Barcelona - a dream come true

We went there from Jan. 2-7 and the locals were on a shopping spree during the Jan 6 Reyes Holiday. It was Barcelona at its liveliest, I'm sure!

In Barcelona you don't necessarily need a map--the sights are all over the place and go on forever and ever. You could just walk around the Barri Gotic's narrow streets and gaze for hours at old buildings, statues, churches, and plazas. Wrought-iron balconies abound! And you just walk around and go "oh, there's one more Gaudi house, right . . ."

There are so many sights that some beautiful plazas may not even deserve a mention in your guidebook simply because there's no some special historical meaning!

Eating and drinking are an important part of visiting this city that abounds with simple but great food and fancy restaurants, too. And you eat late--sitting down for dinner at 10pm did not seem to uncommon at all!

Quick Tips:

I wouldn't bother with Maremagnum--after all, it's just a mall.

Tibidabo - visit for the views!

There's just too much to see--so don't even try to do everything in a couple of days!

Go to a FC Barcelona game if you can!

Best Way To Get Around:

You will do a lot of walking so rest your feet whenever you can by using the great public transport system. The subway is fast and clean and goes most places. Note that if you buy a 2-, 3-, 4- or 5-day ticket, activating it late at night means you'll lose almost a whole day!

There are plenty of taxis, especially around the major sights, so getting one shouldn't be a problem. Large parts of the old town are pedestrian zones - in Finland the shop owners always complain that this hurts business - as far as I could see the business was going quite well on Portal D'Angel, for example... FOr airport transportation, the cheapest (and surprisibgly fast, 30 minutes max, I'd say) option is the aerobus that leaves from outside the arrivals terminal (cost 3,30euros) and takes you to Plaza CAtalunya and back to terminals A and B every 10 or 15 minutes. It gets quite packed, though!

Cataluña is a small, simple hotel on a busy little shopping street, Santa Anna, right between Portal D' Angel and Ramblas (not to be mixed up with other hotel Catalunas--those are definitely more upscale!). It is so centrally located! If you take the airport bus to Plaza Catalunya, no need to take a cab--it is less than 5 minutes' walk, and the streets (Santa Anna, Portal D'Angel) are mainly pedestrian anyway.

The star rating is two--the rooms are quite OK, clean and spacious, especially the bathrooms (five-piece, actually quite large!), and some rooms even have balconies to Santa Anna. Our room faced a very narrow side street, so basically we just saw another building, but some of the rooms seemed to only have a window to a tiny courtyard (more like a shaft, really).

The hotel was renovated in 2001, but that doesn't mean everything is new now! In the wintertime, this hotel is fine--it has central heating--but in the summertime, I would choose a hotel with air-conditioning!

The breakfast is included at the Hotel Cortes (right across the street, with air-conditioning) and consists of a croissant, crisp bread, jam, butter, orange juice, and coffee or tea.

I think Cataluña is quite good value, but the lack of air-conditioning may be a problem . . .

We booked an apartment for a week this September through Citysiesta.com -- they have a good selection of apartments in different sizes, locations etc. The rate per night was 80 euros for an apt with small fully equipped kitchen (no dish washer, though and limited dishes), living/dining room, an alcove type bedroom, bathroom and washer/technical closet with a long foyer connecting these all. Also a tiny balcony, black iron rails as in all old buildings here. :-) No ocean view, though but we could see the Columbus statue on the right.

The apartment looked exactly the same as the pictures on the internet, hardwood floors, tiles, very beautiful. Quite nice furniture, if not the best possible quality (Ikea, mostly with a few antique dressers). A very nice 5-piece bathroom with dark red and white tiles. Very good A/C unit. A bakery right across the street (oh the smell - just had to get fresh bread every morning...) and two supermercados 2 blocks away with Passeig de Joan Borbo as well 2 blocks away, Barceloneta subway stop not much further.

