Castle entrance.

Plan of the castle. As you can see, it’s impossible to photograph from the ground, but there are some nice aerial shots if you Google.

It’s not like our Norman castles!

The central courtyard, with the headquarters building on the right.

There are a lot of arches! They always make nice photos.

You can see what these all are – the practicalities of life.

We can see from this how flat the castle is. This is to make it difficult to shoot cannonballs over the walls and knock things down.

This view from the inner ramparts gives an idea of the scale of the place. That path is the outer rampart – the jogging track.

More arches.

And yet more. This is the stables – you can see the mangers on the right, and the gutter for mucking out down the middle.

Steps up to the ramparts.

Another room, don’t know the use but it looks nice. The fort could house 6000 men, that’s why so many rooms.

Colin suspects this bannister rail is not original, and is also doubtful about the white PVC cable trunking.

Almost at the exit, I was worried we wouldn’t see any scaffolding. What a relief!

These bits seem to be left over, I don’t know if that is before or after the builders. There is something similar on Sydney Domain, but that was arranged by an artist, so it is now called an Art Installation.

We had a really good day! Walked for 6 hours and didn’t feel tired. Tomorrow, Girona.