First time in Barcelona. Trying to decide if we should hire a guide.

We visited Barcelona in 2010 and stayed 5 or 6 nights. We did not hire a guide, and we didn't feel we missed anything without a guide. It is helpful to have a good guidebook. I do remember we used audioguides for Casa Battlo. We had a guided tour of Palau de Musica. If the other Gaudi buildings offer audio guides, I recommend renting them.

Really EASY- our first ever europe trip and had no issues. That said, we did sign on for a food & culture tour that was 1/2 day and really enjoyed exploring older parts of town and market with a guide first before doing our own thing.

If this were me, I would hire a guide for at least a walking tour soon after arrival so as to get your bearings and then do the rest with audio guides and a good guide book. We took a bike tour with Fat Tire bikes that was so much fun! I highly recommend them and also possibly a food tour if you have time. I try to do both of these whenever I’m visiting a big(ger) city I haven’t been to before. Both include what I think amounts to on the ground experiences.

I have never regretted hiring a guide. With that said, I usually hire guides for places that I am extremely excited about seeing - Normandy, Pompeii, Ercolano, Provence, etc.

In Barcelona, we hired guides for day trips to the Priorat wine country, Tarragona, and Girona/Costa Brava. I arrived in Barcelona loving Gaudi, but left loving Montaner even more.

I was there a few weeks ago mid-September. Although there were many tourists, we never had to wait in a line. We had prepaid tickets and got right in everywhere.

You are staying in Barceloneta? Good place if you are on a beach vacation, otherwise far from the sites you’ll be visiting. You’ll tire of the walk but cabs are plentiful. We like to eat in Barceloneta, but would not stay there. We were in Barcelona a few weeks ago on a Tauck tour. We arrived early and I bought a combo ticket for Casa Mila and Hospital San Pau on line a few weeks before we left. They both had audio guides and they worked just fine. We also bought advance tickets for Park Guell and for a few Euro more they offer a guided tour. It’s quick and effective. We saw Sagrada Familia with a guide and that added to it tremendously. I agree with hiring a guide for a walking tour of Bari Gothic, it will be worth it. Also, consider a tapas tour. We used The Barcelona Taste. Great fun! Lots of folks on this forum don’t use guides. We do and never had a bad experience. In fact, some of the best money I’ve ever spent!

For Gaudí specific sights, an art and architecture specialist could be a real plus. Also, whether they’re driving or just doing the navigating on foot and/or public transportation, a guide could help save your time and energy getting around to sights. Money well spent, if you want to focus on the Gaudí objects, and not getting to them, then reading about them in a reference book/guidebook.

We just hit the subways and buses in Barcelona. Had no problem getting anywhere we wanted to go. After reading about the city on Wikipedia, we saw no reason for a guide.

We'll save the guides for Rome and Florence and Athens.

Also - download the Rick Steves app on your phone for free - open up the Spain - Barcelona section and download that section before you go - tons of great walking tours and cathedral tours of many towns in Europe. We always get the RS guidebooks and, on occasion, we get a guide - you certainly learn TONS more with a guide and get a good preview of the area.

After reading about the city on Wikipedia, we saw no reason for a guide. We'll save the guides for Rome and Florence and Athens.

Huh. what's that supposed to mean lol?

A good local guide can be an invaluable resource no mater the size of a city. I'd say look for a guide for the local tapas scene in Barcelona, which I have heard from non-Spanish tourists is difficult to navigate by one's self.

We used Runner Bean Tours for 3 walking tours. They were excellent.

Rick Steve’s’ book was all we needed for Barcelona. We were there last week, and the lines were short. some of the sites’ websites are a little cranky when it comes to online ticket sales. In those cases, we bought advanced tickets at the TI. Rick gives good guidance on every neighborhood, but the skipping the line business really just applies to high season (mainly summer).

This raises an interesting conundrum. I didn't use a guide this past trip (one exception described below), while others read RS guidebook or Wikipedia. The bottom line is that those who said they didn't need a guide, that the reading material sufficed, means it was enough for what they wanted and expected. My answer was that we didn't have to wait in a line. Not having used a guide, I can't compare what I don't know.

However, before the pandemic, I did have a guided tour of the Gothic Quarters offered by the Office of Tourism. I know I wouldn't have absorbed and remembered as much on my own because a lot came back to me as we revisited the area recently.
The tour was excellent concentrated information.

