Hey Hey!
It's been a while since I've done a blog. If you're a regular to my blogs then you'll know from my last few that I started a new job in May so everything has been a little crazy.
Anyway, since then I have recently come back from another city break. This time round my boyfriend got the luxury of my company in Barcelona!
As I have so much to tell you about I am separating this one into two blogs; this one will be about all the places we went to whilst the other will be a smaller one to tell you all about places to eat and of course, outfits.
So here we go; Barcelona in 4 days...
We arrived in Barcelona on a Monday around mid-day ish after catching the 9:45am flight from Gatwick. With not really knowing what was around our hotel and not having a lot of time to go far, we went to find the beach and have a wonder. The beach was a 3 minute walk from our hotel and being at the North of Barcelona meant we were right at the end of it. Barcelona beach caters for all individual needs as we discovered; from dog beaches to your standard sunbathing beach and then onto the gay beach and nudist areas. Nothing against any of these areas but, it can become quite a shock when you don't expect it, nor are able to read Spanish to understand what the signs are saying. Least to say that both me and Aaran were uncomfortable in most areas.
There are many cafe's and restaurants along the beach front that go on all the way down to the World Trade Centre. After walking through the array of beach options we headed back for the streets and back to our hotel to get ready for dinner.
We were staying at Barcelona Princess Hotel , a 4 star hotel with 2 pools; one on the 3rd floor and a rooftop pool on the 23rd floor. Our room had a terrace which overlooked the city and the rooftop pool overlooked the sea, best of both worlds. I would definitely recommend this hotel, although being in the North of Barcelona it makes some of the sight-seeing areas a little further to get to.
Exploring:
We'd planned a few things that we would like to see and do during our time in Barcelona and worked out that the best way to do this would be to go around on the 'Hop-on-Hop-off' bus, which conveniently stopped right outside our hotel.
There are two different tour buses that go round the same routes in Barcelona, we did the Barcelona BusTuristic. The bus was 3o euros for a day ticket or 4o euros for a two day ticket. We bought a two day ticket as we were unsure how much we would fit in on one day.
Here are some of the places we stopped off and went to on the two days:
Port Olympic:
The port halfway along the coastline towards the World Trade Centre.
We stopped here for a cute wonder round and to swap bus routes.
It is here that they have the 52 flags from the Olympics Barcelona hosted many years ago.
(I'm basically a historian)
Parc De La Ciutadella:
Barcelona's version of London's Hyde Park if you ask me, just with a pretty fountain. The fountain is beautiful and round the park there is also a lake that you can hire out rowing boats to go round.
This is where Aarans' photography skills were tested first. We even got out the selfie stick (his, not mine may I add). There's a toilet located in the park by a snack stand (always useful to know where toilets are). It was whilst Aaran went to the toilet that he'd loaded me up like a camel to hold his back pack *insert eye rolling emoji*.
The Arc De Triomf
Now I can say I've seen the Arc De Triomphe in Paris and the Arc De Triomf in Barcelona.
This is a five minute walk from Parc De La Ciutadella.
Me and Aaran were still trying to perfect our 'tumblr' style pic, "ooo couple goals..."
Casa Batllo- a house designed by Gaudi. You can purchase tickets to go in, however this wasn't something on our list to do but does looks good from the outside.
Sagrada Familia:
A Cathedral designed by Gaudi that was programmed to take 100 years to finish. They reckon it won't be completed til 2032. That's another 14 years.
The Sagrada Familia is massive, that even photos don't quite portray how big it is in real life.
I had this wonderful idea of climbing onto Aaran's shoulders for a picture; I don't know what I was more worried about, him dropping me or someone stealing my phone if I gave it to them. In the end we opted out of this option and just took a selfie.
Park Guell:
A place of architecture where the bottoms of the walkway look like tree trunks and the buildings look like little gingerbread houses (basically a world of Hansel and Gretel?) The view is amazing.
At this point Aaran was hating me for the amount of walking so, a heads up- Park Guell is at the top of a hill.
Bunkers El Carmen:
A 20 minute walk uphill from Park Guell, but so worth it!
LOOK AT THE VIEW!
Aarans' photography skills were getting better by this point (they were better than his navigating skills at least). He even joined in with the posing...
Tibidabo:
A cable car to take you all the way to the top (do NOT walk). Aaran wasn't up for walking...I also retracted my idea to walk once we got to the top.
Tibidabo is an amusement park at the top of a very big hill, next to a castle. The views up here are incredible and allow you to see the whole of Barcelona and most of the places you've just been.
When we were on the cable car there was a boy singing "TI-BI-DA-BO" and I've never seen a kid so excited to go to a fairground!
(Aaran still sings the song now just to be annoying *again insert eye roll emoji here*).
Camp Nou:
The football stadium is on the bus tour however, there was a game on during the time we wanted to go. This meant that the busses couldn't get right round to the stadium and therefore no pictures I'm afraid. I can tell you it's massive and I had a disappointed boyfriend...)
Make sure you check games and dates if you're planning on going here.
Port Vell:
The port is situated right by the World Trade Centre and shopping centre. We had dinner here one night and it was amazing!
The Magic Fountain:
Two times a week The Magic Fountain puts on a display of lights and effects to music and it's honestly one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. It's just like watching fireworks!
We went on a Wednesday for a 9:30pm start (the other day was a Sunday). Days change so make sure you look online but definitely a must see!
The magic fountains are not part of a bus tour. The buses do stop near them but when it came to getting there we got the bus to Catalunya and then a taxi. Taxi's aren't ridiculously expensive so it was fine and the bus keeps running till around 9:30pm so every little helps ( I must say it felt a little weird being dressed up on a bus heading out for the evening).
Overall, for 2 days on the move we managed to cram in quite a lot and I would 100% recommend going to Barcelona. 4 days is plenty of time to fit everything in and if you wanted to go in some of the places more than others then just allow yourself extra time in the day, or having an extra day may help. Me and Aaran were more interested in sightseeing and going to the places rather than going into all of them. e.g. the Sagrada Familia and Casa Battlo.
One thing Aaran has learnt about coming on a city break with me is that it involves a lot of walking. We made up for all the walking by spending the day by the pool before catching our flight home. I learnt on this holiday that Aaran can't sit still for longer than 10 minutes before getting fidgety or bored.
I hope you enjoyed seeing what I got up to and reading my stories. Keep a lookout for my food and outfits blog for Barcelona.
Much Love,
X