It was pouring outside at the time we started to walk towards our next destination… Gothic Quarter! With rain jackets and umbrellas we headed out. Why did it have to rain today I muttered, what about taking pictures and what about my hair that gets so darn frizzy! I was sure not in a good mood as my husband made us walk 15 mins in that rain and cold weather. Kids complained and I did too… it really wasn’t going to be a good eventful day for me today, I thought.
By the time we reached our meeting place for the Gothic Quarter walking tour, we had soggy shoes, my son was wet as he thought he had water proof jacket so he shouldn’t be walking with me under the umbrella ( or he just didn’t want to wait for me every two minutes and take pictures ).
We waited inside for fifteen minutes for the rain to get a bit slower before we left for the tour. The morning walking tour of Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter was a fun way to get the kids engaged in the two hour tour. They had a blast learning about the history of Barcelona with the tour guide, who kept it fun for them. And we sure wouldn’t have known the small details she mentioned during the tour. The rain stoped half way through the tour, it was starting to be a better day already! The only thing that wasn’t right were my white sky pictures as it was still foggy and cloudy. But, I choose to ignore that take more pictures and enjoy my walk.
After the tour, we walked around the Gothic Quarter looking for the Granja Dulcinea Bakery my friend had mentioned. We enjoyed the Sunday farmer market which we discovered in one of the plazas and tired the amazing cheeses they were selling. It is so easy to get distracted and walk different ways in Gothic Quarter. Be mindful of getting lost in those small streets but google maps helped us navigate through that area.
We finally reached the bakery, which is a small little place. And ordered a cup of chocolate to dip with our Nelindros, which our guide had suggested getting instead of churros. Good choice not getting churros as this was amazing for dipping inside the cholocate. The kids got waffles. It was delicious, we were so glad that we had dessert before the lunch! It’s a must visit place if you like anything sweet.
Gothic Quarter is probably the most beautiful and intriguing part of Barcelona. Try to spend at least half a day exploring this area.
Next, we walked to Restaurant Can Solè, which was good twenty minutes walk from Gothic Quater, in the Barceloneta area near the marina. This place was my most researched restaurant in Barcelona. I had spent hours reading different blogs about where to eat paella in Barcelona as it doesn’t originate from here but from nearby place of Valencia. So first, Paella is eaten by locals during lunch and on Thursday’s or Sundays. We ordered cod corettes and tomatoes bread as appetizers , which was a wrong decision! Because the paella was big enough for us two as the kids didn’t want to eat anything after waffles. The paella was delicious but I would have preferred a little crunchy rice at the bottom. We packed the the left overs as we couldn’t finish. Me and the my daughter debated about walking for 30 minuets to our apartment but the boys won this round. I guess we needed that walk to justify all the eating we had done. And my son wanted his steps on his Fitbit. It was a good decision, as we won’t have seen the amazing areas we crossed during the walk.
After, 30,000 steps we crashed at our apartment for good 2 hours. Caffeine helped us wake up for the next tour… Casa Batllo, which was luckily just five minutes walk from our apartment.
The kids were done for the day and didn’t want to move out of the apartment. It took a lot of bargaining to get them out again.
Casa Batllo is a beautiful display of modernist architecture of Gaudi’s work. The kids loved the interactive audio/ video guide and went through the whole place without complaining. It’s a must see place if you like modernist architecture.
We retired back to the apartment and kids made their bargained pasta dinner. We choose to eat at a Paco Meralgo Tapa Bar suggested by my friend instead of our reservations at Botafumeiro, which is supposed to be a great place. But, after the heavy paella lunch, the tapas were a better choice then a full on dinner.
Paco Meralgo, is a gem! Every tapa was better than the last one. We had fried artichokes, spicy patata brava, Russian salad and sausages plate with tomatoes bread. It was all washed down with beer and cava. I plan to go here again when we get back from South Spain. Get reservations early or be there at 8 pm, right when they open to score the bar seatings. We sat at the bar.
Waking back to our apartment, me and my husband thanked our kids for not complaining … Much! We all decided that it was a better, more interesting day than the day before…
One Foot Out the Door 
Productive and fun day!!!!
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