Barcelona: Ultimate Family City Break

Barcelona must be one of the best cities in the world to just wander. Just wandering is not always pleasant with children getting bored and tired, but central Barcelona is a living, indeed thriving, residential city, with ample parks and squares with playgrounds and drinks appearing every couple of blocks. We went over New Year, when it was pleasantly warm but far from oppressively hot. The streets are in a grid structure, making it hard to get lost. The boulevards are wide, with broad walkways well away from the traffic. This was a bit like one of those pre-children city-breaks when we just used to wander from café to café in a strange place, only we had children this time, and managed to find a pace of exploration that was to everyone’s liking.

And whilst food for travelling children can be a bit tiresome, Spain has Tapas. Within an hour or two of landing, we had dumped our bags in the flat that would be our home for the next few days, and nipped round the corner to the nearest sunny square for January outdoor dining. The great thing about sharing Tapas is that amongst the dozen or so little plates between the 5 of us, each child will try most of them, and generally end up fed. Simple basics like patatas bravas are really a take on chips and ketchup (well – that’s what we told them), croquetas de pollo are rather nicer than the chicken nuggets in British fast-food outlets. With the added optional reward of churros y chocolate, we all ate well.

Our flat was close to the Sagrada Familia, Gaudi’s monumental cathedral which seems to be a perpetual building site. However, children and adults alike will gawp dumbstruck at the building as it stands now – the images and stonework are like no other church we have seen. The scale is breathtaking now, its hard to imagine that the even larger central spire representing Christ is still to be built. Every city has a gothic cathedral of some kind; indeed Barcelona has a rather fun one with palm trees in the cloisters, but the Sagrada Familia is absolutely something else. And although that’s probably the highlight, it sets a high bar for standards of architecture across the city. A little planning on the wandering took us past plenty of buildings that were just that little bit more crazy than necessary. The famous Casa Mila and Casa Batllo are well know, but wander past Casa Calvet and Bellesguard for some unexpected interested buildings dropped into otherwise quite normal areas. And although there is now an entrance fee for the more famous parts Parc Guell, there is still plenty to see and wander through in the free bits.

The excitement of the city makes it easy to forget that Barcelona is actually a port and also has a beach. My various beachy blogs demonstrate that children and sand are a fantastic combination, they can be amused for hours. Barcelona beach has the added panache of CableCar from the beach up to the Olympic Park up the mountain on Montjuic. Whilst the Olympic park is a pleasant diversion, the views from the CableCar really should not be missed. During our visit, we also saw the Three Kings arrive by sea to celebrate Christmas, generally observed by Catalans over Epiphany.  The children (in reality just our younger one) went onto the boat to see the Kings, and get some sweets and cakes, a fantastic tradition to witness.

If that was her highlight, the highlight for the boys was a trip to Camp Nou to watch Barcelona play Elche. Unlike Premier League games in the UK, the stadium is vast enough to service season-tickets and visitors alike, enabling us to watch the finest football club in the world, admittedly playing one La Liga’s lesser known clubs, for only EUR 19 each! The architecture of the stadium means that even the cheap seats like ours are closer to the action than most large stadia, with the big name players clearly recognisable below us. An injured but recovering Messi tantalising warming up but sadly not playing, however Fabregas, Iniesta, Sanchez were all working hard to show us why they are worlds best. We had given the tickets to the boys as a surprise Christmas present a week earlier, but I don’t think they really believed it was happening until kick-off. 

City breaks with children have the potential to be quite tiresome - the things that adults look for are often different to what children enjoy, However, I think Barcelona has the right combination of sights and experiences for everyone enjoy together. The relaxed atmosphere, plenty of space to run around, and easy food choices add to the combination that any family can enjoy their time there.  

Marbella, an easy family holiday

It’s well known that there are a lot of wealthy people on the Costa Del Sol, and somewhere amongst them, the worlds most successful concrete salesmen live  a glamorous high life of fast cars, flash villas, and fun. They sold a lot of concrete. It coats the ground from the sea towards the mountains, and stretches skywards in a quest to occupy all three dimensions. Huge concrete highways connect the concrete airport in Marbella to the concrete hotels and resorts along the coast in a topography where concrete salesmen outnumber conservationists.

Cross the highway, and a different Spain opens up. Whilst the continuation of concrete suggests this is not exactly the “real” Spain, it is still real enough to have proper tapas for 5 people and get change from EUR50, then slip next door for crunchy Churros dipped in thick warm chocolate. English is barely spoken this side of the road, a world away from the holiday-makers across the road taking conference calls from the sun-loungers. As ever in a Spanish-speaking country, the combination of children and something kickable allows a game of football to initiate. Whilst more children join, more beer is drunk… and there goes another afternoon in the sunshine.

Flights and accommodation are plentiful and inexpensive, and activities for children boundless, making this part of Spain a reliable recipe for a pleasantly easy, if unadventurous, family holiday. And the beach itself, whilst only a thin strip between the concrete and the sea, is sandy and virtually deserted during our visit over Easter. The distant views of the romantic mountains of Morocco in the distance across the sea add a stunning backdrop to a lazy day.

We stayed in one of hundreds of very similar concrete timeshare resorts sandwiched between the concrete highway and the sea, chosen mainly because the apartment easily accommodated our family of five with two good bedrooms and a sofa bed in the living room.  The resort facilities included the standard set of indoor and outdoor swimming pools, restaurants and bars, a little football area and a kids club. Even with all that however, the most fun is to be had on the beach. The sea was just about warm enough over Easter for a swim, the sand was just firm enough for us to create our own fortifications, and the space enough to run around.

Despite our general idleness on this trip, we did one day set off with a plan and caught the bus along the concrete highway to Marbella, and its jolly pretty old town full of Orange Trees and shady passageways. A statue of the King commemorating the restoration of the monarchy reminds us that this modern European country was a dictatorship in our lifetimes.  Despite my fascinating lecture on twentieth century Spanish history, the children decide that getting ice-cream would be a more interesting option at this point. Both of the overpriced restaurants recommended by the resort are closed, so we follow a group of hungry looking builders into a café and order by pointing at neighbouring tables – and ate like – well – hungry builders.

But the holiday is mainly a good value week of quality time with children. We swim, we read, we play football, we colour in princess pictures, we eavesdrop on conference calls taken by the pool. We buy fresh food in the market across the road, and serve up on the balcony of the apartment having leisurely late evening meals all together. We talk to each other, often without shouting. The ipads and phones stayed locked in the safe forgotten about. And at the end of the week, we follow the concrete strip back to the airport and home, having properly unwound ourselves.