Jason's Travel Blog

Barcelona, Spain - Part 1

My next trip is to Barcelona, Spain.



I've decided to break this one up into a few postings, because there was a lot to see, and putting it all in one post would be veeeeeeeeeeeeeery long (I took over 500 pictures, but I won't subject you to all of them).

Unlike Leiden or Amstrerdam in previous posts, Barcelona is most certainly a city. It reminds me in many ways of London. The greater metropolitan area has a population of over 4.5 million. There are some sections of the city that appear to have changed very little in centuries, while other sections resemble most cities anywhere in the world. While it is customary to greet people in Spanish, most people speak at least some English. Barcelona is also the capital of the Catalonia region, and many residents also speak Catalan (I would not have known this in advance if it weren't for my friend Dave Neyhart, who married a woman from a Catalan family).

I was staying outside the main part of the City at the Barcelona Hilton, to attend a conference. This is north and west of the city center.

There are a few options for getting around Barcelona. Taxis are plentiful and there is also an extensive public transportation system. I bought a multi-day pass and did most of my travelling on the subway system, the Metro. The Metro was efficient and clean for the most part, although there are a number of station undergoing maintanence work at the moment. Another option that I would recommend for touring the city would be one of the bus tour services. The one that I got information on was the Bus Turistic, which I saw at every spot I wanted to see, and offers a pretty good deal. It's a double-decker bus that makes regular runs around the city, stopping at more than 40 sights on three separate loops. You can hop on and off at your leisure, using a 1 or 2-day ticket, and transfer between loops at various points along the way. A ticket on the Bus also provides discounts at a number of the sight in the city. In addition, the Barcelona Tourism board offers the Barcelona Card, which provides additional discounts in and around the city.

I used two books this time around, another book from Loneley Planet, and one from Knopf City Guides, which are great because they are basically a series of foldout maps with listings the apply to each section of the map for food, sights, and shopping.





First stop on the tour - La Sagrada Familia...

posted by Jason Ward @ 10:23 AM