24 Hours in Barcelona

(to see the YouTube video of our time in Barcelona, click here)

It was brief, but it sure was beautiful. We spent a little less than 24 hours in Barcelona, Spain two weeks ago and all we can say is that we wish we were there just a little longer because wow. What a gorgeous and eclectic city!

Since we knew we wouldn’t be there very long, we spent the majority of our time walking around the city and looking at all of the architecture (always our favorite part of visiting a new city) and, of course, people watching. We’re realizing more and more than people watching is becoming one of our favorite activities, especially in bigger cities or airports. And Barcelona was ideal for people watching because there were SO MANY PEOPLE. For some reason we didn’t realize just how big of a city it was. The whole time we were walking around we kept getting San Francisco vibes and (somewhat less) NYC vibes.

We walked around seven miles the night we got there. A little thrown off by the time difference (six hours ahead!), we were starving by 5p, but decided to walk around until we couldn’t wait any longer to eat. We settled on this quirky little market/restaurant called Woki Organic Market and it was exactly what we were looking for: fresh food and and intimate, cozy setting.

Thomas got a tomato pesto ravioli dish that was beyond delicious and PJ ordered a Margarita pizza that….left a little to be desired, but it was okay nonetheless.

Since we were so thrown off from the time difference, we ended up waking up the next morning at 4:45a and, after several unsuccessful attempts to fall back asleep, decided to bite the bullet and just stay up for the day. While we were in bed, we pulled out our phones and began looking up places to eat breakfast, but started to notice a pattern: nothing opened before 9a. We had forgotten what one of our friends had mentioned to us months ago when talking about Spain- that people eat dinner really really late and don’t go to bed until really really late and then in turn don’t wake up until later, hence why restaurants stay open late and don’t open early. Oh well.

(the view from our hotel room)

(the view from the rooftop of our hotel)

It seemed almost every street was ready to be photographed, like you couldn’t take a bad picture if you tried.

(Casa Batllo- PJ actually studied this building in college and was so excited to get to see it in person)

(Casa Mila)

Barcelona is a quirky city, and there was something fun and unexpected at every corner.

We found out that our favorite hotel ever, the Hotel Pulitzer, has a location in Barcelona! So we had to go explore and see how it compared to the one we stayed at in Amsterdam. It didn’t disappoint and suddenly we were feeling nostalgic for October in our favorite Dutch city.

Barcelona is a city that we would love to visit again in the future, only with more time to explore and immerse ourselves in the culture because 24 hours just isn’t enough time is it? Have you ever been? What did you think? We won’t soon forget our time there (or the beautiful sunrise on the rooftop of our hotel!)