Barcelona Blog

One of the best touchstones of Barcelona is that on each neighbourhood you have different cultures, from Spanish, Africans Puerto Rican to many europeans which all blends to a perfect mix which and adds to Barcelonas many attractive qualities.

To me that is the most diabolical combination. You can´t beat it! It is place for everyone to visit or to stay. The areas are safe for kids to play on their bikes, skateboards, playing doubledutch, Rollerblading and to go with that you have safe driveways.

/Luke

I recently travelled to Barcelona for a week with two friends.

After consulting friends and countless travel guides, we decided to try something different from the traditional hotel or hostel accommodation and just rent an apartment. After making this decision we were then faced with another: How do we do it???

We consulted a variety of sources and came up with three different ways how to find and rent an apartment:

1. Check local listings for owners looking to rent out their apartment

2. Companies that provide you with lists and phone numbers of places to check it out yourself, and

3. Companies that own and operate apartments around the city that offer you a variety of options.
Upon arriving to Barcelona, we met with Carmen who showed us the apartment that she owns and wanted to rent out. It wasn’t in very good condition, and we had some difficulty agreeing on a price, especially because she didn’t speak our language. We moved on…

After this stressful experience we went to a company that advertised itself as the “perfect way to find an apartment.” Not quite. We met with Jaume who told us he would supply us with a list of reliable, clean apartments for a fee of X€. We paid; he gave us the list and said “adios.” Half of the numbers were out of service, and the rest of the apartments had already been rented a long time ago. And there was again a major language barrier. Our stress level increased…

Our last, most successful and best experience was with a company that owns and rents a large number of apartments and flats all over the city. Their staff was international, with just about every language spoken. We were able to choose the area of the city in which we wanted to stay, the amenities we wanted in the apartment and a wide range of prices. We were also able to visit places in which we were interested.

We left Barcelona extremely satisfied with our stay, and I will chose renting a flat over a hotel at any opportunity I get. Ciao and good luck!

/ Courtney Serventi

(Washington, D.C. USA )

My Barcelona experience!

Hi, I’m Linda from the Netherlands, and I like to tell you my story about my life in Barcelona

First of all I would like to say that Barcelona is a great city, and I would recommend to everybody to come here and see it for yourself! There are too many things to do during the day time as well as the nightime (the nightlife is outrages!)! I’ve done my internship here and learned Spanish. First I´ve rented accomodation through a language school but after I talked to several people I found out that renting through an agency is much better, due to the fact that they easily can help you find a place that suits within your budget and your needs. It’s also a great way to get to learn a lot of different people from different countries.
I’ve made really great friends with Italian and Swedish people whom I was living with! I’m glad to be back in the Netherlands but I’m definitely will be coming back to Barcelona soon! For everyone who’s thinking about going, I just can say: don´t think, just do! If not, you will regret it for sure!

Ciao Linda

Hola Amigos!

I moved to Barcelona a couple of months ago for work, and I´m really happy with my neighborhood. Its called Clot, and it pretty much has everything. Its only 5 minutes from Plaza Catalunya - but don´t forget the parties and night life aren´t always only in the centre of the city. There are great bars and clubs all over Barcelona, plus all the uni´s, language schools and colleges through out the city, so make sure u explore the bars in ur area before jumping on the metro to Plaza Catalunya every time! Clot may not have heaps to offer your average tourist, (even though its close to Sagrada Familia) but I think it’s a cool place to live.

The shops are way cheaper than in the centre of Barcelona, and have some really great stuff too. By the way, for all you sun seekers, Clot is only 10 minutes from the beach….

ANITA USA

Hello there!

I have noticed that Barcelona-Home has launched three new webpages, have you already seen them?

If you go to these webpages you can find everything about rooms, apartments and transfers. From these pages it’s easy to look for an accommodation. You just have to fill in the dates, and all the available accommodations will appear!

The same with the transfers from or to the airport, or somewhere else in Catalunya of course, you just have to fill in a form and they will receive your request. Very easy!

Ciao, James

Hey guys!

