Gimme Some Barcelona Travel Guide

El Born Barcelona

Ever since we moved to Barcelona, we continue to receive many requests for travel recommendations around the city for those of you and your friends who are planning a visit. So today, I’m happy to finally present to you our official Gimme Some Oven Travel Guide!

Barclay and I have done our best to compile a list of our favorite places to eat, visit and stay in the city. And we’ve especially worked hard on the restaurant recs, because with so much amazing food in this city, I firmly believe you should never have a bad meal here! (Always such a tragedy on vacation.) We’ve also created a list of Barcelona-specific pro travel tips for how to navigate the city like a local. And we have created a Google Map so that you can download to have easy access to all of our recommendations while you’re out and about.

We’ll try to keep updating this guide as often as possible as we continue to discover more great places around the city. But please, if you have your own Barcelona travel recommendations, be sure to share any of your favorites in the comment section below too. And if you use this guide in any way, would you mind leaving a comment below just to let us know what you enjoyed? We’ve received hundreds of emails and DMs from readers over the years who have used and loved this guide, but very few people leave comments here and I’d love for you to be able to read one another’s feedback and share recommendations too.

For more travel guides and general travel tips, feel free to also check out the archives in our Travel section on the blog. And if you would like to follow along with our adventures behind the scenes living in Barcelona, you’re always welcome to check out my personal Instagram. Alright, without any further ado, here are our favorite Barcelona travel recommendations including:

  • Our Barcelona Travel Tips
  • Our Barcelona Travel Map
  • Where To Eat
  • What To Do
  • Where To Stay

La Colmena Panellets in Barcelona Spain

We would really encourage you to download our (free!) Gimme Some Barcelona Google Map, which includes all of the recommended places listed in this guide. It’s a great way to navigate around the city and can also give you the option to make an impromptu stop somewhere nearby if a place on the list catches your eye. Be sure to also click through to read the notes for each restaurant pin, where we have included our recommendations for what to order.

Barraca paella | Gimme Some Barcelona Travel Guide

Naturally, my favorite subject. ♡  And also the #1 question we’ve received from friends, family and all of you readers coming to Barcelona — where to eat!

There are literally thousands upon thousands of places to eat here in Barcelona, with new great spots popping up literally every week. And as someone who tends to plan my vacations — and, let’s be real, everyday life — around food, it’s critically important to me that each of your meals here be home runs. So here is our current list of places we love and recommend. There should hopefully be something for everyone here!

Brunch

Bakeries

  • Baluard (Croissants, bread, and more / Multiple locations)
  • Brunells (Croissants and pastries) / El Born
  • Chök (Cronuts, donuts, chocolate / Gothic)
  • Demasié (Cinnamon rolls, cupcakes, desserts / El Born)
  • Eric & Benjamin (French breads and pastries / Eixample)
  • Hofmann Pastelería (Croissants and pastries / El Born)
  • Origo (Breads and pastries / Gràcia)
  • Turris (Breads, pastries and more / Multiple locations)

Tapas

Paella & Fideuà

Vegetarian & Healthy Food

Pizza & Italian Food

Mexican Food

Middle Eastern Food

Southeast Asian Food

Desserts / Sweets

Coffee

Drinks

Sagrada Familia | Gimme Some Barcelona Travel Guide

In a city that offers so many great things to do, choosing places to visit isn’t always an easy decision! But whether you like to see a place through its sights, sounds or flavors, we’ve put together a list of our favorite ways to experience Barcelona. Two things that we would say that you can’t miss here — visiting La Sagrada Familia (trust us, it’s not like any cathedral you’ve ever seen) and taking a food tour (always our favorite way to get to know a new city).

Museums / Cathedrals / Top Sights

Our Favorite Parks

Live Music Venues

More Fun Stuff To Do

Day Trips

A Few Of Ali’s Favorite Local Places To Shop

  • Be (fun gift shop, multiple locations)
  • Biscuit (favorite boutique)
  • Charly Therapy (cute sunglasses)
  • La Nostra Ciutat (art, apparel, gifts, all made in Barcelona)
  • Natura (apparel, home goods, gifts)
  • Oysho (yoga apparel, leisureware and more)
  • Boutique-ing around El Born or Gràcia in general. There are so many great local shops in these neighborhoods!
Alma Hotel Barcelona Spain

We still have yet to do much research on where to stay in Barcelona, but we promise to report back with some updates on great places to stay soon! A few great places we have stayed and loved so far include:

Also, for more boutique/luxury hotels, we recommend looking here. For discount hotels, check out this list. For hostels, we recommend looking here.

