Whilst the main purpose of my trip was to visit and tick off Andorra, for practicality I was staying in Barcelona, Spain’s second largest city and the capital of Catalonia. Whilst the bulk of my full day would be taken up with my trip across the border to Europe’s sixth smallest country, I had chosen flights that would allow me time to explore some of the city on my arrival and departure days, given the last time I visited Barcelona was over nine years earlier in Feb 2017. And so, having arrived in Barcelona mid-afternoon, I made my way to Plaza Espanya to check into my hotel, have a rest and then head out to explore some of the city.
If you are visiting Barcelona you can buy your transport tickets ahead of time with the Hola Barcelona app with a slight discount, although you still have to go to the ticket machines to collect a physical ticket. In an attempt to save myself money I bought a 48-hour pass for €16.83, which includes two single journeys to/from the airport, thinking that I’d be heading back early enough on the final day to fall within that 48-hour window. As it turned out, I completely messed up the timings and ended up having to buy an extra ticket, so rather than being frugal, I’d advise just rounding up to the next ticket if the timings are close.
After a bit of a siesta, I headed back out and jumped on a bus from outside Fira (between Espanya and the Magic Fountain of Montjuïc) which runs on a circular route all the way up Montjuïc to the castle at the top. However, rather than just sitting on the bus all the way, I jumped off at the bottom of the cable car, opposite the swimming pools from the 1992 Olympic Games. A return trip on the cable car costs €17.10 when bought online, so is a little bit pricey, but I thought was worth it for the experience. Unfortunately, I reached the top at 1745, with the castle closing at 1800, so I instead enjoyed the views for a while and did my ‘fun with flags’ before making my way back down to Paral-lel metro station via the cable car and by foot (the latter due to the Funicular being closed for maintenance).
After a quick trip to Sants to see where the coach to Andorra would depart from the following morning, I headed back to Plaza Espanya to find somewhere for dinner before making my way back to the hotel for the night. I ended up heading to the top of Arenas, the city’s former Bullring, which has been turned into a shopping centre with a cinema and restaurants. The external lift, giving you views over Plaza Espanya, costs €1.50 to go up (its free to come down), or you can head up to the top floor via the inside escalators and lifts. I ended up choosing Mussol for dinner, where I had snails as a starter, followed by what was essentially pork chops and chips for my main. What did amuse me was after a quick google of how to eat snails and vaguely understanding the specific fork you are given, all I was provided to eat them was a couple of toothpicks…
The following day was my trip to Andorra, so my next opportunity to explore Barcelona was on day 3 of my trip, which was also my going home day. After a couple of days with a lot of walking I decided to do one of the tourist bus tours, which conveniently had a stop in Plaza Espanya close to my hotel. Unfortunately I lost a bit of time as a tour group was checking into the hotel as I tried to check in and then I was met with chaos out in Plaza Espanya as an education expo (Saló de l’Ensenyament) was being held at Fira Barcelona with 1000s of teenagers being dropped off by coaches or arriving on their scooters! I chose to do the Barcelona Bus Turistic which seemed to be the ‘official’ tour ran in partnership with the tourist board, with Plaza Espanya being stop 5 on their Red Tour.
From Plaza Espanya, the bus heads up Montjuïc passing Pbel Espanyol, MNAC and the Olympic Stadium to the bottom of the cable car, before then making its way back down to the port, passing under the port cable car enroute. By the port is the Columbus monument where legend would have you believe the statue of Columbus on top is pointing towards America, whereas in fact it is behind him. The bus then heads along the sea front out to the Mar Bella sports complex, then inland to Forum and the end of Avenue Diagonal, passing the historic Torre de les Aigües del Besòs water tower. Pobelnou, now over 200 years old, was once the Manchester of Barcelona due to the large number of factories and also had a cemetery due to it being outside the historic city walls. Pobelnou is also home to one of Barcelona’s 39 food markets, meaning fresh food is readily available across the city.
The round tower Torre Glòries with its observation deck is the meeting point of three major streets, and so is an important landmark in the north of the city. It is also close to Barcelona’s most well-known landmark, the Sagrada Familia (which is a Basilica not a Cathedral) and the commentary took the opportunity to tell us about both the Basilica and Gaudi himself, including his death in 1926 due to being hit by a tram. There had certainly been a lot of progress on the Sagrada Familia since my last visit, with it looking less like a building site, although its still not finished. There is lots of symbolism within the design of Sagrada Familia, with its three facades representing the Holy Trinity, whilst its 18 towers represent the 12 Apostles, 4 Evangelists, Mary and Jesus, with the latter two being the tallest and topped with an illuminated star and large cross respectively.
From the Sagrada Familia, the tour took us round to the former Barcelona Nord station (now another coach station) and the Arc de Triomph before skipping Plaza Catalunya for some reason and going on to Casa Batillo/Museu Tapies. Here I changed onto the Blue Tour which covers the ‘outer’ tourist sights such as Recinte Modernista de Sant Pau, Park Güell and Tibidabo along with Camp Nou and the richer neighbourhoods of Sarria and Garvasi. Camp Nou was still very much a building site on the outside but was hosting games again, including that night’s UEFA Champions League game against Newcastle United. After passing through the Les Corts neighbourhood and along Avenue Diagonal, I swapped back onto the Red Tour at Eixample which then took me back to Plaza Espanya via Sants.
The tours actually took me a lot longer than I had expected so whilst I got great value for money, it did mean I only really had time to collect my bag from the hotel before making my way to the airport. Barcelona is one of the top cities for tourists to visit in Europe, something that is becoming a bone of contention for the city, but ultimately you don’t need me to tell you what a fabulous city it is. Obviously there are the main tourist sights such as the Sagrada Familia and Pobelsec, but there is so much to do you could easily spend days seeing everything, especially if you include further out sights such as Montserrat.
Flights & Times 