Perfect Pitstop: Enjoying Barcelona During the Grand Prix
As Barcelona hosts the Spanish Grand Prix, here’s how to hit the city’s highlights at an equally speedy pace over a weekend
Ed Grenby - 19 June 2024
Start your engines! Formula One roars back into town for the Spanish Grand Prix in Barcelona this weekend, making the city look even more blisteringly exciting than usual. Year-round, the Catalan capital is a hotbed of incredible food, fantastical architecture, decadent nightlife and a sexy beach scene. But the high-speed circus of thrills, spills and overlooking-the-Highway-Code that breezes in for three days (before heading off for Austria next week, and Silverstone the one after) is a reminder that you can get an exhilarating taste of this 15,000rpm city in just one fast-track weekend. Here’s how to make your pitstop perfect…
THE LEG-STRETCHER
It’s more or less compulsory for all visitors to Barcelona to meander down La Rambla at some point during their time in the city. The sort of pedestrianised promenade for which words like “vibrant”, “bustling” and “colourful” were invented, it links traffic-honking Plaça de Catalunya and the lovely waterfront at Port Vell.
Admittedly it’s infested with pickpockets and, worse, street performers, but even they can’t dent the charm of its traditional florists and confectioners. And, crucially, when it gets too much you can just duck off into La Boqueria, the multi-sensory food market that was founded in 1217 but is still making mouths water 800 years later.
THE MUST-NOT-MISS SIGHT
If your high-octane itinerary allows time for only one actual tourist attraction, first place on the starting grid has to go to the still-unfinished La Sagrada Família, the masterpiece of one of Catalonia’s most celebrated sons, architect Antoni Gaudí. “Iconic” is an almost iconically overused word, but the cathedral is as instantly recognisable from its outline as any Eiffel or Liberty – and much more than a mere picture to tick off.
Book ahead and you’ll find the interior is as surreally beautiful as the façade, all vaulting arches and kaleidoscope stained glass. The audio guide is worth the money for its fascinating titbits (it was an errant tram that killed Gaudí, now buried here himself, in 1926), and so is the extra trip up a tower or two.
Image: Sergio Pérez at the Spanish Grand Prix in 2023
THE CHEAP THRILL
Montjuïc – the huge hill that looks like it’s been plonked in the middle of Barcelona to spite its residents – will be particularly appealing to motorsport fans, as the old Montjuïc Circuit was where the Spanish Grand Prix was held in the 1960s and 70s. Up on top, 1992’s Olympic Stadium and the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya preside in a grand manner – but the hill is also home to the Fundació Joan Miró (more art), Montjuïc Castle (more history) and gorgeous botanical gardens. The biggest thrill? Climbing aboard the half-a-century-old cable car that links Montjuïc and Barceloneta, and soaring (in either direction) between them at a height of 70 metres.
THE FOODIE HEAVEN
It’s pretty hard to eat badly in Barcelona, but if you’re looking for a single showpiece memory-maker of a dinner, head for Barceloneta’s Enoteca Paco Pérez, where the eponymous chef has earned two Michelin stars (he has another two for his restaurant Miramar in Llança up the coast). The room here is gorgeous (light, airy and elegant), the service impeccable yet winningly down to earth, the wines magnificent (at 700 bottles, this is one of the city’s largest cellars). And then there’s the food. Startlingly creative dishes – razor clam flower, for instance, or sea cucumber in fricandó; maybe even “The sea remembering Gaudí” – aren’t just a chef showing off: each is an exquisitely put-together taste of something unfamiliar but utterly fun to eat. enotecapacoperez.com
THE NIGHTLIFE VIBE
By day, Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter – Barri Gòtic, or just El Gòtic to locals – is a timewarp neighbourhood of hidden squares, medieval houses and even older churches. And by night it’s the same, but with bars. Which means you can wander from the fairy-tale 13th-century Catedral de Barcelona, through the Plaça del Rei and its anciently atmospheric stone buildings, past the Museu d’Història de Barcelona with its 2,000 years of stories… and then straight on into Polaroid or Milk or Nevermind or any of a few dozen other excellent bars and tapas joints hidden down one of the Quarter’s labyrinthine alleyways.