However, the apt could definitely have used a good cleaning . . . it was quite dirty but we did not bother calling the agency -- we did a quick cleanup ourselves and it was much better. The fridge made some horrible noises once and the washer door broke and did not open, but all the problems were quickly and friendly dealt with by the agency (staff speaks good English). The water I guess in most of Barceloneta is a bit salty/minerally and makes your skin a bit sticky, and the gas-heated hot water is a bit slow to start coming but all things just made our stay feel more like we're actually living in Spain -- just a week but still.

Just a word of warning: a lot of the older buildings in Barcelona do not have elevators and our apt for example was on the third floor. In case someone doesn't know (like we did not), in Spain the floor at street level is ground floor, the next one is "principal" and the next one is 1st . . . so guess how many floors we were up a very charming old staircase (read narrow and dark . . . ;-)

So if you rent an apartment in Bcn, you'll probably face a few more difficulties than with a hotel room, but you also will get to live almost like a local and possibly also in a very pretty old building like us!

This is a tapas place close to Placa Catalunya, a couple of blocks up Passeig de Gracia. It seemed to be popular among the locals as well, though not the cheapest place. The line-up may seem long, but the staff told us it would be some 10 minutes to get a table and it actually was no more than that. The queue is arranged between the food counters, so by the time you get your table, you want to order everything--everything looks so fresh and delicious! The cooks seemed very efficient, and the service was indeed quite fast. The waiters were youngish, quite informal, and very friendly. The place was busy and looked like it must be somewhat in at the moment.

We had tomato and mozzarella salad (3.50 euros) and a tortilla (3 euros) for starters with a "small" sangria (1 liter, 4 euros . . . ). For mains, we both chose brochettes--they came with a potato and some mushroom salad, so at 6 or 7 euros, they made a very cheap main course. I had some very fresh and refreshing-tasting blackcurrant cheesecake and my husband just took some coffee--we had already had way too many crema catalanas by then . . .

This was the best dining experience for us here--I guess it was the combination of mood and food, in a place that seemed like a place we might frequent if we lived in Barcelona.

This is a good place to start eating tapas--the menu has it all explained-- your placemat is your menu with pictures of all tapas and there is also explanatory menu available in English and several other languages. Prices are not too badly affected by the location so the little increase is well worth paying for a seat on the patio (as in all restaurants on Passeig de Gracia).

Patatas bravas or al'ioli (sp?) are a safe bet always ($2,65 I think). Crema catalana is not bad here either ($3,50). The wines and beers are more expensive, the menu suggests bottles that start from seven or eight euros, quite expensive in a city where house wine most often is three or four euros in non-touristy places.

Service is not bad but not overly friendly either. A touristy place but the location is great and tapas are good (certainly beats next door McDonalds).

This is the small mountain or hill you see in the north of the city behind Zona Alta. You will get a fantastic view of the city (much better than from Montjuic, in my opinion), and getting here is much more fun than going to Montjuic.

You start by taking the subway (actually the Renfe's Tibidabo local train) to the last stop, Avinguda Tibidabo (for example, from Placa Catalunya). From there, take the Tramvia Blau, which is an old streetcar, up Av. Tibidabo. Buy a return ticket if you don't plan on walking back--it is cheaper. Taking the streetcar may not be the most local thing to do, but well, you are a tourist!!! The road up to the funicular station is somewhat steep already, so it is not a bad idea at all to save a few steps, since there are so many other places where you can walk!

While in this old restored streetcar (very pretty itself already), you can see some very fancy houses that just seem to get bigger and fancier the higher you go. In Barcelona, traditionally, the prices for apartments and houses rise by the altitude . . .

Once you get off the streetcar, you are in a small plaza where there are a couple of restaurants and the funicular station. Buy the return ticket again and step on the brightly colored funicular for some very steep uphill climbing. The trip lasts several minutes, and if you're sitting in the "down" part of the car, you get some very great views of Barcelona--and see how steep the route is!