This forum needs more info about neighborhoods in Barcelona, its pretty hard to know where the good and bad areas are if you´re from another country! I´ve been living here in Barcelona for 3 months now, and I absolutely love it! The city is not at all as big as people make it out to be, and they have the best public transport ever – through the night too! The metro is my favourite coz its cheap and always reliable, but the buses and trains are great too. You can cross the entire city in 15 minutes on the metro! I live in Plaza Espana, coz I love the shopping and the night life! There are so many stores, bars and restaurants, and of course Creu Coberta – the largest street of shops in Europe! I really like Plaza Espana coz its full of local people, and it really is beautiful with the fountains and lights and music. Sants is pretty much the same area as Placa Espana, which are both only 5 mins on the metro to central Barcelona at Plaza Catalunya. If you´re not sure about areas to look for apartments in, I give a big thumbs up to Plaza Catalunya and Sants!! ……Cathy C

Hello peepz,

Did you all see the new website of barcelona-home?! I think it´s a big improvement if you saw the old website. The new website is more clear and you can find everything very easy. If you look for a room/ apartment you see everything about the room/ apartment you looking for! What do you think about the improved website ??

It is also fine to do a tour, it´s worth the money and time. You can see all the beautiful things of Barcelona. You can choose for a cycling tour, or a walking tour if you prefer to walk.

Barcelona-home also can arrange your tour from the airport to the city. In other words, barcelona-home can arrange everything to have a nice stay in Barcelona.

Greetz!

I found this on a blog called Blissful travel (mark that Barcelona is listed as number 37, we should be proud) :

The British television network BBC has made a list of 50 places to visit before you die.

I have only been to three of these 50 places, New York City, Paris and Zermatt, but I would love to see all of them. How many have you been to? Which one is your favorite?

1. Grand Canyon - USA

2. Great Barrier Reaf - Australia

3. Florida - USA

4. The South Island - New Zealand

5. Cape Town - South Africa

6. Golden Temple - India

7. Las Vegas - USA

8. Sydney - Australia

9. New York - USA

10. Taj Mahal - India

11. Canadian Rockies - Canada

12. Uluru - Australia

13. Chichen Itza -Mexico

14. Macchu Pichu - Peru

15. Niagara Falls - Canada/USA

16. Petra - Jordan

17. The Pyramids - Egypt

18. Venice - Italy

19. Maldives - Maldives

20. Great Wall - China

21. Victoria Falls - Zambia/Zimbabwe

22. Hongkong - Hongkong

23. Yosemite National Park - USA

24. Hawaii - USA

25. Auckland - New Zealand

26. Iguassu Falls - Argentina/Brazil

27. Paris - France

28. Alaska - USA

29. Angkor Wat - Cambodia

30. Himalayas - India/Nepal/Tibet

31. Rio de Janerio - Brazil

32. Masai Mara - Kenya

33. Galapagos Island - Ecuador

34. Luxor - Egypt

35. Rome - Italy

36. San Fransisco - USA

37. Barcelona - Spain

38. Dubai - Arab Emirates

39. Singapore - Singapore

40. La Digue - Seychelles

41. Sri Lanka - Sri Lanka

42. Bangkok - Thailand

43. Barbados - Barbados

44. Iceland - Iceland

45. Terracotta Army - China

46. Zermatt - Switzerland

47. Angel Falls - Venezuela

48. Abu Simbel - Egypt

49. Bali - Indonesia

50. Bora Bora - French Polynesia

Since Kajsa wrote a follow-up on Hanna’s blog, I will write a follow-up on the follow-up. By now we have been here over two weeks, time has just been flying by and what is left now is only one week.

Last week we did not really do that much but of course we went to the Hard Rock Café (the good-looking bartender was not there). We met two men from Catalunya who talked to Hanna about how Kajsa could not possibly be Swedish. It did not matter what she said, Kajsa was NOT Swedish. Later on we met some Scottish guys on La Rambla and they wondered why we were not blonde if we were Swedish. I explained that my hair was dyed but they would not believe that Kajsa’s hair was her natural haircolour. Then they invited us to a party but unfortunately Hanna’s Braveheart-imitation changed their minds. They also told us that they disliked Henrik Larsson before walking away into the night.

