Barcelona, Spain. Markets, Hop on Hop Off Bus, Park Güell, Casa Batlló, Gothic Night Tour & Tapas

Day 16 of our 322 day journey around the world.

La Boqueria Market Rambla, 91 08001 Barcelona, España. Probably Barcelona's best-known market, ideally situated on La Rambla this market is a must whether sourcing ingredients for a fine meal or just wandering through. It's an assault on the senses with smells coming from the fish to fruit. The food sold ranges from ready-made fresh fruit salads for the tired tourist, to literally fresh out of the sea still moving crabs and lobsters (maybe you would also like to look out for the whole sheep's head!?) Not to mention the bright sweet counters that will act like a magnet for any child (or adult).

Hop on Hop off Bus Touristic Barcelona
Do you want to discover Barcelona from the comfort of a bus? If you were looking for a hop on hop off service in Barcelona, the Tourist Bus is your best option. We take you to the most emblematic corners of the city. You choose where to get on and where to get off, as many times as you want. And along the way, enjoy an audio guide in 16 languages, free Wi-Fi, a map of the city and tourist information. You can choose among two routes that will take you through different areas of the city. Not only will you enjoy icons such as the Sagrada Família, Casa Batlló or La Pedrera, but you will also have the pleasure of discovering their best kept secrets. An original and fun way to discover a unique city. Enjoy the best hop on hop off service in Barcelona!

When Park Güell began to be built in 1900, Barcelona was a modern and cosmopolitan metropolis whose economy was based on the strength of its industry and which had over half a million inhabitants. Its walls had been knocked down nearly half a century earlier and the new city, the Eixample planned by engineer Ildefons Cerdà, had grown spectacularly from 1860 onwards, in what was the largest 19th century city development project in Europe.
Ildefons Cerdà had made a thorough study of the difficulties of modern growth within the walled Barcelona and the impact of technological changes, especially the railway. The plan for his Pla d’Eixample proposal increased the area of Barcelona tenfold, as the result of a practical vision of the city. Cerdà conceived the plan as a flexible instrument undertaken with a reformist spirit in order to foster the formation of a modern city that would be more effective, healthier and fairer.
Barcelona expanded very rapidly throughout the second half of the 19th century, with the Eixample spreading out over the plain. Its central area began to take shape as a large bourgeois center, while development also advanced along its flanks, in the direction of the old manufacturing areas on the plain, with a more popular and industrial nature
The Universal Exhibition of 1888 showed Europe and the world the dynamic thrust of Barcelona, capital of a Catalan nation being reborn, and boosted the quest for a new artistic language and idiom of urban representation. That explained the success of the Modernisme movement, very much in evidence at the heart of the Eixample, and the work of an architect as singular as Antoni Gaudí.

Casa Batlló is located at number 43 on Paseo de Gracia, a street that, in the past, connected the city to Villa de Gracia, which today is a fully integrated district of the city.
Development of Paseo de Gracia
Since 1860, when an ambitious urban plan was approved in Barcelona (known as the Cerdà Plan), Paseo de Gracia has become the city’s backbone and its most important families started to set up home here. In this manner, in the 19th Century, the street became a promenade for pedestrians and horse-drawn carriages, and from the 20th Century it became a main avenue for cars. Originally, the building was built in 1877 by Emilio Sala Cortés (one of Gaudí’s architecture professors), when there was still no electric light in Barcelona. In 1903 it was purchased by Mr Josep Batlló y Casanovas, a textile industrialist who owned several factories in Barcelona and a prominent businessman.

The Gothic Quarter (Catalan: Barri Gòtic [ˈbari ˈɣɔtik] or El Gòtic; Spanish: Barrio Gótico) is the historic centre of the old city of Barcelona. It stretches from La Rambla to Via Laietana, and from the Mediterranean seafront to the Ronda de Sant Pere. It is a part of Ciutat Vella district.
The quarter encompasses the oldest parts of the city of Barcelona, and includes the remains of the city's Roman wall and several notable medieval landmarks.Much of the present-day fabric of the quarter, however, dates to the 19th and early 20th centuries. El Call, the medieval Jewish quarter, is located within this area, along with the former Sinagoga Major.
The Barri Gòtic retains a labyrinthine street plan, with many small streets opening out into squares. Most of the quarter is closed to regular traffic although open to service vehicles and taxis.