Our program allows you plenty of time to discover your new country, culture and customs. Below are some of our recommended highlights. Some tours and packages can be organized when booking your program, please see the program price page for more information.

City Tour
The central section of the city that most tourists spend their time in is conveniently divided by La Rambla - the main artery of Barcelona life which tumbles from Plata de Catalunya southeast towards the Mediterranean and the recently reborn Port Vell (Old Port). The atmospheric Barri G=tic (Gothic Quarter), the area to the right of La Rambla heading in the direction of Plata de Catalunya, is the charming heart of the old city.

Plata de Catalunya divides the old town from the Eixample - a grid of streets laid out in the nineteenth century in which much of the city's finest modernist architecture is to be found. The most celebrated practitioner of the style was Antonf Gaudf, an eccentric recluse whose innovative work threw all design rulebooks out of the window in his quest to get architecture to mirror the curves and intricacies of nature.

language
To all extents and purposes, Barcelona is a bilingual city. Castellano (Castilian Spanish) is the national language of Spain and is spoken throughout the country, but Catala (Catalan) is used side by side with Castilian as the official language in Catalunya (Catalonia). Catalan was used in all spheres of life in the region until the decrees of the Nova Planta (1716) made Castilian the official language of Spain and banished Catalan from public life.

The language survived in the vernacular, however, and according to official estimates there are currently more than ten million speakers of Catalan in Europe. In Spain, Catalan is spoken in Catalonia, Valencia (to the south), on the Balearic Islands and in some parts of Aragon and Murcia. It is also spoken by the people of Andorra, North Catalonia (in France) and in L'Alguer on the west side of Sardinia. Note: Spanish is taught at our school, private lessons can be arranged for Catalan.

la rambla
La Rambla is not one street, but rather a seamless series of pedestrian avenues stretching from the Monument a Colom on the waterfront to Plata de Catalunya in the centre of the city. Attractions along the way include Gaudf's Palau Gnell. Some of La Rambla's most captivating attractions are its famous street entertainers who delight the crowds with their weird and wacky shows.

barri gòtic
The maze of streets known as the Barri Gòtic or Gothic Quarter contains an exemplary collection of Gothic buildings dating from Catalonia's Golden Age in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, interspersed with Roman ruins, delightful squares and numerous bars and restaurants.

Plaça Sant Jaume, at the heart of the district, is the epicentre of the city's political life. The square is overlooked on one side by the Renaissance-style Palau de la Generalitat - location of the Catalan government, and on the other by the Ajuntament (town hall).

catedral de la seu
Catedral de la Seu was built in the fourteenth century on the site of an earlier basilica, but the spire and fatade were not added until the end of the last century. Highlights include the spiritual space of the cloisters, the carved choir stalls and the Capella de Lepanto.

santa maria del mar
Santa Maria del Mar is generally considered to be the most beautiful church in the city and a prime example of Mediterranean Gothic architecture. It is located just to the northeast of the Barri Gòtic in the Ribera district. A fifteenth-century rose window adds colour to the simple harmony of the columned interior.

temple expiatori de la sagrada familia
Recently the subject of much controversy over who should pay for its completion, Gaudí's unfinished masterpiece and the city's most outlandish landmark, the Expiatory Temple of the Holy Family, towers crazily above the grid-like streets of the Eixample. Despite being very much a building site the cathedral has a certain beauty that somehow emerges despite the omnipresent construction.

casa milá
Casa Milá - also known as La Pedrera (the stone quarry) - is an undulating apartment block on the corner of Passeig de Gràcia. The building, inspired by the ocean, is an incredible testament to Gaudí's ability to make stone malleable. Apartments (not open to the public) are arranged around elliptical patios with no square corners in sight. The roof terrace is watched over by sentry-like chimneys and offers an excellent view across the city to the spires of La Sagrada Familia.

parc güell
With Parc Güell, Gaudí created a fantasy land that seamlessly combines the natural and the man-made, as well as offering good views back over the city.

The park, originally conceived as a garden city, covers a hill to the north of the centre. The gardens are enlivened by fantastic pavilions, stairways, columned halls and an organic plaza decorated with stunning broken-mosaic work (trencadís) by Gaudí's assistant, Josep Maria Jujol.

mançana de la discòrdia
A series of extraordinary houses by Montaner, Gaudí and Puig i Cadafalch comprise the Mançana de la Discòrdia (Block of Discord) on the Passeig de Grácia between Aragó and Consell de Cent. Information and passes for the Ruta Modernista can be obtained from the first floor of Casa Lléo Morera at number 35.

museu nacional d'art de catalunya (MNAC)
The Palau Nacional on Montjuïc was the focus of Barcelona's International Fair in 1929 and now houses the National Museum of Catalonian Art. The museum boasts a stunning collection of Gothic, Romanesque and Medieval treasures and religious artefacts. The most impressive approach to the Palace is up Avinguda de La Reina Maria Cristina from Plaça Espanya; the Avinguda is lined with fountains that are floodlit at night.

museu picasso and museu d'art contemporani de barcelona (MACBA)
The Picasso Museum is devoted to the artist's early work, including a large number of Rose and Blue period paintings, exhibition posters and childhood sketches. The delightful collection is housed in two fifteenth-century palaces close to the Parc de la Ciutadella.

Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA):Looking rather incongruous in the down-at-heel surroundings of the Raval district to the west of La Rambla, the brilliant-white Museum of Contemporary Arts is at the forefront of efforts to regenerate this traditionally seedy area of the city. The museum opened amid a blaze of publicity in 1995 and houses a permanent collection of post-1940s international art and various temporary exhibitions.

party in the island of ibiza (eivissa)
Ibiza is the party capital of the world and it can be easily reached from Barcelona. Ferries leaves daily from the port of Valencia to the ports of IBIZA, MALLORCA & MENORCA. The ferry normally leaves a few times daily during the week and once at the weekend, the price per person varies depending on your destination. For additional information, please visit: www.viamare.co.