2 Days in Barcelona

Arriving in Barcelona: Dinner at Pepita

After a long day of travel, we finally arrived at our hostel around 8:00pm. We were really hungry, so we asked the front desk for a good recommendation for a nearby restaurant. They recommended a place called La Pepita, a small tapas place just down the street – so off we went. We ordered a few tapas items, including a couple “pepitas” (essentially tiny flatbread sandwiches) and we realized these tapas were not going to satisfy our traveller bellies, but our wallets weren’t going to allow us to order much more at that particular restaurant. So after a few tapas and a glass of sangria, we headed back to the hostel and ordered a pizza. Perfect. After that, we put ourselves and our happy bellies to bed to get ready for our first full day in Barcelona.

Day 1: Barcelona’s Old Town, La Rambla, La Boquira Mercat, Casa Batlló, Gatamala Restaurant

It started as a rainy morning in Barcelona, so we took it as a sign to spend some time on a backpacking traveller reality – laundry. Once our clothes were fresh and dry (and the rain had settled down), we headed out to explore the streets of Barcelona. Our first destination was the “old town”. In the old town we walked through the maze of small streets, admiring the architecture and buildings, but not yet fully understanding their historical significance.

From the old town, we ventured to La Rambla, one of the most popular streets for tourists, shoppers, and of course, pickpockets. Almost as soon as the rain began again, our bellies started rumbling. Good thing we were on the most overpriced street for food in all of Barcelona… We almost settled for a nice sit-down restaurant, but we carried on, in search of something a bit more local. That was when we stumbled upon a huge covered (yay!) food market. We didn’t know it yet, but we had found Le Boquirea Mercat – an attraction in itself, a haven from the rain, and the perfect spot for a delicious, fresh lunch.

After leaving La Rambla, we also just happened to come across one of the unique Gaudi buildings (there are a few scattered across the city). Impressed with all our inadvertent finds of the day, we went back to the hostel to do a bit of research on dinner. Our Yelp search turned up a reasonably priced tapas restaurant called Gatamala.

When we arrived at Gatamala, the menu was entirely in Spanish, and without the help of mobile data on our side, we didn’t have much of a clue what they offered. Fortunately our server was super nice and tried to explain every single menu item to us in what English she knew. We managed to order some amazing food, (including our favourite dish of the night, patatas bravas) and began to feel right at home in this little, not so touristy, restaurant. Needless to say, we stayed a while and ate a lot. We finished dinner with a special alcohol known to the area (given to us on the house!) from our amazing server. We ended our first day in Barcelona pretty proud of all the sites we managed to see on a rainy day, and with a sweet taste in our mouth from our experience at Gatamala!

Day 2: Barcelona Free Walking Tour,  Park Güell, Sagrada Familia, Paella

After exploring the city for ourselves the day prior, we decided it would be a good idea to take advantage of a walking tour offered through our hostel. Our guide Elena was the perfect tour guide – she was such a storyteller and immediately captivated us with her sense of humour and love for Barcelona (or as she would call it, Catalonia). 2.5 hours later, we were well-versed in Barcelona’s past and present, from Catalonia’s violent beginnings (just google St. Eulalia and you’ll know what we mean) to it’s current struggle for independence from the country of Spain. We also learned about the historical importance of many buildings we passed throughout our walk, including the Plaça del Rei (the former “Buckingham Palace of Catalonia”), Barcelona Cathedral (also known as the Church of Eulalia), monument of the war of 1715, the gothic quarter, Jewish quarter, and even saw some street art.

The tour finished at the beach created for the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, and we were off to Park Güell. After a short subway ride and several escalators/staircases later, we had arrived at the top of the city in the famous park designed by Gaudi. We spent too much time trying to get the perfect photo of us in the park without other tourists cramping our style, plus we had to get over the fact that the pictures can’t quite capture the true beauty of this park.

Also, we had to start making our way to the final attraction on our list for the day – the Sagrada Familia. The church was amazing even though it is still yet to be finished after 133 years! Estimated date of completion is 2026…bringing the construction time to 144 years!

As we made our way back to the hostel, our iPhones told us we had walked about 13 km in total that day! That meant it was food time! Before heading out for dinner, we made fast friends with a few others who would be starting a Contiki tour with us the next day, and off we went for a paella and sangria dinner on the street. After dinner we all said goodnight – our Contiki tour manager would be expecting us at 7:15 am in the hotel lobby to start the tour, and take off to Nice, France!