Get Away To Barcelona And Enjoy Attractions For All Tastes

Are you considering a visit or vacation in Barcelona? Then the capital city of Catalonia will certainly leave you with strong impressions, delight your senses, and draw you into pulsing vibes of expansive tastes and fashions, as this is not a city of half measures.

Be ready to enjoy a vast array of attractions and sights, as this historically important city has a lot of experience in offering you the best in sightseeing, comfortable hotel accommodation and entertainment in the arts, music, dance, outdoor and sports activities.

From its early days in the twelfth century, through a cultural renaissance in the nineteenth century and up until today it has welcomed new ideas as well as birthing many of its own. The city was key to the development of many painters, such as Picasso, Miró and Dalí, musicians like Pablo Casals, and the fantastic Modernist architect Antonio Gaudí.

To get a feel for the historic origins of Barcelona the Gothic Quarter (Barrio Gotico) would be a good place to start walking around. After following many narrow, winding streets on your map, you will see the large and spacious cathedral, in the Catalan Gothic style from the thirteenth century. You can sit down for a rest in its pretty  shaded garden in the cloister. On Sundays there is a busy market outside the main entrance, where on occasion, you can see the sardana, Catalonia’s traditional folk dance, performed there.

Briefly, two other historical buildings and places of note are: the Palau de la Generalitat, seat of the Catalan Government, and the building of the Ajuntament, the City Hall on the Plaça St Jaume. Both of the buildings date from the fourteenth century.

The most famous street in Barcelona is certainly the Ramblas. This wide avenue with trees on either side of the central pedestrian walkway is full of newsstands, flower stalls, vendors selling birds of all kinds, and performing artists of all varieties ready to perform for the neverending passage of visitors and passersby.

Of course, it can be said that Barcelona is really Antonio Gaudí’s city, and therefore no visit would be complete without seeing a couple of his magnificent buildings, the most spectacular and visited being the temple of the Sagrada Familia. Its thin spires rise out above the district of Ensanche as high as 350 ft. The building of the temple was started in 1882 and is yet unfinished. This is also the resting place of the master who was killed in a streetcar accident in 1926.

A great example of Modernism at its height is the dramatic La Pedrera, at the top end of the elegant Passeig de Gracia, which was built by Gaudí in 1910. It is an amazing creation of flowing concrete, wrought iron balustrades, and playful chimneys.

Another Gaudí masterpiece is the Park Guëll fantasy further up the hillside beyond the Travessera de Dalt, where pavilions with sweeping roofs covered in mosaics, a grand stairway, a dragon and terrace walls shaped like spreading palms will surprise and keep you entertained.

The above is hardly a drop in the big bucket of the many interesting, stately and Modernistic buildings to be seen in this culturally rich city. But you will have to come and discover that for yourself!