Ciutadella & Barceloneta

Recreational space has always been high up the list with every redesign of the city. Recently, peripheral bits of industrial wasteland have benefited from the drive to provide some greenery and relative peace, but the late nineteenth-century expansion of Barcelona relied instead on transforming previously fortified, and very central, sections of the city. The quickest respite from the center, and one which can be slotted quite comfortably into a day's pottering about the old town, is the Parc de la Ciutadella , lying east, and within easy walking distance, of the Barri Gòtic. Once the site of a Bourbon fortress, this is a formal park, with a zoo, museums and other attractions spread about its paths and gardens. To the south lies the beach, stretching from the fishing (and seafood-eating) district of Barceloneta , jutting out into Barcelona's central harbour, to the continually expanding Parc de Mar , which has totally transformed a previously redundant section of the city's coastline.

Around Barcelona

Ciutadella and Barceloneta

Eixample

Montjuïc

Ramblas and the Old Town

Suburbs