Barcelona bound: five sights you shouldn't miss
Barcelona is a wonderful city and perfect for a weekend city break - but with so many attractions to choose from, which sights should be at the top of your priority list if you're only there for a couple of days? No need to panic; here follows a list of five great places to visit, meaning you can spend the time you have left before the day of departure concentrating on the important stuff, like finding cheap travel insurance and a good rate for buying foreign currency.
Plaça d'Espanya
Built to celebrate the 1929 International Exhibition, the Plaça d'Espanya is one of Barcelona's major squares and boasts a whole host of worthy attractions on the square itself or nearby. Chief among these are the ‘magic fountains', which offer a spectacular show ¬- especially at night. Also nearby is the National Art Museum of Catalonia (or Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya), which houses a wide range of work including Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque art.
Sagrada Familia
Widely considered to be the greatest achievement in architect Antoni Gaudi's career, the Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família (Expiatory Church of the Holy Family) is a truly stunning Roman Catholic church which, despite building work beginning way back in 1882, is remarkably still under construction. Such is the scope of Gaudi's design that work is expected to be complete by 2026 at the absolute earliest. File this one firmly under ‘you have to see it to believe it'.
Parc Güell
Another of Gaudi's masterpieces, Parc Guell is a lavish garden complex featuring a stunning main terrace, which is covered in colourful mosaic work and surrounded by a huge bench in the shape of a sea serpent. The garden's entrance also features an incredible mosaic-covered fountain in the shape of a dragon. The garden, which was built between 1900 and 1914, is protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site along with more of Gaudi's works.
Camp Nou
Football fans will get a real kick out of visiting the home stadium of one of the biggest club sides in the world, but the structure is a breathtaking sight whether you're a fan of sport or otherwise. The home of FC Barcelona, the Camp Nou was completed in 1957 and regularly plays host to a capacity crowd of 98,787 people, making it the biggest stadium in Europe. Take the stadium tour and you won't be disappointed. Even better, get some matchday tickets and experience arguably the greatest sporting atmosphere on the planet.
Barceloneta
If you visit Barcelona during the summer months, then you're in for a bather's paradise. The city boasts seven fantastic beaches - it was previously named as the best beach city in the world by National Geographic - and at 1,100m in length, Barceloneta is one of the biggest and best. It's also extremely popular, so your alternatives are the similarly-sized Sant Sebastià - or, if you prefer something a little more intimate, one of the smaller beaches such as Mar Bella or Llevant.
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Before heading off to Barcelona, make sure you look into some cheap travel insurance
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