The day started off with us packing up our bags once more and checking out of the hotel. With our luggage safely stowed with reception, we headed off to the nearest tube station to start our journey up Montjuic.
After working out what tickets we needed for the tube, we jumped on the next one that arrived, and headed towards the stop Paral-lel.
From here, you could transfer to the Funicular Metro without paying an additional fee, which was a nice surprise.
After waiting for the countdown timer to reduce, and for the metro to arrive, we got on-board ready for the ascent.
Once at the top, it was only a short walk to the cable car that took you up to the top of Montjuic. This was around 8 EUR each one way. With panoramic glass giving amazing views all around you, it was a spectacular ascent up the mountain. It was also quite cool as the cable car changed directions at one point along the route.
Upon arriving at the top, we soaked up the views and enjoyed looking at the castle from the outside (we’ll go inside the next time we visit Barcelona!).
It was also impressive looking down on the massive port of Barcelona; there were so many storage containers, ships and fuel silos!
We decided to walk around the outside of the castle, and then back down towards the olympic swimming pools, where we’d spied a cafe when on our bus tour on the first day in Barcelona.
After winding our way down the mountain, we first took a look at the posh restaurant prices on the same stretch as the cafe. Suffice to say, we opted for the cafe instead!
The views from the cafe balcony were stunning, and we managed to blag ourselves a table with a great view in the shade.
The size of the olympic pools from above was eye-popping.
We both had pizzas, iberico ham for me, and vegetarian for Lois. We also shared some fried potatoes; yum! Of course, a cold beer was also in order!
After a brief sit in the very narrow viewing seats that would have been prime viewing points during the olympics, we headed back towards the metro station to travel back to our hotel.
This time we managed to grab seats right at the front of the metro on the Funicular descent, which was pretty cool.
After picking up some things for lunch, collecting our bags from the hotel and grabbing a taxi to the train station, we looked for where our train would be setting off from.
We soon realised that we’d have to go through security, and were a bit worried that we’d lose quite a few liquids and also a kitchen knife and some other tools that we’d brought. Surprisingly, we were rushed through, with the bags chucked onto the scanners and us not even needing to empty our pockets. Convenient, if a little bewildering.
After a 20-30 minute wait in the departure lounge, boarding for our train was called, and so we joined the queue of others for the ticket inspection. With that out of the way, we made our way to the platform, onto the train and got settled into our seats.
The train for this leg of the journey was a bit more modern, and although generous in space compared to UK trains, didn’t have the extra bit of space between us that we had from Valencia to Barcelona. This meant we had all of our food and drink down by our feet, but we managed, and partly eating and drinking our way through the content of the bags helped with the space issue!
It was a really interesting journey, with varying landscapes and some sections where you went across bays with water on either side of the train.
We also passed some of the 4 1/2 hour journey by watching a film, playing games and reading.
Arriving into Marseilles on time, we grabbed a taxi and loaded up our stuff. After a brief fright where the taxi driver started to drive off with me still half in-half out of the car, we made the short journey to the hotel unscathed.
Checked-in and up to our lovely room, we chilled out for the remainder of the evening. It was almost 10pm when we arrived, so we were soon asleep ready to pick up the hire car in the morning, and make our way to our cottage where we will be for the second week.
The Spanish Grand Prix used to take place in Montjuic Park from the 30’s to 1975.
Yep, great fact that we also learnt on the bus tour. 🙂