We went back to Hard Rock Café; somehow we always end up there, where we met more Scottish people who also wanted to tell us that we should be blonde if we were Swedish, asked us if we shopped at IKEA, listened to ABBA and if we wanted a drink. To the first two questions the answer was no.

At this point they thought that our English was really good, but as the night went on Kajsa’s and my English got worse and worse, even though I do not really remember it.

We went home and slept a couple of hours to later on get up to go see Sagrada Familia. When we got there we had some problems really enjoying it, or at least some of us that could not look up without getting dizzy. We did not go inside it because we felt it was too expensive, and we were not really that excited about walking up a lot of stairs. It was still a good day though, the sun was shining and we ate some “lunch” in the park next to Sagrada Familia.

Not much happened on the weekend either. On Friday night the plan was to go out, but since we did not feel that good we decided to go see a movie, but when we got to the cinema it was closed. Instead we went home and slept like the party people we truly are.

The following night the plan was also to go out, a plan we partly succeeded with. Before going out one of our roomies wanted to show us La Fuente Mágica de Montjuic but we got there too late, so we went home to get ready for a night out. Then we went to a shot bar and at this time we still thought that we would party all night long. The problem with our plan was that we were going home between the shot bar and going to the club. By the time we left our apartment again it was too late to get into a club for free, so we decided it was not really worth the money and went back home again.

On Sunday we went to the beach, even though we had not been out all night we did not feel our best, so we just felt like relaxing and do nothing. We went to a place to eat pizza but of course I dropped my slice on the ground.

In conclusion I would say that this weekend was a weekend of “almosts”. We almost saw the fountain, we almost saw a movie, we almost went to a club and I almost ate a pizza.

Sara

This can be seen as the follow-up of Hanna’s blogg since we are doing the same things. You might think that I should have a lot more to write now that we have been here in a week, but let’s see about that.

By now we have done some of the typical tourist stuff. For a starter we have walked up and down and up and down Las Ramblas and the thing that I noticed the most was the animals in the cages. In one cage there was a pigeon, why would you want to buy a pigeon? I understand that you would want to buy a hen, from the hen you can get eggs and you might even eat it but the pigeon, do you have it as a pet or do you eat it? And if you wanted to have a pigeon so baldy, couldn’t you just catch one of the street? Anyhow, let’s skip the pigeon thing now. Actually I have done more things then just thinking about pigeons the past week.

On Thursday we went to the Picasso museum, it could have been more appreciated if it would not have been for the four hours we had slept and the headache that were constantly present. Another bothering thing with the museum was that it was a lot of people there when we were there and you almost hade to stand in a queue to see the paintings. But I would recommend you to go there, just make sure to get some sleep the night before.

Later the same day we went to Parc Güell and that could really be appreciated even considering the adventures of the day before. Parc Güell was a little bit more interesting then Picasso, there was a little bit more to look at, we got to be outside and it was bigger so all the people did not bother you as much. The only bothering thing was Hanna’s craving for souvenirs but since there weren’t that many places to buy souvenirs at, it was okay.

As far as the partying is considered we have had the time to do some things. On Wednesday we went to Catwalk, it was okay but it was really not my kind of music but as the night past by I stopped caring more and more about what music they played. The thing though that was most annoying was all the people starting to follow us, if you said “Soy Sueca” you got about ten persons trying to get you to go home with them, not as nice at it may seem.

On Friday we went to Hard Rock Café just to get one beer and look at Paul Simonon’s pants, things did not exactly go according to the plans, me and Sara stayed there for a few hours eyeing the good-looking bartender. Saturday gave us a bit more action since we went to Razzmatazz, we had a good time even though Hanna did not like it but perhaps she did not understand that we had actually found a place that played good music.

So if I am going to recommend some places I recommend Hard Rock Café because of the bartender, Parc Güell because of the great view and architecture and Razzmatazz because of the music.

Kajsa