How to Spend 48 Hours in Barcelona, Spain

What to do on a weekend in Barcelona

First, 48 hours is not enough for Barcelona! We spent a little over 48 hours there on our trip, and we could have spent four days there easily! So if you have 48 hours or less, here is what I would do.

Take a food tour
Visit the La Sagrada Familia
Eat at Bar Cante
Visit the Market
Siesta by the pool or take a dip in the Mediterranean
Eat all the tapas

Really Barcelona/Spain living is slower, more relaxed but fun way of living. Start your day with some history, enjoy a fancy lunch, take a siesta at the hotel pool or ideally in the Mediterranean then head out to a tapas food tour and then keep the party going at night.

Do a Barcelona Tapas Foot Tour

Since doing our first food tour in Paris years ago, this has become our go-to activity while traveling. You really get to know the city from a local, explore a neighborhood and try a few establishments and dishes you might not have visited otherwise. Plus, you get to meet people from all over the world. The guide is usually a pretty outgoing, fun person – I mean, why else would they be a tour guide – and they will give you tons of recommendations of what to do and where to go, so I highly recommend doing this at the start of your trip. This is the exact tour we did with Airbnb.

What to look for in a food tour

How many stops and how many tapas overall
What neighborhood are they exploring
Does the description or the reviews mention the tour guide also gives a history of the area? This makes the tour way more interesting!

Visit the La Sagrada Familia

La Sagrada Familia is truly jaw-dropping. Make a reservation in advance to skip the lines. Pick up your headphones and walk around with your jaw on the floor, taking in the beauty of this church. The headphones are a must as you get an in-depth but digestible history of the church which really puts into perspective how long it took to built and all the intricate details and their meaning. I suggest doing this first thing in the morning after breakfast.

On your way to lunch, you could hit a few other Gaudi spots around town too. We didn’t do any of the tours at the other Gaudi sights as we just wanted to eat. Head to lunch at Bar Cante or got to the Mercado de La Boqueria and hop from vendor to vendor.

Eat at Bar Cante

I can’t tell you how amazing this meal was, from the food to the ambiance to the server. We went for lunch, which was perfect, but if we had had another night, we would have gone back for dinner. (Pictures above)

Visit Mercado de La Boqueria

This market is OLD. The market was a pig market in the 1470’s but there are even mentions of the market in the area dating back to 1217! So there is a lot of history here. Plus a lot of really awesome food!

Siesta – By the Pool or On the Beach

There is nothing I love more than swimming in the Mediterranean, so looking back, I’m not really sure why we didn’t go to the beach other than our hotel had a pool with a bar and great views, ha, but don’t try to squeeze things in siesta time – enjoy it. You will need the rest because Barcelona goes all night. So when searching for a hotel or Airbnb, look for a pool or plan to go to the beach as most of the city will shut down in the afternoon.

We stayed at the H10 Cubick Hotel, which we really liked and felt like it was a great central location too!

Eat and Drink All Night

Check out my Barcelona Food Guide for tons of great restaurant recommendations. In our 48 hours, we hit over 15 spots! It’s super easy when you tapas hop from one place to another.

I can’t wait to go to Barcelona again! If you have a favorite spot in Barcelona, drop it in the comments. Have a question? Drop a comment or send me a DM on Instagram

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