We'll (self, husband, 11- and 8-year old kids) be in Barcelona for a day and night before a cruise this July. So initially I was thinking of taking the Barcelona Metro everywhere. I picked a hotel on the Metro line (AC Hotel Som, close to Ildefons Cerda on the blue line). I was planning on riding the T1 Orange to Europe Fira, then switching to the blue line and taking it one stop over. But when I "plan my route" on the Metro site, it recommends getting off at Fira and walking the 1,000 meters to our hotel instead of switching lines. Someone on my cruise website mentioned that the connections between some lines require a lot of walking, so I was wondering if that was why it would recommend not switching lines there? I'm not keen on walking 10 football fields with luggage straight from the airport.
The Metro website also mentioned catching a bus, no. 46, from the airport which goes right by our hotel. How easy is the bus system? Both bus and Metro would be $18/four people.
There's also the option of taking a taxi, which my hotel website says costs $30. Would this hold true for 4 people? I also heard that taxis charge for luggage? We'll only have 4 carry-on size bags. Just trying to find the best fit of reasonable cost and low level of difficulty since we will have kids in tow who could turn whiny. :)
Also we don't have a lot planned to do that day/evening. We'd like to hit Sagrada Familia and maybe Ramblas. Ideas for easiest/best transportation options for that? Looking at the Metro map, it looks like it would require 2 train changes from Ilfedons Cerda to Sagrada (blue to red to purple) and takes 50 minutes. The bus route would require 1 change (yellow to red) and takes 40 minutes. Not sure how to price a taxi or how long it would take - thoughts?
Also any recommendations about getting from Sagrada Familia to Ramblas, Ramblas back to our hotel, and our hotel to the Barcelona port the next day?
Thank y'all so much! My head is swimming with information overload!!