Here's the exception: one guided tour in September to Montserrat organized by friends visiting from the US, a bus tour my BFF found on Viator (yeh, I know, but I wasn't about rain on besties' choice). That was a waste: poorly informed guide, too much time near the shops, mediocre lunch at a farm. We would have been better off going on our own with a good guide book. OTOH they had an excellent private tour to Dali sites the day before, given by the same agency.

We took a city tour with Barcelona Day Tours and it was great. After that we did the city on our own.

Like Bets, I have taken (in 2016) the tour of the Barri Gotic offered by the Barcelona Tourist Office. I thought it was excellent. We observed at least one "free" tour in the same area, and the tour group was much, much larger. I have a lot more confidence in the information imparted by guides on tours vetted by the local tourist office.

http://www.explorecatalunya.com/

I am going to Barcelona next year and like you said, I’m an overplanner too! (Wink wink)
I would like to book this Salvador Dali tour that goes outside of Barcelona to the Salvador Dali museum (that he designed!) , also Cadaques and his and Gala’s ACTUAL HOME complete with eccentric decor. I’m so excited!!! I hope it’s the same that a previous poster mentioned was excellent.

I’m travelling solo on this trip, so going to use a couple guided trips in Barcelona. More enjoyable I think to enjoy it with others. It will be a pre-tour 4 days as I’m attending the Rick Steves best of Spain in 14 days.

Thanks everyone that posted- I’m going to bookmark. I want to do a tapas tour and see that someone mentioned a few, so will research those!

I also want to focus on art in Barcelona. With Gaudi, Picasso and Miro sites, plus Dali right out of town, Barcelona seems an art lovers dream!

Thanks original poster- I think there is some very useful information here for a first-time Barcelona visitor! I hope that you have a wonderful trip (me too 😊)
Lisa

MODERNISME
For those that prefer DIYing their visits -like me-, but at the same time feel a tour guide might be helpful to bring that "knowledge of a local" into the visit, there's a self-driven route called "Ruta del Modernisme", based on a book published by the Barcelona City Hall, which help visitors to discover more than 120 different modernist gems in Barcelona, including all of Gaudí's but also other equally famous geniuses such as Puig i Cadafalch, Sagnier, or Domènech i Montaner among others.

More info: https://rutadelmodernisme.com/en/ and the book can be purchased here https://rutadelmodernisme.com/en/modernisme-route/#guia-preus

But, I would like to remind visitors that Modernisme is just "one" of the reasons why visiting Barcelona's architectural history. We also host a variety of ancient Roman vestiges, plenty of Medieval (Romanesque and Gothic) houses and palaces in the Old City and gems from Modern vanguard architects (such as Nouvel, Rogers, Foster, Calatrava, Meier...). There's a handy guide collected by Virginia Duran, a famous licensed architect, that can be downloaded for free here.

The Ruta del Modernisme book is excellent; it's useful and also makes an excellent souvenir. However, it is very heavy, though soft-bound. The accompanying discount booklet will save a bit of money if you go to secondary sights where you can just walk up and buy tickets. Arriving without a ticket already in hand at places like La Sagrada Familia, Casa Batllo, Casa Mila and Parc Guell is not recommended due to lengthy ticket lines, and I don't think you can claim the discount when you buy a ticket online.

Good info here.

I know Barceloneta is out the main drag. But our place is 2 kilos from Placa d Catalunya to me that's a short walk. We can cab and metro too but people I talked to Said this was where to eat tapas at night and that's a big part of the trip. Where will I be when I'm full and a little.... buzzed?

We also have Toledo and Madrid in this trip.
I waited so long to go to Europe because I never had 3+ weeks to take off. This is sort of a test. Fly in Thursday am home in bed in the states Tuesday night. 2 nights Toledo 3 nights barcelona.

If it's a good trip. I think I'll do another trip to Europe over Mardi Gras break while the wife and kids are with school at Disney.

This is the company we used for our tapas tour https://thebarcelonataste.com/. We greatly enjoyed our time. This company https://devourtours.com/destinations/spain/barcelona/ also does tapas tours. We used them in San Sebastián and Madrid. You will see none of the tours visit Barceloneta as that is not a popular place for tapas despite what you have been told. That “easy” 2km walk will get very old very fast. If you are planning a tapas tour or a do-it-yourself tapas experience you’ll be very full, very tipsy and facing a long walk in the dark along with the many pickpockets who will spot you a mile away. Good luck!

Book those food tours early. We couldn't get one, all full.
No, it's not a long walk, 3k at most from the Port at the base of Las Ramblas to the top.

