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General Information [edit | add image]

Barcelona is the second largest city in the Iberian Peninsula, capital city of Catalonia and the province with the same name. It is located in the comarca of Barcelonès, along the Mediterranean coast between the mouths of the rivers Llobregat and Besòs. It is 160 km (100 mi) south of the Pyrenees mountain range.

Barcelona offers an opportunity for the tourist on foot to walk from Roman remains to the medieval city and then to the modern city with its open thoroughfares and grid-iron street pattern. The historic city center is fairly flat, while the modern city fans out towards the surrounding hills, bordered by steep streets.

A notable feature is La Rambla, a boulevard that runs from the city centre to the waterfront, thronged with crowds until late at night and lined by florists, bird sellers in the higher part, craft sellers in the lowest, street entertainers, cafeterias and restaurants. Walking along La Rambla one can see the world-famous opera house El Liceu, the food market of La Boqueria and the Plaça Reial (literally Royal Square), with its arches and palm trees, amongst other interesting buildings. There is also a Wax Museum near the end. It is also worth keeping an eye out for pickpockets, for whom the boulevard is a favourite haunt.

La Rambla ends at the old harbour, where a statue of Christopher Columbus points eastwards across the Mediterranean Sea toward his hometown of Genoa.

Next to it is the Museu Marítim (naval museum), which chronicles the history of life on the Mediterranean, including a full-scale model of a galley. The museum is housed in the medieval Drassanes (shipyards), where the ships that made Catalonia a great sea power in the Mediterranean were built. The old harbour offers all kinds of other amenities, including the second largest aquarium in the Mediterranean area and an IMAX cinema.

To the north of the Gothic Quarter lie the Jardins de Fonseré i Mestre which contain modernist buildings housing zoological and geological collections. The adjacent Parc de la Ciutadella includes both the Parlament de Catalunya (Catalan Parliament) and the Parc Zoològic de Barcelona (zoo) whose most famous resident was an albino gorilla - Floquet de Neu ("Snowflake") - who died in 2003 of skin cancer.

Outstanding is the legacy of architect Antoni Gaudí, who lived and worked in Barcelona and Madrid, and who left several famous works like the Palau Güell in the city's old center, the Parc Güell at the northern tip of Gràcia, and the immense but still unfinished church of the Sagrada Família, which has been under construction since 1882, financed by popular donations like the cathedrals in the Middle Ages (However, it is not a cathedral: the cathedral of Barcelona is the Cathedral of Santa Eulàlia, a Gothic building of the late Middle Ages). The Sagrada Família is billed for completion in 2020.

Another very notable modernist building in the older part of the city is the Palau de la Música Catalana, designed by Lluís Domènech i Montaner and built in 1908.

In the modern districts of the city are several avenues on which most of the international merchants offering clothing, jewelry, leather goods and other items have their stores. The most elegant avenue is the Passeig de Gràcia, where two Gaudí buildings are situated, the Casa Milà (La Pedrera) and the Casa Batlló, along with buildings by other famous modernista architects: Casa Ametller by Josep Puig i Cadafalch and Casa Lleó Morera by Domènech i Montaner. Several of these buildings and indeed the Sagrada Familia church itself are threatened by Mayor Clos' plans to build a large railway tunnel for high-speed trains under the city's shaky 19th century foundations. In recent years, office developments along Passeig de Gràcia have been allowed to break up the architectural unity of the 19th and early 20th century buildings lining the avenue - a process which shows no signs of slackening. Property speculation is also blighting other areas of the city, including the 19th century Poble Nou district with its many interesting buildings dating from Catalonia's Industrial Revolution. Many of these have now been levelled to make room for the city's ill-starred "22@" project to build an area for ICT-based firms.

Art visits include the museum of the Fundació Joan Miró, where several paintings and sculptures of this artist are shown, together with guest exhibitions from other museums around the world. There is also a unique museum featuring the lesser known works of Pablo Picasso from his earlier period. The National Museum of Art of Catalonia (in the Palau Nacional left behind by the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition) possesses a well-known collection of Romanesque art, including wall-paintings of Romanesque churches and chapels around Catalonia that have been transferred to the museum. The Contemporary Art Museum (MACBA) is also worth a visit, not only because of its paintings and sculptures, but because of its architecture, and the vibrant square in front of it, the sitting wall used by skaters, and the inveriably changing wall of graffiti. The building was designed by the American architect Richard Meier. The Fundació Antoni Tàpies holds a collection of Tàpies works.

Transportation Information [edit]

Barcelona is a major hub for RENFE, the Spanish state railway network, and its main suburban train station is Sants Estació (which is under renovation and enlargement at present in order to prepare for the arrival of the AVE system). The AVE high-speed rail system was recently extended from Madrid to Lleida in western Catalonia, and is expected to reach Barcelona by 2007. Renfe and the Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat de Catalunya (FGC) run Barcelona's widespread commuter train service. Barcelona's transit company, Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB), runs the Barcelona Metro system and city bus. See List of Barcelona metro stations. Barcelona has recently adopted another transport option with two new tram lines known as Trambaix and Trambesòs.