Up on Mount Tibidabo, you'll first see a large church and hear the bells. When we were there, it sounded as if the bells came from a tape that was not in the best working condition anymore--don't know if it was my ears or what . . . The church was quite pretty inside, but featured electric candles that you could light by inserting money in the machine--I had not seen electric ones before. Climb up the stairs for some more amazing views of Barcelona. You can take a different picture with the fun-fair equipment in the front!

There is also a fun fair with traditional carousels, etc. (the entrance was 20 euros!!!--which included use of the rides, but still . . . we did not go).

The Torre Calatrava is close by; there should be some form of transportation from the funicular. The views should be even better, but in my opinion, there are so many places for great views already that I cannot see the point in going there, too . . .

This event is arranged in connection with the Fiesta Major Poble Nou on Catalonia's national day, September 11. Participation costs 6 euros and includes the 10k run, a T-shirt, small gifts, a drink, bocadilla, and an ice cream.

My husband took part in this race this September and was very happy. There were some 500 people running in the race, which goes across Poble Nou (quite a bit of it on diagonal, endless according to my husband ;-). Great atmosphere, participants on all levels (the best finished at 33 minutes or so, and the worst - well, I don't know for sure, but it must have been well over 1 hour). At the finish line, everyone got drinks and drink/food tickets, a gift bag, and obviously a sponsor, Damm, offered everyone a free beer...after a 10k run...but it was a new beer, lemon-flavoured. :-)

Spanish people don't drink bad coffee, I guess. Even in a village event like this one, the coffee sponsor did not offer any instant coffee - they had brought in a whole professional espresso-machine system complete with a bean grinder. The coffee was good, for sure! :-)

Participating in an event like this is a nice way to meet people and see places you would not see otherwise - for example, Poble Nou mostly isn't really a touristy place yet.

And it is a good way to get to know the Spanish culture - I think it was quite typical that we stayed for 2 hours after the race and the reward ceremonies had been going on for an hour or so already...and were nowhere near finishing...

I had not been in Spain before, so maybe this is all old news to all of you. But the first time I ordered a hot chocolate in a cafe, I was quite surprised!The drink was barely liquid enough to be consumed without a spoon! It is thick, thick, thick, and wonderfully rich--THIS is the drink that deserves to be called hot chocolate!!! It is not greasy, though I do not know how they make it so thick . . . And I was always brought some sugar with it; I'm not sure who would need that! It cost 1 to 2 euros. This is definitely the best hot chocolate I've ever had.

To enjoy a really pretty view, be sure to get yourself at some point during your BCN trip to Barceloneta at sunset. The strategically best location is at the Moll de Fusta (I think . . . ) anyway, the boardwalk between the harbour and the Passeig de Joan Borbo. It is so pretty when the sun sets behind the hilltops over the city skyline. You can see all the boats and in the distance, the church on Tibidabo and the Torre Calatrava on Montjuic. A lot of people are promenading in the area on a nice summer evening, there is a small marketplace selling crafts and restaurants are all over the place. I see several of the restaurants next to the harbour have been recommended by the guidebooks but they did not look too interesting to me, and the prices were outrageous - if I were to shell out 20-30 euros for a main course, I'd choose a "normal" restaurant midtown! The place is nice but you can take it all in without sitting in a restaurant. And Passeig de Joan Borbo is so close, just go there and choose from so many less pricey establishments.

At beach end of the Passeig you'll see for example the open windows of Nick HAvanna, a bar with live music quite often, last time we were there it was Cuban rhythms.

The beach is beautiful at night, too. The moonlight shines a bridge on the black sea in the night . . . and you can see the city skyline behind you. Well, there are some werd folks always hanging around (the ones who sleep there, too . . . ) but they are no distraction, new age flower children plunking on their guitar and well, that's that.

If you walk a couple of blocks into Barceloneta from Passeig, loads of crowded tapas bars can be found. Some quite stylish, some very local, with a TV blasting that night's soccer game. Worth a try, all!