Image: Waterfront Port Vell
THE HIGH-LIFE HOTEL
If you’re only here for a night or two, aim high. Hotel Arts Barcelona (hotelartsbarcelona.com) towers 44 floors over beachy Barceloneta, with views out across the Mediterranean one way and directly across to La Sagrada Família the other. The chic modern rooms gleam with natural light, the service has a similarly Jeevesian shimmer to it, and the food and drink options make it hard to leave (from the sunwashed seafood and sangria of poolside Marina Coastal Club to the darkly sophisticated speakeasy vibes of the candlelit Pantry restaurant). Out front is the hotel’s lovely rooftop-terrace pool and gardens, and beyond that (mere steps away) is the beach – and city. Vroom!
THE LEG-STRETCHER
It’s more or less compulsory for all visitors to Barcelona to meander down La Rambla at some point during their time in the city. The sort of pedestrianised promenade for which words like “vibrant”, “bustling” and “colourful” were invented, it links traffic-honking Plaça de Catalunya and the lovely waterfront at Port Vell.
Admittedly it’s infested with pickpockets and, worse, street performers, but even they can’t dent the charm of its traditional florists and confectioners. And, crucially, when it gets too much you can just duck off into La Boqueria, the multi-sensory food market that was founded in 1217 but is still making mouths water 800 years later.
THE MUST-NOT-MISS SIGHT
If your high-octane itinerary allows time for only one actual tourist attraction, first place on the starting grid has to go to the still-unfinished La Sagrada Família, the masterpiece of one of Catalonia’s most celebrated sons, architect Antoni Gaudí. “Iconic” is an almost iconically overused word, but the cathedral is as instantly recognisable from its outline as any Eiffel or Liberty – and much more than a mere picture to tick off.
Book ahead and you’ll find the interior is as surreally beautiful as the façade, all vaulting arches and kaleidoscope stained glass. The audio guide is worth the money for its fascinating titbits (it was an errant tram that killed Gaudí, now buried here himself, in 1926), and so is the extra trip up a tower or two.
Image: Sergio Pérez at the Spanish Grand Prix in 2023
THE CHEAP THRILL
Montjuïc – the huge hill that looks like it’s been plonked in the middle of Barcelona to spite its residents – will be particularly appealing to motorsport fans, as the old Montjuïc Circuit was where the Spanish Grand Prix was held in the 1960s and 70s. Up on top, 1992’s Olympic Stadium and the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya preside in a grand manner – but the hill is also home to the Fundació Joan Miró (more art), Montjuïc Castle (more history) and gorgeous botanical gardens. The biggest thrill? Climbing aboard the half-a-century-old cable car that links Montjuïc and Barceloneta, and soaring (in either direction) between them at a height of 70 metres.
THE FOODIE HEAVEN
It’s pretty hard to eat badly in Barcelona, but if you’re looking for a single showpiece memory-maker of a dinner, head for Barceloneta’s Enoteca Paco Pérez, where the eponymous chef has earned two Michelin stars (he has another two for his restaurant Miramar in Llança up the coast). The room here is gorgeous (light, airy and elegant), the service impeccable yet winningly down to earth, the wines magnificent (at 700 bottles, this is one of the city’s largest cellars). And then there’s the food. Startlingly creative dishes – razor clam flower, for instance, or sea cucumber in fricandó; maybe even “The sea remembering Gaudí” – aren’t just a chef showing off: each is an exquisitely put-together taste of something unfamiliar but utterly fun to eat. enotecapacoperez.com
THE NIGHTLIFE VIBE
By day, Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter – Barri Gòtic, or just El Gòtic to locals – is a timewarp neighbourhood of hidden squares, medieval houses and even older churches. And by night it’s the same, but with bars. Which means you can wander from the fairy-tale 13th-century Catedral de Barcelona, through the Plaça del Rei and its anciently atmospheric stone buildings, past the Museu d’Història de Barcelona with its 2,000 years of stories… and then straight on into Polaroid or Milk or Nevermind or any of a few dozen other excellent bars and tapas joints hidden down one of the Quarter’s labyrinthine alleyways.
Image: Waterfront Port Vell
THE HIGH-LIFE HOTEL
If you’re only here for a night or two, aim high. Hotel Arts Barcelona (hotelartsbarcelona.com) towers 44 floors over beachy Barceloneta, with views out across the Mediterranean one way and directly across to La Sagrada Família the other. The chic modern rooms gleam with natural light, the service has a similarly Jeevesian shimmer to it, and the food and drink options make it hard to leave (from the sunwashed seafood and sangria of poolside Marina Coastal Club to the darkly sophisticated speakeasy vibes of the candlelit Pantry restaurant). Out front is the hotel’s lovely rooftop-terrace pool and gardens, and beyond that (mere steps away) is the beach – and city. Vroom!