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Return to Australia
Nov. 6th, 2016 10:57 pmHave just arrived back in Australia after a lengthy plane journey from Barcelona which included a thirteen-hour stop over in Dohar. Absolutely exhausted as a result, which is hardly surprising at all. Air Qatar, it must be said, is a really good airline serving quality food and offering a wide range of in-flight entertainment (although the user interface of their system could be improved a little). Highlight of the journey however is the particularly low flights on the Barcelona to Dohar leg of the journey over Egypt and Saudi Arabia which included a spectacular viewing the pyramids by night.
The last days in Barcelona were simply great. Spent a good period visiting the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre which is quite rightly described as hosting the most beautiful supercomputer in the world - the MareNostrum system is hosted in an former old church. Members of the center took us out for a great lunch where we covered various issues of systems architecture and planning.
For the remainder of the visit we spent a lot of time around the gardens of the Parc de Montjuïc, and the overwhelming Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya. Whilst the former was peaceful, beautiful, and even romantic, the latter is an overwhelming collection of Romanesque, medieval, gothic, renaissance, and modern artworks - including the usual suspects of course, but also with a moving collection of material from the Spanish Civil War. It is an event that clearly still hangs heavy in the hearts of the Catalan people, and it was perhaps unsurprising that the final day in the city I spent visiting various anarcho-syndicalist bookstores and the CGT industrial union.
Thus ends my first ever tour of the European peninsula, and one which I think in hindsight I managed to do quite well if only for a one-month visit. Four countries, six HPC centre visits and presentations (including CERN and two other national facilities), one library research visit, one social science research institute visit, one week-long conference, a dizzying array of museums, art galleries, cathedrals, a couple of concerts, and I even managed to make myself understood - if poorly - in several different languages. I can certainly imagine making this a regular feature of my life.
The last days in Barcelona were simply great. Spent a good period visiting the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre which is quite rightly described as hosting the most beautiful supercomputer in the world - the MareNostrum system is hosted in an former old church. Members of the center took us out for a great lunch where we covered various issues of systems architecture and planning.
For the remainder of the visit we spent a lot of time around the gardens of the Parc de Montjuïc, and the overwhelming Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya. Whilst the former was peaceful, beautiful, and even romantic, the latter is an overwhelming collection of Romanesque, medieval, gothic, renaissance, and modern artworks - including the usual suspects of course, but also with a moving collection of material from the Spanish Civil War. It is an event that clearly still hangs heavy in the hearts of the Catalan people, and it was perhaps unsurprising that the final day in the city I spent visiting various anarcho-syndicalist bookstores and the CGT industrial union.
Thus ends my first ever tour of the European peninsula, and one which I think in hindsight I managed to do quite well if only for a one-month visit. Four countries, six HPC centre visits and presentations (including CERN and two other national facilities), one library research visit, one social science research institute visit, one week-long conference, a dizzying array of museums, art galleries, cathedrals, a couple of concerts, and I even managed to make myself understood - if poorly - in several different languages. I can certainly imagine making this a regular feature of my life.