Dude. Devour tours, AND multiple others feature La Cova Fumida, is on almost every YouTube tapas video in Barcelona. I dint know why you have to be so salty in all your replies. But it's not needed nor wanted.

I personally never stay right in the city center. I look for more of a locals place. Yes RS says stay in Catalyuna. I wouldn't stay in Times Square. I prefer Hells Kitchen. I wouldn't stay in Hollywood I prefer Los Feliz.

Yes pick pockets I'm aware. I also live in the American city most known for pick pockets and our are armed and dangerous. I've been dealing with pick pockets my entire life to the point I've never had a back pocket wallet. If I can the French quarter at 3am I'll be fine in Barcelona.

I've already picked out so many places.

Also there are these things called cabs. I downloaded the local app. Cabs seem frequent.

Dude? Salty? You posted looking for advice. You’re not hearing what you want. Been there many times, most recently a month ago. You found a tapas bar in Barceloneta and a tour that goes there. My mistake. Good, then, have fun. And if you think you’ve encountered skilled pickpockets, well, welcome to Barcelona! And yes, cabs are plentiful and cheap. They all have touchless card readers so no need to fish for cash. Safe travels…..dude.

I don't suppose there's anything seriously wrong with staying in Barceloneta. A heck of a lot of other tourists will be doing the same thing. I walked through the area once and had the impression (can't really pinpoint on what basis) that a lot of the residences had been turned into Airbnb lodgings. I much preferred the Eixample. But if you want to go tapas hopping in the evening in Barceloneta, that may be the best place to stay.

The truth is no true Barcelonan would ever choose Barceloneta to stay, too many cons, but again, there's no accounting for taste. I imagine that for some visitors the area has some "allure", but then, they're only staying a few days.

We only took one guided walk in Barcelona, for the Gothic quarter. It was done by the TI out of one of the Placas in the quarter (St. Jaume, St. Miguel?). It wasn't free but very affordable and wouldn't have been better if we'd chosen a "professional" guide.

We used Laura Coch for a guide in Girona and she was amazing. Yes, you can do both cities w/out a guide but you learn so much more,save time and get great recommendations for restaurants..Local places.
We ate at Casa Marieta in Girona open since 1892 and she made the reservation. She is also a guide for Barcelona. By her recommendation we ate @ La Pepita which was amazing..need resevations
Download the Whatsapp and you can speak directly w/her. She set up a video call w/me before I left which was so helpful.
lauratoursbarcelona.com Phone number 34 635039406

I'm back from wonderful Barcelona and I HIGHLY recommend this city. I didn't see enough.
To the guys slamming my choice of neighborhood they don't understand my travel desires.
I woke on November mornings to a short two block walk to the Mediterranean where I would walk along the beach. Locals were so friendly and would open up and talk about New Orleans once I mentioned where I was from. It was cool being from a place people knew of. I would often swim as the weather was never below the mid 60s. I had the nearby New Orleans coffee shop for keeping my local routine. Then the food.

Who said that area was devoid of options? Can Ramonet was a AMAZING, Xup Xup was really good. We would eat at 4-5 tapas places a day and Can Ramonet had the best Gambas which became our favorite dish though we never had a bad meal. Outside of Botin in Madrid. Which I knew we should have avoided.

Barcelona was amazing I wish I toured the Eixample more. What an amazing area. Getting lost in the Gotic area was great too.

We enjoyed the Pinxtos bars near Mt Monjuic as there were dozens in a nice pedestrian walk. Then the markets. The Galacian oysters were the best I ever had. I could have eaten in the seafood market every day. The food is just so fresh.

As I sit home over a week now returning to Barcelona is high on my mind.
Though I really fell in love with Toledo. What a magical town. While I didn't eat my way through that city the same way. The architecture was second to none in the way it was preserved and honored.

Before this year Spain wasn't even in my top 5 euro travel destinations. Now I want to return annually. Go to Spain. Eat your way through the city.

I would talk to people and ask what they like. So many friendly locals. We had no pick pocket incidents. I dropped a debit card in the water but that was only loss. Locals were great. Reminded me of travel in the southern US. Very out going and friendly.

Taxis are cheap and plentiful. We had the local app but hailing a cab was super simple. Most rides were €5-10. My 4am trip from Barceloneta to the airport was ,€30 but included advance fees.

I loved Barceloneta. The area reminded me of the French Quarter with all the small bars and restaurants. Though the area was loud all night.

I'll try another area next time.

We had a 3rd floor apartment.

Planning a return next November with Seville added in.