Cocktails In Barcelona at Dr Stravinsky

Questions? Requests? Recommendations to share? We’d love to hear from you in the comments below. ♡

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87 Comments

  1. Nancy says:

    We just got back home to CA from a trip to Paris and Barcelona. Thank you so much for your advice, need to know knowledge and recommendations!! The Aire Barcelona baths are, as you said, 1 million % worth it! We were in an AirBnB apartment right across the street from La Sagrada Familia-so amazing! We purchased a 3 day pass for the metro and were able to find our way around easily. We also did a food tour and a free walking tour-well worth it! Thank you, Ali for your inspiration!!

    Reply
  2. Lynn Bainbridge says:

    Just got back from a week in Barcelona with my 25 year old daughter! Thanks for the map and tips! We had dinner one night at the San Pedrito bar and Orlando the bartender was great! Makes fantastic mojitos and margaritas. A couple of recommendations we got from tour guides that we really enjoyed were Un’Altra Storia which is a mother/son Italian restaurant. We had the suggested dinner and it was wonderful! Another spot was SportsBar (pizza makers from Naples) which is close to Sagrada Familia. Great lunch spot after visiting the Cathedral. Finally we did a cooking class at La Foodieteca. So fun! Thanks for all the information you provided!

    Reply
  3. Bridget says:

    All of your amazing posts have inspired me to take a trip to Barcelona this fall! Just purchased my tickets and can’t wait! ?

    Reply
  4. Kris says:

    We were in Barcelona for 2 days a couple weeks ago (before we left on our Mediterranean cruise). Thanks for your travel tips. My husband and I read them to prepare for our trip.
    We did the Barcelona City Tour (hop on/hop off bus tour) – which we would highly recommend for a great overview of the city.
    Also wanted to tell you that we are from Omaha. I read your review of your Omaha weekend and have not eaten at a lot of the restaurants you reviewed. Can’t wait to try them.

    Reply
  5. Rachel says:

    Thank you so much for this! We just spent four days in Barcelona at the end of our European vacation, and planned all of our itinerary around your recommendations and had SUCH an amazing time! The paella at Barraca was our favorite meal. But I have to admit… Aire Barcelona may have been my favorite 90 minutes of the whole trip. ? We hope to come back and visit again sometime soon!

    Reply
  6. Caryn says:

    Hola! I’m a fan of the blog and headed to Barcelona in a few weeks (last minute, just now planning) our way to Naples (and then coming back to Madrid). I am looking at your travel guide recommendations and wondering if there is a way for me to print it? I can’t seem to figure it out!

    Also wondering what area you suggest at for staying that is closest to most of the things and transportation we would want to see in a short, 3 day visit? Plan to do Montserrat one day (Whole day? Or combined with a visit to the Winery Ollas?) and possibly some kind of food/wine tour, and a performance at the Palau. So excited to visit!! Thanks!

    Reply
    1. Ali says:

      So glad you’re coming! And sorry, we don’t have a great print feature yet for this page, but you’re welcome to highlight the parts you’d like and then print just those.

      As for a good neighborhood to stay, we highly recommend El Born, which would be closest to most things. Or the Gothic, which is also close but considerably louder and more touristy. You probably need to only allot a half day for Montserrat (try to time it when the boys choir is singing!), but it’s a great destination to combine with a food/wine tour. And the Palau is terrific — just book tickets in advance, since the tend to sell out quickly. Enjoy!!

  7. Natasha Prokhnevska says:

    Hi! I love reading your blog about Barcelona and all the amazing food. I lived there for a summer a few years ago and it was incredible, I still miss it everyday. I have a couple of my favorite places I wanted to tell you about. My favorite brunch place is Caravelle Cafe, its off the ramblas towards El raval, but the food and the coffee are amazing! Also the Rambla del Raval has some super cute cafes, and a kind of crafts market on the weekend when I used to go visit. My favorite rooftop bar is definitely at Hotel 360, you can go up without being a guest, and the view is amazing. It’s the whole city and you can walk around with a gin tonic in hand and just enjoy the view. My other two favorite bars are little getaways from the cramped city. One is El Jardin, which is off Carrer L-Hospital also towards el raval, its just in this beautiful corner of an old church that has gardens where you can sit and enjoy a summer day. The last bar that I love, a local showed me, called L’antic Theater. It is right by the Palau de Musica Catalana. It is literally an open air bar with a giant tree and lights all around. Such a great place to grab a beer in the city center. Hope you have time to explore some of my favorite spots.

    Natasha

    Reply
  8. danielle says:

    We used your guide in Barcelona this past week and loved so many of your recommendations!!! Bar Mendizabal and Tantarantana were two of our favorite meals. Thank you so much, Ali! It’s easy to see why you guys love it there!

    Reply
  9. Carrie says:

    This guide has been an enormous help planning our trip to Barcelona this coming month. Thank you!!! We can’t wait to try out your recommendations!

    Reply
  10. Michelle says:

    We loved Boca Chica and El Nacional!

    Reply