My husband and I had never been to Spain and were looking forward to seeing it and getting to know a little bit more about their culture.
We had a cruise going out of Barcelona, so we decided to spend 2 days in the city before departing on the ship. We had no idea where to stay or what to see when we were there. As we looked up more information about Barcelona we learned that it had different parts to the city, some closer to the airport and cruise port, and some further away. We felt most comfortable staying closer to cruise port/airport to have lower fares when leaving/heading to the two. This ended up being the best decision for us as we walked the city for everything else we wanted to see.
*Barcelona had Uber, but it ended up being cheaper and more convenient to take a taxi, when traffic was light.
Where we stayed:
After about two months of us going back and forth trying to decide the best place to stay we ended on Hotel Brummel. And we are so glad that we did! This hotel was definitely in more of a residential area than a tourist area, but we truly enjoyed it. It is a boutique hotel with only about 20 rooms. They had wonderful reviews, and a great price. We even arrived 6 hours before check-in and they stored our luggage for the day as we started off exploring the city.
Hotel Brummell was extremely informative when we got there, and gave us a giant map in English, with all sorts of suggestions! What to see, where to eat, etc. If you want to be closer to some of Barcelona’s famous architecture then you may want to stay somewhere else, but we truly didn’t mind walking a mile or more.
Food:
We were extremely excited to try the food in Barcelona, and can I say I had some of the best brunch I ever had in my life! After traveling for over 12 hours it was safe to say we were starving and Hotel Brummell was awesome enough to give us a giant map with all sorts of their favorite recommendations in Barcelona. One of the brunch recommendations was called Caravelle and oh my goodness was it good!
This held us over while we went and saw the Barcelona Cathedral which was gorgeous and I believe only about 7 euros to get inside.
We also ventured to Plaza Real, Plaça Reial in Spanish, which is a square with a beautiful water fountain in the middle with a lot of restaurants and bars around it.
We ate at Les Quinze Nits, and truly enjoyed our food. It has a nice view of the square, but their was street performers and people asking for money coming to the tables that were sitting on the end.
I also had some very good sangria at this restaurant. Tapas are what Spain is known for, so of course we only had Tapas for dinner that night.
The second night we had more Tapas and they were not as good as this restaurant so I am not going to recommend them.
What to see:
Fat Cat Statue- Not exactly sure what this is called but if you are walking around La Rambla de Reval it is cute to see!
Cathedral de Barcelona – Was absolutely beautiful inside and I think only cost about 7 euros to get in.
Sagrada Familia– Gorgeous architecture that they have been working on for many years. It was extremely busy and unfortunately we got there too late in the day to be able to go inside. If you are looking to go in I highly recommend getting your tickets online in advance or getting there very early.
Casa Batllo Gaudi- We walked by here to see the beautiful architecture.
We truly enjoyed our 48 hours in Barcelona, and walked over 17 miles in two days. A few tips is that Europeans eat dinner later, and when we were hungry from skipping lunch we were looking to eat dinner around 6, and the restaurant we planned on going to wasn’t serving until 7:30. So just be careful of that!
Hope this answers some questions you have on traveling to Barcelona!
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