Visiting Barcelona

I travel a lot. Exploring new places and breaking up my routine has been the best way for me to cope with anxiety and depression, so any time I’m feeling overwhelmed my first instinct is to hop on my bike, or a train, or an airplane.

I think my love of traveling has rubbed off a bit on the people I love—my family all live thousands of miles away, so when we get together we’ll often meet up somewhere in between. Traveling together means that we don’t suffer as much from the imbalance of visiting someone in their regular life. If we’re all on holiday together, no one has to go to work or fit visiting and catching up around our jobs and routines.

My little sister turned 30 years old earlier this month. To celebrate her birthday, she and her husband came to visit me in London, and then we all went for a long weekend in Barcelona. I never wanted to leave and can’t wait to go back. The weather, the mountains, the seaside, the great food and gin, the architecture…it reminds me of my hometown, only better. And you can thank her husband, Vance, for the food photos linked below! I apparently only had eyes for art and architecture, but his dedication to documenting our tapas adventures has paid off marvelously.

Barcelona Street Art Tour: We did the bike tour, and it was fantastic. It’s hard to miss the marks made by the city’s most prolific artists, but many of the best large murals are a bit off the beaten path. We took a tour with Barcelona Street Style guide Mike, who was well-versed in the city’s artists and culture. Later we paid a visit to the Base Elements gallery, where you can support the artists directly by purchasing their work.
Xixbar: On the corner of C/ Rocafort and C/ Tamarit is an unassuming little gin joint with a blue awning. Select from a long list of infused gins for a gin&tonic, or pick your favourite from their massive wall of gins to drink neat. I went for a martini with Nordes gin, garnished with one of those fat, juicy Spanish olives, and it was perfect. The smoked cardamom g&t was also pretty great.
Lolita: Across the street from Xixbar is Lolita, a brightly lit taperia with cheap house wine and good service. It’s popular and crowded, and for good reason. We especially liked the aubergine with molasses and the braised leeks, which didn’t pop up as frequently on other tapas menus around town.
Parlament: We were staying in Sant Antoni, right across the street from a newish place called Parlament on (you guessed it) C/ Parlament. This spot has many tables but gets really busy on Fridays and Saturdays. Their sangria is really good and mixed to order, and the patatas bravas were the best we found. Go for the burrata or roasted vegetables with romesco sauce, but stay away from the olives if you’re vegetarian—they serve them stuffed with anchovies.
Rasoterra: Speaking of vegetarian food, Rasoterra is an all-vegetarian tapas restaurant right across the street from Base Elements on C/ Palau. A lot of the food in this part of town is touristy, low-quality, and overpriced, but Rasoterra is phenomenal. They made us massive fishbowl gin&tonics with Gin Mares, and we ordered nearly everything on the menu, enjoying a long, leisurely lunch. The service was excellent; the trinxat with kimchi were even better.
Baracca: Even though we’re all vegetarian, it seemed like we should try paella at least once in Spain. It was fine, and nicely presented in a massive paella pan served at the table. In the moments before the paella arrived, when I was drinking a crisp, dry white wine out of a high-quality thin-walled wine glass, stuffing my face with the creamiest, most flavorful burrata and feeling the sea breeze on my face and sunshine on my shoulders…now that’s something I’ll be dreaming about for years. So sure, go for the paella, but don’t miss that burrata and do try to get a table with a sea view. It’s very nice.
Sésamo: We went to Sésamo on C/ Sant Antoni Abat after enduring one of the worst “meals” of my life. They have tons of vegan options, including a dessert that came with a flame-charred vegan marshmallow, plus very nice service, and the food was good and reasonably priced.
Tarannà: We stopped by this little cafe on C/ Viladomat in Sant Antoni for lunch before heading to the airport. They had an affordable prix fixe weekday lunch special. The food was great, the ambience was even better. Looked like they serve good coffee too, but I had wine with lunch instead.
Gaudí: It would be a shame to visit Barcelona and not see any of the famous Gaudí buildings. We did a guided tour of Sagrada Familia, but it isn’t really worth it unless you’re a big church fan (I’m really, really not, but went against my better judgment because so many people had recommended it). On my last visit to Barcelona, I toured Casa Battló and stopped by La Pedrera and Parc Güell, all of which were way more interesting and impressive than Sagrada. This time, we took a tour of the newly refurbished Palau Güell, which was closed for renovations during my last visit. Palau Güell was Gaudí’s first completed building, very ornate with a heavy hand on the finishings. The restoration has been done beautifully though—it’s stunning to see a building like that tucked away on the edge of El Raval.
The Vos Shop: This little boutique has clothes from local designers at reasonable prices, and the customer service is great. Pretty limited range of sizes though. There are two locations; we visited the one in Sant Antoni.
Xocolat and xurros: On my first visit to Barcelona way back in 2007, I spent a lot of time searching for the best drinking chocolate and churros. After many taste-tests, I decided Petritxol Xocoa, at C/ Petritxol 11, was the best. This time around, the xurros were straight instead of curved, but other than that it was exactly as I remembered. Order simply: thick, bittersweet custardy drinking chocolate with fluffy, chewy churros, and skip the cream. Perfection.
Coffee: Nømad and Satan’s Coffee Corner were the two coffee places people recommended to me. I had a cold brew at Satan’s and it was great. Good coffee doesn’t seem to be too rare these days, but you could do a lot worse than this.
Orxata?: People widely recommended Orxateria Sirvent to us. Maybe it’s because I grew up with Mexican-style horchata, but I didn’t find the Spanish orxata to my taste at all. Turns out it’s basically a completely different drink, made with tiger nuts instead of rice and cinnamon. Maybe just try it for yourself though; cups are small and only a couple euro.