Staycation: Mossèn Costa i Llobera, the cactus garden in Barcelona!

Howdy!

This post reminds me of the US West, so I thought I would start it with the salute I learnt during my summer exchange program in Houston :) My sweet exchange-friend Ashley explained me that it was a short term for “how are you doing?” or “how do yo do?” and that it was frequently used, at least back then, for the locals specially amongst the teenagers and university students. So, howdy! We are today travelling very very much locally though, to be precise we are not leaving Barcelona, and we are only around 4km from our home, we are going to the Mossèn Costa i Llobera cactus garden!

Old readers of the blog (million thanks if it’s your case, big love!) may found this place familiar, as I already talked about it many years ago back on 2015 when we discovered for the first time. Don’t forget to check the post in case you are in the mood for a before and after, do you think we have changed a lot?

Montjuïc park (it’s in fact a mountain with different parks, gardens and other spots) has become the only place we like to currently visit in our city, since we are trying to make minimum social interaction. It’s quite incredible to see how we have 180º changed our weekends and free time, we usually aligned visits to admire architecture spots or exhibitions with trying new cafés & restaurants, now our Barcelona outings are exclusively for errands or to walk around Montjuïc. Need to mention of course that we are supporting our favorite places as much as we can by buying from them take-aways or products that they sell online, it’s super important to help them keep going, but we are not eating inside restaurants since March. I know people are now travelling and thus eating in restaurants, but for me it’s important to be supportive while keeping people safe, so that’s for now our take. We may change our opinion and routines depending on how everything evolves. What do you think? I’d love to know!

We stumbled upon some gorgeous little stray cats, were able to take our masks off for some time since we had people at a huge distance, which felt nice, and was able to admire once again the gorgeous cactus & succulents. I was sad though to find that some of the cactus had names craved on them, who would do that? My mind blows with these type of behaviors, like for instance, at the Bamboo grove in Kyoto were people are killing the millennial bamboo tree just to put their name there.

This week I’ve started my semi-vacations although I will be partially working because we have a new project (plus we are short on people). I also have some doctors appointments, lately I’ve been frankly feeling a bit down so I wanted to take some tests and see what this is all about. Still, this next week Daniel starts vacation too, so we would like to have some 1-day outings nearby at the Costa Brava and maybe a mountain hike too, we’ll see! Make sure to follow our Instagram for the stories. I am also finally tackling the gallery wall in the living room, and I think I’m getting closer to have it ready soon. I’m definitely sharing it all here, at least a mid-way update!

How is your August looking like? Hope you are feeling good, sending my best vibes to you! <3