I’d been looking forward to Barcelona since we crossed into Spain, I think I’ve only spoken to one person who didn’t like the city or have positive things to say about it, it’s well known for having a lot of vegan options, nice beaches a beautiful city and lots of history! We were only planning a day there and ended up spending 3 days exploring, in this blog I’ll tell you where we parked and what we did. If you have any questions about visiting the city put them in the comments below and I’ll do my best to answer.
As usual we looked on the Park4Night app before visiting the city and found one 3km outside the city up the hill, this made for a exhilarating ride down into town but a lengthy workout on the way back up, not such a bad thing after stuffing our faces with vegan cake and coffee? On the second day I found a free walking tour in Barcelona that left from Placa de Catlunya, you can’t miss it! It’s at the end of La Rambla and the tours leave every day in Spanish and English from 10/11 & 1500. I can highly recommend the tour we joined, the guide was very informative and friendly like they usually are, as everyone who’s been on one before “free tours” are free however, if you like the tour and the guide you would leave a tip, you give what you can afford or what you thought the tour was worth.
Click HERE the link will take you to the google map location where we parked outside the city, if you’re not taking your bikes then you can take the bus into town I believe they run around every 15 minutes from the top of the hill into town, close by is a lovely park from which you will hear thousands of frogs croaking under the moonlit sky at night, the park shuts around 2200 so you can’t go in after then. Don’t be alarmed if you park in the same location I’ve linked above, as you get closer to the parking places you will see local vans sprayed from top to bottom by local “artists” these are local vans, as with other cities in Spain and Portugal tagging vans seems to be common practice but I’ve only ever seen local vans tagged.
If you like vegan food and you’re looking for an amazing small cafe for breakfast, lunch or lots of delicious cakes then look no further than Santorini’s, it’s a small family run business and even if you’re not vegan you will appreciate the food and the cakes! Unfortunately we only found Santorini’s on our last day in Barcelona, previously to this we found a city chain called Chok reading blog posts and Google reviews it seemed like the place to be, it wasn’t! The cakes were presented beautifully but unfortunately the taste didn’t match their decoration! Or their price tag. Check out the photos below to see Santorini’s.
On our last day in the city of Barcelona we decided to get up at 0615 and head into town to see the city before it was packed with tourists, it was well worth it! This was suggested by our tour guide the previous day and to be honest I was dubious when he told us we needed to be in town before 0700 to see the city at the best time but it didn’t disappoint! We took a bike ride around before the sidewalks were full or the shops open, afterwards we went and enjoyed breakfast at Santorini’s followed by a swim at the beach.
I hope you enjoy Barcelona as much as we did if you get a chance to visit! If you have any questions or tips you would like to share then please leave them in the comments below! Ciao for now, Adam – @aboutavan
About A Van 