Living In and Exploring The City of Barcelona | Small Group Tour

This escorted small group tour in and around Barcelona city is tailored for those who like to spend a little extra time getting to know a place. This tour allows time to explore and discover the geography, culture and hidden gems that are often invisible at first glance. You will have the opportunity to get to know a major European city in a completely different way and see for yourself how the history and culture of Barcelona has shaped the city it is today.

Barcelona has over 2000 years of history, having been ruled by Romans, Visigoths and Franks. The city itself was founded as a military camp by the Romans at the end of the 1st century and named Barcino. It is now the sixth largest city in Europe, a dazzling seaside city alive with culture, colour and cuisine . The city itself is home to around 1.7 million people, and the province of the same name contains nearly 5 million. Until the Barcelona Olympics were held in 1992, the city was largely an industrial hub, but the global event transformed the city's reputation as a tourist city, and saw an increase in hotel room capacity of 200% from 1990 to 2004. Today, the city is one of Europe's and Spain's most popular destinations, yet retains its unique culture and lifestyle.

Barcelona City Explored

This tour is designed with a mix of escorted guided portions and free time, during which you can relax and recharge, or head off the beaten path to go exploring on your own. We stay in self-catering apartments for the duration. This approach gives you a base from which we can explore the city on foot and on public transport including high speed rail.

Throughout the tour, we delve into Barcelona's history, culture, and cuisine, and take day trips to some of the most wonderful nearby locations, such as Andorra, the magnificent port city Tarragona , Girona and the beach resort town of Sitges. You will experience the Fiesta De La Mercè (a huge city festival), discover the wondrous architecture of Antoni Gaudi at La Sagrada Familia and Park Guell, take wine tours, learn to cook Catalan food, see the first church dedicated to Mary in Zaragoza and visit the Picasso Museum and the Salvador Dali Museum in Figueres. We also visit the Santa Maria Monastery of Montserrat.

This trip is a rare opportunity to discover what is below the surface of one of Europe's most complex and beautiful cities.

For more details, click the ‘Top 5’ or ‘Itinerary’ buttons above! If you’re keen to experience this tour, please call or send an email. Or, to book, simply fill in the form on the right hand side of this page.

This tour is just one of many tours offered to Spain. You can also read our country profile and view all tours of Spain. We also prepared a suggested reading list for Spain.

The April and August dates for this tour are timed to finish to allow you to then join Odyssey's tours of Spain & Portugal each May & September.

Enjoy Odyssey's long stay return to explore city programs

Since 2012 Odyssey has offered long stay tours based in some of the greatest cities of the world. It began with exploring French history by rail inspired by Ina Caro's book.

Since that first long stay city tour Odyssey had added the following great cities to the list:

• Rome
• Florence
• Paris
• Berlin walking tour
• Discovering Berlin
• History of France by rail
• Contemporary Japan
• Lisbon & Barcelona

There are more programs to follow that have a similar style. They are centred on cities where you have indicated that you would like to return to explore further. They are places of cultural and historic importance where in a different life or different time you would have enjoyed a period of living in these cities. So whilst you may not be able to live here today, you can spend 3 weeks living as a local exploring with a local guide all that each city has to offer. A chance to return to explore some of the greatest and truly fascinating cities of the world.

Articles about Spain and Barcelona published by Odyssey Traveller

The following list of articles published by odyssey Traveller for mature aged and senior travellers to maximise their knowledge and enjoyment of Spain when visiting;

• 15 of the best places in Spain to visit.
• Travel notes for Barcelona 
• Ten of the best books published on Spain
• Ten of the Best art galleries in Europe to visit.
• Discovering Spain (and Portugal ) 

External articles to assist you on your visit to Barcelona and Spain

• Lessons about the Moors in Spain
• Monarchs of Spain
• A brief History of Spain

• History in-depth
• Level 1 - Introductory to Moderate
• Long Stays
• Specialised