A Barcelona Scavenger Hunt

Barcelona is a beautiful city with plenty to see and do when you come to visit it. Without a doubt the most well-known would be the modernist architecture route, with the works of Antonio Gaudi and his disciples being at the forefront of these magnificent buildings.

If all you're looking for is an introduction to Barcelona and to see "the highlights" then you can actually do pretty well with the official bus tour, which is a hop-on hop-off bus with three different routes that will actually give you a pretty good overview of the city. A visit to the Sagrada Familia is also a must, including the small museum inside the basilica, and the much larger history and architecture museum underneath it, which also has what is the best souvenir shop in town, in my opinion.

A different way to see some of the less well-known sights

I live in Barcelona, and have plenty of visitors, many of whom are repeat visitors, and who ask me for ideas of what to do. At one point, I decided to create a scavenger hunt, that I've been refining as several visitors have tried it.

There are 20 challenges in all. A number of them are in a nice route that's easily walkable, but others are much more far-flung. All can be seen for free, but you should have a zone 1 public transport ticket to get to some of them. A good afternoon's scavenger hunting will manage maybe 8 of these. I think the record in one session is 12.

Some of these are covered in the more famous tours, others, not so much.

You should be able to take photographs of all of these. If you're with me, send me pictures and I'll validate them.

The challenges

Try to find:

1. Four Griffins, two with feathered wings, two with leathery wings, near a monument to a lady called Sonia
2. A building seemingly waterproofed with umbrellas
3. A biblically accurate hotel
4. A sultry giraffe
5. A giant pussy
6. A head that pops out at you
7. A happy prawn
8. A square named after a British author
9. A square named after an American president
10. A statue of Antoni Gaudi that you can shake hands with
11. A place that you used to be able to pay to have shade thrown at you
12. A 13th century freezer
13. A submarine that used to work
14. A statue of Liberty
15. A colon on a stick
16. A giant glory hole
17. A dragon you can slide through
18. A bridge fit for senior clergy
19. A boy hiding a star behind his back as he looks at the sky
20. Light reflected by giant metal balls

Good Luck!

Transport geek bonus hunt

As I have a lot of public transport-aware friends, here is a bonus scavenger hunt to try and ride all the forms of public transport in Barcelona:

1. Metro - there are two different metro companies, and there are 3 different gauges to run on. A total of 12 different metro lines, though two are currently split into a North and South variant. Some run autonomously.
2. Bus - some have only numbers and some have letters. Bonus if you manage to ride one not operated by TMB.
3. Tram - there are two main branches split into 6 lines if you want to be complete. Most of it is powered by overhead wires, but there's a new section that's powered by a third rail.
4. Funicular - there are two available on the public transport network card, and one private one that only runs in the tourist season
5. Rodalies Renfe - Suburban and Regional rail, don't miss visiting Estació de França station. There are 13 lines running through Barcelona, but I don't suggest attempting all of them.
6. FGC - Catalan Autonomous Railways - there are two different gauges, and some track is shared with the metro. You can use FGC to access the Rack Railway to Montserrat, but that's technically not a Barcelona public transport system.
7. Cross-port ferry - only available in the summer months, connects the area near Drassanes to an area near the W hotel. It's not in the integrated ticketing system, so requires extra payment.
8. Dangleways (Cable Cars) - there are two, both on Montjuic, but they require separate payment, and are quite expensive.
9. Taxis are a regulated public transport option in Barcelona, so definitely count as far as I'm concerned.